Babes in Tealand: How to Make Tea in Five Seconds

The following morning we tried, in vain, to take the Toy Train up to Ghoom Monastery from where we could walk to the Peace Pagoda. Honza battled with a group of Indian tourists about the formation of a line and I learned from the ticket seller that a) bureaucracy exists even at the "World's Most Tourist Friendly Train Station" and b)all trains to Ghoom that day were booked.

Instead we walked up the bustling and noisome Hill Cart Road to the Happy Valley Tea Estate, a welcome change from the meat-selling stalls and car exhaust. Another disappointment awaited us, however, as we realized it was Sunday, and the day before May Day, which meant the factory was closed and the tea pickers had the day off. We were still able to receive a free tour from a very knowledgeable third generation tea estate worker from Nepal.

The Meaning of Flush
First Flush: Tea picked in the months of March, April and May. The finest quality, usually shipped out to fine tea shops including Harrod's of London
Second Flush: Tea picked during the monsoon months, second best in quality.
Third Flush: Autumn picked tea, worst quality, probably the tea you find on your grocer's shelf, also the tea Indians mix with milk and spices and call chai.

Black, White, Green
A tea leaf contains a top, fine tip, plus two leaves, one higher up on the stem than the other. The tea that comes solely from the tip becomes white and green tea , which is not fermented. The tea that comes from the tip and is then fermented and heavily processed is black tea, first grade. Tea that comes from the second and third leaves and is also fermented is black tea, second and third grade. The finest tea, from the tip, and picked during first flush should be so high in quality that you can brew it in 5 seconds, and not have to add any sweetener or milk. Hard to believe, but a retired tea worker named Kurush brewed this right in front of us and we then enjoyed the finest cup of tea we'd ever had. We also bought 100 grams for 400 rupees, under the table, after being told that the money would go straight to the workers.

Brought back to reality by a wrong turn and a walk through a crowded slum where little boys played cricket in bare feet with a busted tennis ball and a PVC pipe and then the odors of Chowk Bazaar, we later learned that all trains to Patna, where we needed to go to connect to Gaya, and then Bodhgaya, were booked on the day that we wished to travel, but that we could book waitlist tickets for the following day, which we did. The next morning we skipped yet another trip to Tiger Hill to catch views of the Kanchenjunga and Singalila Ranges due to another bout of cloudy weather, and then trekked to Chowk Bazaar to jump on a circulating Jeep looking for passengers to Siliguri where we could catch our train. We bid farewell to Darjeeling, a city that surprised us in its unkempt streets and crowded slums, not knowing that the density and overwhelming sights and smells would only increase the further we ventured into the Ganges Plain.