JOURNALISM - SHANGHAI STAR

MR. ZHANG'S TEA SHOP

March, 2008

Shanghai is a tough town. It is also a great town, just as New York, Moscow, or Paris are great. We love it and hate if for all the same reasons too. It can be a struggle to survive here: the cold makes you appreciate the heat, and five straight days of cold drizzle definitely makes you appreciate the sun. Cold, seemingly indifferent people can make you lose faith in humanity just as fast as one small human kindness can restore it. It is this diversity, this ever evolving yin and yang that makes us love a place more than we could ever love a tropical island somewhere. We are tougher, funnier, and crazier for it. It’s what makes a city great.

Exactly two years ago Valentine’s Day I moved to Shanghai from Bangkok. One day I was pulling myself up out of the pool in my condo, looking up at the hot blue sky, and thinking: It’ll be nice to have seasons again. The next I was in a rattletrap taxi with the windows mysteriously open, hurtling through the grey post-nuclear Pudong countryside, while the driver yelled into his cell phone while smoking. Smoking! And this is what they call culture shock.

My fist week in Shanghai was spent in a friend’s old lane house apartment. It was colder than a witch’s tit (inside and out), and I couldn’t speak the language. The ayi came in one day, and after a bizarre game of charades, I finally worked out how to turn on the air conditioner. Silly me, I thought the air conditioner was just for cold air. I was like a helpless, freezing child. All the directions on everything were in Chinese.

At the end of my first week I nailed down a new apartment, in a high-rise, with all mod cons. I decided I needed a bit of furniture, and on a friend’s suggestion I headed down to Dongtai Lu, and it’s overflowing (mostly) fake antique stalls and shops. Walking around Shanghai, I’d been pushed, pulled, bullied, bumped, and banged around for a week, and was just starting to get the hang of it as I headed into Dongtai Lu – ready for the best they could throw at me. It was a cold, windy day, and the dishonest sun was long gone as I reached the end of Dongtai Lu empty handed, and it must be said, heavy hearted. Shanghai seemed a cold, unforgiving place indeed. And then I saw a sign outside of a small teashop that read: Tea goods will be delivered to you with free delivering fees within Shanghai City. If you feel satisfied after tasting it, please pay for it…Otherwise, if you feel unsatisfied we’ll immediately exchange or cancel this order for you and you don’t need to pay for this change.

I was intrigued to say the least. I was also cold, and it occurred to me that I had been living in China for a week and hadn’t bought or drank any tea yet. Walking into the Chinese Tea Specific Store, I was warmly greeted by Mr. Zhang ling Mu, who was at that moment busy tending to his very pregnant wife. She also gave me a cheery ‘hello’ and then scuttled off into the back of the shop. Mr. Zhang then proceeded to bring out a variety of teas, as he started his wizardly preparations – which I had never seen before. The hot water, the small earthen pots, the screens, the many little cups…the aromas! I was hooked, and at this point started to take a slightly different view of Shanghai, as the hot liquid warmed me up, body and soul.

With his broken English and my new-found ability at charades, we were able to ascertain among other things, that I was indeed American, new to Shanghai, and that his wife was due to burst at any moment. We must have spent an hour like this, only semi-communicating linguistically, but totally communing with good will and hot, delicious tea. The most delicious tea that he served was a floral Oolong from Anxi, in Fujian province called Gui Hua, because it grows next to the gui hua flowers, and takes on their aroma. It is the most subtly sweet and beguiling tea I’ve ever tasted. Uncooked it smells like some rare exotic moonflower, but then when u drink it, it doesn’t taste sweet at all. It has a classic Oolong flavor, but with just a hint of that lovely floral aroma. This is surely a world class tea, and one not to be missed if you are lucky enough to be in Shanghai.

In the past two years I have given out many of Mr. Zhang’s attractive little 50g boxes of Gui Hua tea as gifts. In fact, last Christmas that’s all I gave my family and friends back home. I’ve already got orders for more. One Aunt who considers herself a bit of a tea connoisseur praised it to the heavens, even going so far as to quote somebody named Carole Manchester (Tea in the East). According to Carole, ‘The best Oolong has the odor of peaches’. I guess she got her hands on some Gui Hua back in the day.

As I walked over to Mr. Zhang’s little shop today I noticed how much the neighborhood has changed since that first chilly February day. I live not far from here, and already the blocks on three out of four sides of my apartment are gone to the wrecking ball. There are new high rises and two new hotels obscuring the skyline over towards Xintiandi. Dongtai Lu remains the same: cramped, full of foreigners (guidebook in hand) bargaining in a hundred different languages, picturesque, expanding. The faces remain the same, an so does the hustle (and bustle) of Shanghai. It can be maddening surely.

Mr. Zhang is always happy to see me, as I am happy to see him. I buy a lot of tea from him. I turn a lot of people on to his shop. I once brought a friend from Bangkok in and she wrote about him in two different Thai guidebooks. His soft sell approach, his warmth and kindness, his great selection of teas with a money back guarantee – all of these are the antithesis of the usual big city experience. He is the yin to Shanghai’s yang, and therefore he has won my loyal custom. I realized today that his happy, red-cheeked son is now two. And that means I’ve been here for two years too. I’ve adapted to Shanghai, and been able to find its fleeting beauty, its tough love and hidden gems. Surely one of the best is this gentle, unassuming ambassador.