Attempting to decipher puerh wrappers…
August 10, 2006
All right…just a brief account of something I found amusing…I recently picked up some puerh in Chicago’s Chinatown. Well, the other day I sat down to try and decipher the wrappers–to get a handle on the when and where of them, at least.
First observation: This is harder than I initally thought it would be.
Before I continue, let me say this: if you’re making any similar attempts of your own, get thee posthaste to this wonderful resource on Mike Petro’s amazing puerh site:
http://www.pu-erh.net/cheatsheet.php
It’s chock-full of the Chinese characters that any silly, ignorant, first-time puerh buyer like me needs to try to puzzle out the pretty little wrappers arrayed in front of me.
So I sat with sheets from Mr. Petro’s site and pored over the wrappers, occasionally saying, “Hey, this has something to do with the factory!” or “I sure have that ‘tea’ character down pat at this point…”
I figured out bits and pieces–grade on one, I think, and the “seven sons” designation on the other. Also, “Yunnan,” and, umm, “tuo cha.”
Advanced, aren’t I?
Anyway, the exercise was very fun, if a bit of a wash. I’m still far too new at all of this to know much what was in front of me.
My plan? To take a six-pack of good longnecks and the mystery puerh to a friend of mine who works as a Mandarin and Cantonese Chinese interpreter. Hopefully, she’ll be able to give me information on the characters, which I can then take to the brilliant people on some of the mailing lists I belong to. I know they’ll be able to tell me loads about my mystery puerh (and, I’m sure, it’s rather poor quality, eep!) if I can provide ‘em with some wrapper info.
So, in short–get that Puerh Cheat Sheet from the link above, find some mystery puerh, and have a blast trying to make heads-or-tails of it. I wish you lots of fun and a bit of luck!
At first, I burned myself on my gaiwan almost every time…
August 9, 2006
No, really, I did!
The first ten or so times I used the gaiwan, it went something like this, “Okay, I picked it up all right…whoops, spilling half of it all over…YIKES that burns…hold steady…OWOWOWOWOWW *clatter*, CRUD!”
And I’d stare at my red, sore fingers and think, “What the devil am I doing wrong? Everybody makes this look and sound so easy–nobody ever mentions constantly burning your fingers!”
I wondered if maybe it was just common knowledge, and that one had to develop blisters and callouses or something. So I kept at it, getting a little better every time and just resigning myself to pained fingers and lots of spilled tea.
Now that I’ve emptied and filled two different gaiwans about a hundred times (not much when you’re talking about multiple infusions, but enough to make a few observations), what I’ve learned is this:
1. No, you *don’t* have to burn your fingers every time!
2. The gaiwan itself really does make a difference. I now have a $4 gaiwan from a Chinese housewares shop and a $18 gaiwan from the Jing Teashop. The more expensive gaiwan is thinner, sounder, and the *lid fits much better*. I’m convinced that it is the better make of the lid and the subsequent fit that makes much of the difference. Less spilling and less burning steam!
3. It isn’t so much the gaiwan that’s burning you as the steam coming from open spots on the lid-to-cup seal. Try to make sure you’re only leaving the pouring spout area open–that way, the fingers on either side of the gaiwan’s mouth won’t get burned along their length by steam escaping from either side.
4. Be careful to rest your “top” finger (I tend to use my pointer or middle) on the knob of the gaiwan, not just the lid. The lid will burn–I’ve learned this even with the Jing Teashop gaiwan, where the knob is hollow in the middle. If I put my finger in the middle of the hollow knob “button,” yeeeowww!
5. Really only do use one hand. It seems tricky at first and you’ll spill a lot, initially, but using two hands ruins the seal and makes the whole process too “busy” with fingers, resulting in steam and burns and yet more spilling.
6. Go ahead and “lower” the lid down into the body a little more–I spent too much time trying to “pull back” the lid from a tiny spot right on the lip and burning myself that way. You can “sink” the lid down at an angle into the body and still keep a good seal all around. This seems to strain better, too.
That’s all. Yup, it’s pure common sense, but it took me a bit to work it all out, so I hope it’s maybe helpful to newcomers-to-gaiwans.
The rest of you can feel free to laugh at me–I’m so new at this!
