Escape from Green Tea Mountain

A sign on the wall read "rising in Lion Peak and Yanmei Hill, nine creeks and eighteen gullies run downhill from Dragonwell, twisting and turning some 7 kilometers - crossing and re-crossing a stream - until they flow out to join the Qian Tang river." I thought for a moment whether this would be worth checking out. The park was called Nine Creeks Meandering through a Misty Forest. I was in a surprisingly mellow mood considering Ali had just broken my camera. The only camera I might add, that we are now sharing since her camera broke in Mongolia while horse riding in almost sub-zero temperatures. She was taking a photo of some local farmers in a rice field when she dropped the expensive piece of equipment. We both stopped and looked at the ground in horror. The camera was amazingly still in one piece (I love Canon!!!). Well, two pieces... the switch that alternates between 'camera mode' and 'preview mode' had snapped off. The camera still worked except it was now permanently stuck in 'camera mode' which meant we couldn't view or edit any of the pictures we had taken. Ali looked like she was about to start crying. I told her not to worry about it and that "it was something I could have just as easily done myself". "It can probably be fixed" I said and started looking for the tiny switch on the ground. I found the small part and kept it in a safe place.

We continued cycling past the Nine Creeks Meandering through a Misty Forest and climbed up a steep mountain through a village of some sort. I wondered what on earth possessed them to build houses on a 45 degree slope. Even the many dogs seemed to have difficulty walking upwards. We were offered tea by the locals as we cycled passed their homes. I thought that was very nice them. I wondered how often they had western visitors in their village. Half way up the mountain I had to dismount and walked the rest of the route. Ali still hadn't spoke a word since she had dropped my camera over an hour ago. I glanced back at her further down the hill. She looked upset and angry. I kept climbing. When we reached the top of the hill I finally gave in to a cup of green tea. Ali observed the four ladies sitting playing Marjong outside just a few doors down. Alison was adamant that she would learn how to play the game. I admired her determination. Back at the tea room I watched a woman purchase some of those soothing green leaves in front of me. I slowly began to realise that this mountainous area that we had stumbled upon was a popular place to buy tea. Looking along the street I could see other locals sifting their tea leaves using large round wicker 'sieve-like' tools. The customer in this shop was buying lots of it in nice boxes for gifts. Ali later joined me for a cup. We sat for a while watching the painful process of the woman packaging the tea for the customer. It took her forever to weigh, pack, seal and wrap 3 boxes. When it was time to go, I thanked the lady for her tea and got up to leave. She tried to sell me some leaves. I refused. She didn't like that. So she tried to charge us 40 yuen for the 2 cups of tea. I gave her 5 and walked away. She shouted and ran after us. Just to put things into perspective; in China, you are given green tea complimentary and those cups would have been considered tasters (i.e. if we liked the tea, we would buy a bag of it). 40 yuen would be the equivalent of paying 6 pounds for two cups of tea. This woman was trying to rob us and I didn't appreciate that. The forceful little woman even tried to stop Ali as she rode away. I stood in front of her so that Ali could escape. There's no way she was going to try and stop me. We arrived back at the hostel and returned our rental bikes eight hours later. Dinner there was very cosy. They did a great job off making the hostel a pleasant place to hang out. There was a fish pond, an outside bar with seating (complete with fairy lights and lanterns in the evening), restaurant, reading lounge and TV with an impressive collection of DVD's and books indoors.

Despite my sometimes brutal resistance to Chinese threats, I am actually a lot more chilled out these days. Maybe it's the green tea.