After wandering through the forest all day trying various edible herbs, the exhausted Shennong had been poisoned 72 times. Dizzy and disoriented, he leaned against a tree, when suddenly a few leaves drifted down from above. He picked one up, chewed it, and immediately felt refreshed, with all the poison dispelled. And so, tea was discovered. This legend comes from China's earliest pharmacological work, the *Shennong Bencao Jing* (The Divine Farmer's Materia Medica).

In 1657, a coffee house in London put up a sign proclaiming that Chinese tea was "good for health, suitable for young and old alike," and went on to enumerate more than a dozen benefits of tea, including refreshing the mind and brightening the eyes, nourishing the liver and stomach, and aiding digestion. In less than two hundred years thereafter, the British went from first learning about tea to falling madly in love with it. One imagines that China's ancient legend from five thousand years ago may also have stirred boundless imaginings about this magical leaf among foreigners.

Tea originated in China and flourishes throughout the world. Today, whether in an Eastern teahouse or a Western café, a cup of tea always brings a moment of tranquility and enjoyment. The tea leaf, this tiny green leaf, carries the weight of history, connects every corner of the world, and has become a shared cultural heritage of humanity.

▲ International Tea Day promotional image (Image source: website of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs of the People's Republic of China)

In December 2019, the United Nations General Assembly declared May 21 of each year as "International Tea Day," to celebrate the economic, social and cultural value of tea and to promote the sustainable development of global agriculture. With its unique charm, tea culture has reached out to the world and built a bridge for communication among diverse cultures.

　Ancient Roads, Mountains and Seas: A Millennium of Tea Fragrance

From the refreshing refinement of "substituting tea for wine" during the Three Kingdoms period, to the innovative experiment of "tea gruel" in the Northern and Southern Dynasties, and on to the tea-learning wisdom in Lu Yu's *Classic of Tea* in the Tang Dynasty, every step in the development of Chinese tea has kept pace with culture and radiated the light of wisdom.

The custom of tea drinking flourished in the Tang Dynasty. By the Song and Yuan periods, teahouse culture arose, and the arts of growing, processing and whisking tea grew ever more refined, embedding tea culture deeply in people's hearts. During the Ming and Qing dynasties, with the establishment of the "six major tea categories," the simplification of tea-drinking procedures, and the unprecedented prosperity of the tea trade, Chinese tea culture reached new heights. As the fragrance of tea crossed mountains and seas, its story continued to be written across ever wider horizons.

▲ *The Tea-Pounding Picture* by Liu Songnian of the Southern Song Dynasty. The tea-related section on the left of the painting comprehensively depicts the Song Dynasty art of whisked tea, from grinding the tea and boiling water to pouring the liquid and whisking the tea. The painting is now in the collection of the National Palace Museum, Taipei.

The Silk Road of the Han Dynasty was not only a domain of silk but also a red carpet for tea. Caravan after caravan of merchants set out from the Central Plains, heading west, crossing vast deserts and endless mountain ranges, carrying this magical Eastern leaf to distant Central Asia and Europe.

In the markets of Central Asia and the courts of Europe, people talked about this mysterious beverage from the East. It brought not only a feast for the palate but also curiosity about and longing for Eastern culture. And with the opening and flourishing of the Maritime Silk Road, tea traveled via the ancient tea-boat route of eastern China to Guangzhou, crossed the South China Sea, and sailed as far as Southeast Asia and even the countries along the farther shores of the Indian Ocean.

▲ In 1984, the wreck of the *Götheborg I*, which bore witness to the prosperity of the ancient Maritime Silk Road, was discovered by Swedish amateur archaeologists. The merchant ship set sail from Guangzhou for home in January 1745, carrying about 370 tons of Chinese tea. The image shows tea samples from the Götheborg wreck. (Image source: China National Tea Museum)

Because of its properties of clearing heat and cutting through greasiness, tea became an indispensable daily necessity in nomadic regions. It was precisely the continual discovery of these properties that, from the Tang Dynasty onward, opened a trade route between Yunnan, Sichuan and Tibet—the Ancient Tea Horse Road.

In ancient armies, horses occupied a position comparable to that of tanks today. Military horses were always a scarce resource for the dynasties of the Central Plains, while the northern nomadic peoples, who ate meat and drank milk over the long term, came to regard tea—which cuts through greasiness and removes fat—as a necessity "indispensable for a single day." And so the two sides hit it off at once: from the folk level to the official level, the "tea-horse trade," exchanging tea from the interior for horses, gradually flourished. This trade not only met the needs of both sides but also promoted economic and cultural exchange among various ethnic groups. A tiny tea leaf both boosted trade and stabilized the frontier—one might well say its merits were immense.

▲ *Lady Attendant Holding a Tea Tray*, a detail from the Tang Dynasty silk painting *Ladies Playing Chess*. The painting was unearthed from Tomb No. 187 at Astana, Turpan, Xinjiang. The lady attendant holds a saucer and cup, serving tea to her masters as they play chess, reflecting that tea drinking was already popular in the Western Regions during the Tang Dynasty. (Image source: Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region Museum)

▲ Nake Li Village in Tongxin Town, Ning'er Hani and Yi Autonomous County, Pu'er City, Yunnan Province, is an ancient post station on the Ancient Tea Horse Road and a village where Hani, Yi, Dai, Han and other ethnic groups live together. (Image provided by the Yunnan Provincial Development and Reform Commission)

By the 17th century, when the first rays of sunlight fell upon the tea gardens of Fujian Province, the story of the Ten-Thousand-Li Tea Road quietly began. This route stretched over 14,000 kilometers, starting from Fujian Province in China, passing through Henan, Shanxi and other places, heading north all the way, crossing what is now the Mongolian Plateau, entering Russia at Kyakhta, and finally reaching Russia's northern pearl—St. Petersburg. On the Mongolian grasslands, tea met Mongolian mare's milk wine and cheese, producing a unique and enticing flavor. Salted milk tea brewed from brick tea became a traditional Mongolian tea drink. When tea finally reached St. Petersburg, it was warmly welcomed by the imperial court and nobility.

By this time, tea had transcended its nature as a beverage and become an envoy of exchange, conveying peace and friendship even as goods and wealth changed hands.

Ten Thousand Cups of Tea from Around the World—Which One Do You Love?

In China, tea is not merely a beverage but a culture; the tea-drinking customs of each region embody unique local flavor and humanistic charm. In Beijing, a bowl of big-bowl tea not only quenches thirst but also reflects the bold and straightforward temperament of northerners. In Guangdong and Jiangsu-Zhejiang, where food is refined, people ingeniously integrate tea with breakfast, creating leisurely morning-tea hours in teahouses. "Few sunny days overhead, many teahouses in sight"—in the lazy, affluent Land of Abundance, slipping into a teahouse on a rainy day to drink a cup of gaiwan tea is simply the most *bashi* (comfortable) thing imaginable. In the Chaoshan region, *gongfu tea* is a refined art of tea drinking; it is not only a medium through which merchants exchange information and strike deals but also a warm moment for family reunion and sharing life.

In Japan, across the sea, the custom of tea drinking is equally prevalent. The Japanese tea ceremony originated in China; building on the study and absorption of Chinese tea culture, it developed into a tea-ceremony art with a distinctive Eastern aesthetic. During the Tang Dynasty, large numbers of Japanese envoys and monks crossed the sea to study in China, spreading Chinese tea seeds, tea seedlings and tea-drinking customs to Japan.

The *Shoku Nihongi* records the story of the monk Eichu brewing tea for the emperor in 815, and his tea-brewing technique was derived precisely from Lu Yu's *Classic of Tea*. During the Song Dynasty, Chinese tea culture was "exported" once again; the "matcha ceremony" familiar to us today has its origins in the Song Dynasty's "whisked tea method." Today, matcha-flavored products such as matcha ice cream and matcha cake are quite popular in China. A tiny leaf of tea embodies the shared aesthetic sensibilities of the two countries and the convergence of their history and culture.

In distant Europe, tea also found its "superfans." Unlike the Japanese fondness for fresh green tea, the British prefer fully fermented black tea with its mellow flavor. They also like to add milk and sugar to tea, concocting a tea drink with a distinctive British flavor.

But don't forget that the British owe their ability to grow their own tea to that botanist and tea thief, Robert Fortune. After the Opium War, he slipped into China three times, "smuggled" Chinese tea-tree seeds to India, successfully cultivated them in the Assam region, and achieved large-scale, commercial production.

From then on, South Asian countries such as India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka fully absorbed the essence of Chinese tea culture and tea-processing techniques, combined them with local characteristics, and gave birth to their own unique tea cultures. For example, India's Assam black tea is famous for its robust flavor; masala chai is much loved for its unique blend of spices and milk; and Sri Lanka's Ceylon black tea, with its pure taste and low sodium content, has become a leader in the global tea market.

The journey of tea is not only a story of a consumer product changing people's dietary habits but also a story of cultural exchange and integration. From China to Europe and on to South Asia, the spread and evolution of tea demonstrate the diversity and inclusiveness of human civilization, and give us a deeper understanding and appreciation of this ancient beverage.

Tea and the World: Sharing Development

For a thousand years, Chinese tea has surged out into the world through land and sea routes such as the ancient Silk Road, the Ancient Tea Horse Road and the ancient tea-boat route, winning the affection of peoples of many countries. According to data from the International Tea Committee, global tea production reached 6.604 million tons in 2023, with China, as the world's largest tea producer, contributing nearly half of that amount.

2023 marked the tenth anniversary of the Belt and Road Initiative. Over the past decade, this grand initiative spanning Asia, Europe and Africa has pushed international political, economic, trade and cultural exchanges to entirely new heights, and has brought more opportunities for China's tea exports. Since 2015, China's tea trading partners have expanded comprehensively to countries along the Belt and Road, and tea export value has risen steadily.

As the Belt and Road advances, some cities have begun actively opening "tea express lines" to countries along the routes. For example, in August 2022, in Hubei—a commercial hub of the China-Russia "Ten-Thousand-Li Tea Road"—a train loaded with 1,000 tons of Hubei tea departed from the Wuhan central station for Moscow, the Russian capital; in February 2023, 1,200 tons of tea from Leshan, Sichuan, also arrived successfully by dedicated train in Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan.

The holding of international tea conferences has also brought a favorable wind to the prosperity of the global tea industry. Since 2017, the China International Tea Expo has been permanently held in Hangzhou, becoming one of the most authoritative, largest and most influential tea events in the world. This platform of "making friends through tea" is not only a window for display and trade for China's and the world's tea industries but also an important platform for cultural exchange and international cooperation.

▲ The Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan exhibition area at the Sixth China International Tea Expo (Image source: official website of the China International Tea Expo)

From May 17 to 21, 2024, the Sixth China International Tea Expo, themed "Tea and the World: Sharing Development," was grandly held in Hangzhou. More than 800 exhibiting enterprises and brands from 12 countries and regions gathered together. During the event, key activities such as the Future Tea Development Trend Forum and the New Era Utensil Integration and Innovation Forum were held in succession, jointly exploring the role of tea in the contemporary world and promoting the spread of tea culture and the prosperity of the tea industry.

　　A Tiny Green Leaf Connecting the World

"If you break apart the Chinese character for 'tea' (茶), it is 'a person among grass and trees.'" General Secretary Xi Jinping's ingenious interpretation expresses the true meaning of "following the way of nature" in Chinese culture.

Chinese tea culture carries the wisdom of the Chinese people in living in harmony with the world. "Using tea as a medium, making friends through tea"—this inclusive, open cultural tradition of exchange and mutual learning has, over a thousand years of cross-cultural communication, become a globally shared language, playing an increasingly important role in promoting mutual learning between Chinese and foreign cultures and enhancing communication and cooperation among countries.

Telling stories through tea, expounding principles through tea. The tiny leaf is full of green vitality, and the elegant fragrance of fine tea refreshes the heart. In the great process of promoting the building of a community with a shared future for mankind, Chinese tea, with its unique charm, has become a cultural envoy spreading the concepts of major-country diplomacy with Chinese characteristics, letting the world feel China's warmth and wisdom.

Let us savor tea together, make friends through tea, pursue win-win cooperation, and jointly build a community with a shared future for mankind. In the comments section, tell us your story with tea!