I'll take my tea... softly — Kristen Writes Things

If you work for a company that shuts down during key holiday weeks, then you know that the week before shutdown is an exercise in being asked repeatedly what you'll be doing for shutdown. And then, after you've returned from said shutdown, the unofficial agenda item for every meeting, the first thing anyone asks at any lunch or during your first break room run-in, is how your shutdown went.

At first, responses are predictable and bland.

I went to London.
Yes, it was lovely.
I *am* glad to be back. (While simultaneously making facial expressions that say that I'm not glad to be back at all.)
How was yours?

It's also a fact that by the end of the day, I always find myself blurting out random observations and facts like some sort of broken fortune telling machine at the boardwalk. A broken fortune telling machine that really just wants to crawl under her desk and take a nap instead of interviewing some really overqualified chick for a temporary gig. Jetlag is for real. But that's not the point I'm trying to make... what I'm trying to say is that it took 50 iterations of this totally banal hallway chat to boil my London trip down to one essential truth.

Are you ready for it?

Tea in London is different. {Boom}

It was around noon when my lovely coworker and resident office Briton finally got around to having our requisite "How was shutdown?" chat. Perhaps it's her pleasant lilting accent or the fact that she and led with "How was the Savoy?" that jarred something loose? I don't know. What I do know is that the profoundest truth hit me at that moment, and that I surely caught her off guard when I replied, "London was fab. But you know, I'm really upset now that I know the tea tastes different here. It's so much worse."

Perhaps its because I'm not using such delightfully patterned china?

And then we had a delightful conversation in which I got to fangirl over the art deco touches in The Savoy atrium's leaded glass windows and how delicious I found the tiny sandwiches. I got to recount in ridiculous detail how the pianist sat down and opened strong with selections from Disney's Beauty and the Beast, and how it was SO GREAT to watch my friend Stefania sing "Total Eclipse of the Heart" softly to the tinkle of such refined accompaniment. And last but not least, I got to describe the divine taste of the scones that Melissa said weren't scone-shaped enough for her Scottish heart, but which we devoured with two metric tonnes of clotted cream nonetheless.

Uncharacteristically spherical scones still taste like scones, Melissa!

Tea at The Savoy was an expensive but totally divine experience, and one that I'm convinced anyone who likes tea, diminutive food, and/or separation from stinky boys should do once. We ate and drank for nearly three hours. Jenny was a little put off by the infrequency with which her tea cup was refilled, but I thought it was adequate. I probably drank three pots of tea and was legit twitchy, so it was probably a kindness that I didn't have someone keeping me properly topped off. The waitress actually had to kick us out to make room for the reservation. That good.

So, imagine my surprise when I took the tea that I purchased from the Savoy and brewed a pot for myself.... and it was different. <sigh> And then, when I took out the same Twining's English Breakfast tea that I drank every morning before heading out the door, and found that it also tasted different? The horror.

While recounting my Savoy adventure, I deduced that it's not actually the tea itself that's worse here, but that somehow California must be ruining perfectly good leaves. It went something like this.

I bought home the exact same tea that I drank every morning in my hotel room. And another tea that I drank for 2+ hours at the Savoy tea room.
The same tea leaves, prepared the same way, with the same temperature of water, doesn't produce the same tea.
San Jose tea doesn't taste as good as London tea.
The bottled water in my hotel didn't taste as good as bottled water in San Jose. It's softer. Drinking water here is clean, sharp, and brisk. Drinking water there is velvet. Like I was drinking a tongue carress or eau de velour track suit.
My hair continues to be VERY soft, even after being home for several days. Not relevant to tea perhaps, but a fact nonetheless.
The water in London (and bottled elsewhere in the UK) must be very soft. Like full of minerals and junk.
Softer water makes for better tea.

Obviously, my deduction skills are fool proof, but I was still a bit surprised when my coworker agreed with me... IMHO, her accent makes her an expert.

And science(!) tells me that I'm not a crackhead. (Well, at least on this point.) This article explains that having the right water for tea is a thing much better than I could.

I'll still enthusiastically drink the tea I brought back, but it's a super bummer to figure out that my tea-drinking experience might be inferior unless I figure out how to import weird velvet water. I wonder if I can get that on Amazon?

Obviously I'm about to start a quest to find the right bottled water for my tea now. But perhaps I'll do that after I purchase and read Weird Tales: The Terror of the Water Tank and order myself a properly terrifying anti-skid kitchen mat.