in Canada amazonaws com
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ith hindsight, I see now that things looked shaky from the outset. Moving from the U.K. where ‘a decent cuppa’ is a fundamental human right, to a country inordinately proud of a chain serving coffee that tastes, in the words of some Canadians, like laundry runoff, should have been indication enough of a radically different national palette. But in my single-minded obsession with shipping manifests and visa arrangements, I never gave tea a thought, unless it was to make another pot. One mouthful of the Red Rose tea at the hotel where we stayed standard blended tea brands when we arrived in Canada was back home. The relief when I almost enough to make me jump spotted Tetley, Yorkshire Tea back on the plane. Prepared at the and PG Tips made my legs go end of a hard day’s house-hunting, wobbly. Exultant, I seized a it was meant to soothe fatigue but box of Tetley but, once home, instead left me with a bad taste disappointment struck again; and a desperate hankering for it tasted nothing like its U.K. home. Some people can see the One woman’s search for the classic ‘cuppa’ counterpart. I felt as though future in their tealeaves; I began someone had promised to to dread it before I’d even drained the share their chocolate with me, told me to cup. Ever noticed how it’s the small contributed by Aisha Ashraf close my eyes, and popped a pickled onion things that can undo you in a foreign in my mouth instead! The first few days in another land? Eyeing the packet darkly, I zeroed in on Like wine, tea differs in taste the words ‘Orange Pekoe’, a mysterious term country – when you weave depending on the soil and environment I hadn’t come across before, that appeared through layers of disorienting it’s grown in. There are almost as many on most of the boxed black tea. I cursed this strangeness – remain in the different types as stars in the sky, but ‘Orange Pekoe’ and Canada’s affection for memory with the permanence my longtime favorite is Assam. A cup it, railing at such Canadian obtuseness that of a tombstone epitaph. of Earl Grey might be perfect for an sought to thoughtlessly foist this foul brew afternoon pick-me-up and Ceylon is on all. But some post-rant online research Events become embroidered pleasant enough but, for my daily fix, soon undermined my one-woman smear in the re-telling, much as nothing beats Assam with its rich, campaign, revealing ‘orange pekoe’ as a lichen prettifies the stone, malty flavor and robust color, and it reference to the grading of tealeaf wholeness but the message beneath is was the one variety missing from the and size rather than variety. Mollified, and unchanged. My first cup of grocery store shelves. Twinnings Earl more than a little sheepish, I felt conflicting tea in Canada was one such Grey, Lady Grey and English Breakfast waves of optimism, ‘So orange pekoe isn’t were all mine for the taking, but Assam the culprit’, and despair, ‘What hope then memorable experience – for was nowhere to be seen. How could of finding an alternative?’. I hastily arranged all the wrong reasons. this be? for Assam to feature heavily in the next care Giving Canada the benefit of the package from home. doubt and clinging to the belief that, in a loose-leaf Banaspaty Assam. I put the kettle on Two years have passed and my cupboard land of immigrants, most foreign foibles immediately; I needed something to help me still holds more tea than Boston Harbor in would be catered to in some form, I grapple with the ridiculous sum of 16 Canadian 1773, bringing a stability to my outlook settled into my new life and into my dollars that the leaves had cost him. The price that nothing else had afforded while my supply of tea shipped from home. Tea back home wouldn’t have been more than three supply line was in question. And, with fanatic that I am, I made a mental note British pounds, the equivalent of approximately that delightful penchant for irony that Life not to accept any offers of tea at friend’s $4.68 Canadian. At the rate I drink tea, it just seems to have, it was only then, when my houses – to avoid any barely-touched wasn’t economically viable. needs for the foreseeable future were more cups of embarrassment (most people than adequately met, that quite by accident I In the supermarket, I scanned the wall of drank coffee anyway). Months passed unfamiliar packaging on the tea/coffee aisle. came across a large box of loose-leaf Barooti and a well-intentioned, tea-loving expat The Red Rose trauma still loomed large in my Assam in an Afghan grocery store. While it friend, also in Canada, heard of my mind and I’d avoided this area, happy to lose doesn’t compare to the Twinnings, it’s indeed anguish and visited the tea boutiques myself in my now dwindling reserves. I was a comfort to have a back-up supply available of Toronto, gifting me a 3.2oz tin of anxious to find anything that replicated the on this continent.
there's no 'T'
image by Aisha Ashraf
in Canada
Global Living Magazine
39
ith hindsight, I see now that things looked shaky from the outset. Moving from the U.K. where ‘a decent cuppa’ is a fundamental human right, to a country inordinately proud of a chain serving coffee that tastes, in the words of some Canadians, like laundry runoff, should have been indication enough of a radically different national palette. But in my single-minded obsession with shipping manifests and visa arrangements, I never gave tea a thought, unless it was to make another pot. One mouthful of the Red Rose tea at the hotel where we stayed standard blended tea brands when we arrived in Canada was back home. The relief when I almost enough to make me jump spotted Tetley, Yorkshire Tea back on the plane. Prepared at the and PG Tips made my legs go end of a hard day’s house-hunting, wobbly. Exultant, I seized a it was meant to soothe fatigue but box of Tetley but, once home, instead left me with a bad taste disappointment struck again; and a desperate hankering for it tasted nothing like its U.K. home. Some people can see the One woman’s search for the classic ‘cuppa’ counterpart. I felt as though future in their tealeaves; I began someone had promised to to dread it before I’d even drained the share their chocolate with me, told me to cup. Ever noticed how it’s the small contributed by Aisha Ashraf close my eyes, and popped a pickled onion things that can undo you in a foreign in my mouth instead! The first few days in another land? Eyeing the packet darkly, I zeroed in on Like wine, tea differs in taste the words ‘Orange Pekoe’, a mysterious term country – when you weave depending on the soil and environment I hadn’t come across before, that appeared through layers of disorienting it’s grown in. There are almost as many on most of the boxed black tea. I cursed this strangeness – remain in the different types as stars in the sky, but ‘Orange Pekoe’ and Canada’s affection for memory with the permanence my longtime favorite is Assam. A cup it, railing at such Canadian obtuseness that of a tombstone epitaph. of Earl Grey might be perfect for an sought to thoughtlessly foist this foul brew afternoon pick-me-up and Ceylon is on all. But some post-rant online research Events become embroidered pleasant enough but, for my daily fix, soon undermined my one-woman smear in the re-telling, much as nothing beats Assam with its rich, campaign, revealing ‘orange pekoe’ as a lichen prettifies the stone, malty flavor and robust color, and it reference to the grading of tealeaf wholeness but the message beneath is was the one variety missing from the and size rather than variety. Mollified, and unchanged. My first cup of grocery store shelves. Twinnings Earl more than a little sheepish, I felt conflicting tea in Canada was one such Grey, Lady Grey and English Breakfast waves of optimism, ‘So orange pekoe isn’t were all mine for the taking, but Assam the culprit’, and despair, ‘What hope then memorable experience – for was nowhere to be seen. How could of finding an alternative?’. I hastily arranged all the wrong reasons. this be? for Assam to feature heavily in the next care Giving Canada the benefit of the package from home. doubt and clinging to the belief that, in a loose-leaf Banaspaty Assam. I put the kettle on Two years have passed and my cupboard land of immigrants, most foreign foibles immediately; I needed something to help me still holds more tea than Boston Harbor in would be catered to in some form, I grapple with the ridiculous sum of 16 Canadian 1773, bringing a stability to my outlook settled into my new life and into my dollars that the leaves had cost him. The price that nothing else had afforded while my supply of tea shipped from home. Tea back home wouldn’t have been more than three supply line was in question. And, with fanatic that I am, I made a mental note British pounds, the equivalent of approximately that delightful penchant for irony that Life not to accept any offers of tea at friend’s $4.68 Canadian. At the rate I drink tea, it just seems to have, it was only then, when my houses – to avoid any barely-touched wasn’t economically viable. needs for the foreseeable future were more cups of embarrassment (most people than adequately met, that quite by accident I In the supermarket, I scanned the wall of drank coffee anyway). Months passed unfamiliar packaging on the tea/coffee aisle. came across a large box of loose-leaf Barooti and a well-intentioned, tea-loving expat The Red Rose trauma still loomed large in my Assam in an Afghan grocery store. While it friend, also in Canada, heard of my mind and I’d avoided this area, happy to lose doesn’t compare to the Twinnings, it’s indeed anguish and visited the tea boutiques myself in my now dwindling reserves. I was a comfort to have a back-up supply available of Toronto, gifting me a 3.2oz tin of anxious to find anything that replicated the on this continent.
there's no 'T'
image by Aisha Ashraf
in Canada
Global Living Magazine
39
