People:

1. Jean – Guest and previous assistant manager at Kyoto Obubu Tea Farm.

2. George – Host of the podcast.

3. Absala – Nepalese tea producer associated with the Kalapani factory.

4. Prakash – Associated with the Kalapani tea factory.

5. Henrietta – Connected to Rare Tea Company.

6. Hiro – CEO of Kyoto Obubu Tea Farms

7. Akky – President of Kyoto Obubu Tea Farms

8. Miwako – Staff of Kyoto Obubu Tea Farms

Companies and Organisations:

1. Kyoto Obubu Tea Farm – Prominent in Jean’s tea journey and employment.

2. Kalapani Factory – Nepalese tea factory producing specialty teas.

3. Palais des Thés – French tea shop mentioned for sourcing tea from Kalapani.

4. Companion Coffee – A Berlin-based coffee and tea retailer sourcing from Absala.

5. Mariage Frères – Renowned French tea brand specialising in loose leaf and high-quality teas.

6. Dammann Frères – Another esteemed French tea company known for flavoured teas.

7. Rare Tea Company – A UK-based tea company selling premium teas.

8. Tea Pigs – A mid-market tea brand in the UK specialising in whole-leaf pyramid tea bags.

Locations and Cultivars:

1. Nepal – Highlighted for its tea production and culture, specifically in Ilam and Terai regions.

2. France – Emphasised for its tea culture, including high-end brands like Mariage Frères and Dammann Frères.

3. Darjeeling – Mentioned for its AV2 cultivar, common in blends with Nepalese teas.

4. Fujian, China – Referenced for its silver needle white tea and unique cultivars.

George [00:00 – 00:08]: “So let me introduce you to what we are actually drinking as a starting point.”

George [00:00 – 00:08]: “So let me introduce you to what we are actually drinking as a starting point.”

Jean [00:08 – 00:11]: “You just told me it’s a Pu’er from China, but that’s that’s all.”

George [00:11 – 01:06]: “It is. A Pu’er from China. That’s the that part is true. It’s from 2009. It’s a Shou Pu’er and this is purple tea. So this is the leaf itself is very purple. And the trees are around 35 years old. It’s a mix of different seasons. So it’s not just one picking. It’s throughout the year and it’s at 1400 metres elevation. So this tea you can brew it so many times and it’s a really enjoyable tea to just continue brewing throughout an evening or something. It’s really good. It’s not super high caffeine, caffeine so you can enjoy quite late at night. I’ll often enjoy it at home while I’m doing some work or something in the evening, and you can just brew it as strong as you like as well. It’s very flexible. It’s very forgiving in the brewing. So really dark, dark colour. How would you describe it? It’s almost like coffee.”

Jean [01:07 – 01:13]: “It kind of looks like filtered coffee. Yeah, yeah. The amber colour is beautiful.”

George [01:13 – 01:13]: “Yeah.”

Jean [01:13 – 01:15]: “It’s a reddish as well.”

George [01:16 – 01:20]: “It’s kind of like soil, you know, red, dark, a dark soil in a way.”

Jean [01:22 – 01:25]: “Does that come from the purple of the leaves?”

George [01:26 – 02:02]: “I don’t know, to be honest. I think it’s probably more to do with the ageing. I don’t I and this kind of tea because it’s Shou it’s cooked, it’s artificially aged. It, you know, has had a dark colour for most of its life. And so the ageing process is just like kind of chilled out some of the funky flavours over the years. So, you know this Tea is is what? How old? 16 years old. 15 years old. It’s an old Tea. It’s half my age. Oh, my goodness gracious.”

Jean [02:03 – 02:04]: “It’s very old.”

George [02:04 – 02:26]: “Yeah, super old. Pretty much fossilised. Okay, so, anyway let’s jump through a few of the, the quicker questions in the first part, and you can go into a bit of depth if you fancy. But yeah, first of all, what’s your name? But yeah, first of all, what’s your name? Where are you from and what’s your connection to Tea?”

Jean [02:27 – 05:10]: “Okay erm, so my name is Jean and I am French. I come from France. And what is my relationship to Tea? Well, I think my relationship to Tea started in Japan in 2019 when I interned at Kyoto Obubu Farm, and at the time, my relationship to Tea already was very rooted in my family kind of like gathering culture where we would always gather for parties or for yeah, family lunch where we would just have tea with food and cakes. And at the time, I would drink only jasmine tea. Lapsang Souchong and Earl grey. And at the time, my favourite was jasmine tea. So I when I arrived in Japan and I realised what actually tea was actually. What? What was tea? I was like, oh, it’s. It’s much more complex than I expected and very interesting. And I kind of got so into it that when I came back in France after the the internship I did in Japan, I didn’t want to leave the industry. So I worked in a tea shop part time alongside my studies to learn more about not only Japanese teas, but other teas from other countries. So that’s where I learned most about the Chinese tea, and that you can also produce tea in Vietnam. And of course, I had no idea, like Vietnam, like Laos or like, I don’t know even Peru or Colombia. So it was a very interesting experience. And then from, from there, I kept working for Tea companies in France, and I went to Nepal, where I lived for four months there with the Tea farmers and in a tea factory. And then now I’m back at Obubu Tea Farm for a year as an assistant manager. And it’s been a year now, and I am leaving now soon. And I don’t know what’s next for me, but I know I will always enjoy tea. Yeah, even if I don’t necessarily work in the tea industry.”

George [05:10 – 05:43]: “You’ve had a quite a long relationship with tea then so far. And it’s gone through quite a few different phases and different ways of enjoyment and ways of interacting with tea, I would say. So how has your favourite Tea changed from the beginning when you were drinking tea more with your family to the internship, to working for a tea company in France, to then eventually finding your way back to Obubu.”

Jean [05:44 – 07:55]: “Well, I think when it comes to tea, I love, I like a lot of things and I think I didn’t like Earl Grey so much at that time when I started because it felt like to me, the very intense, bergamot like lemony taste doesn’t fit well, in my opinion, with the roundness of the the kind of little bitterness, but also the taste of tea. It felt like you were drinking something that has two composite rather than both two things together. Well, for jasmine tea it was I think this, this floral ness was going was mixing itself better with the green tea that it was mixed with and also the the jasmine tea was a little bit lighter as well. So you never had to add sugar or you never had to add milk. While for the Earl Grey, it was also it was very strong. And I liked Lapsang Souchong because it would pair with food very well. So like eggs or toast or or any kind of French breakfast is more sweet, right? And it would pair very well the smoky flavour. So I think that’s how it started. But then I’m not difficult when it comes to tea. As I said, I, I like everything I tend to not like when it’s very, very too bitter or even when it’s too sweet. Sometimes I will enjoy it, but I will not drink it very regularly. So I don’t know. I think I like it usually very much a tea when I am trying it for the first time, and it’s surprising me. And I’m like, oh, I’ve never tasted something like this before. And then I’ll just drink it a lot, a lot, a lot. And yeah, I think right now my favourite teas, it has like changed a lot those past years. But my favourite teas are silver needle teas, white tea and rock oolongs as well. And I love matcha as well. So I think, yeah, those, those three are my favourite, favourite teas.”

George [07:56 – 08:07]: “Now do you, do you tend to drink a tea based on the time of day, or is it more about the feeling that it gives you or flavour, perhaps?”

George [07:56 – 08:07]: “Now do you, do you tend to drink a tea based on the time of day, or is it more about the feeling that it gives you or flavour, perhaps?”

Jean [08:09 – 09:07]: “Yeah. I always try to try and think, oh, what do I want now? And often I would tend to drink matcha more in the morning because it’s fresh and it wakes me up well, in the evening. I’m more I want something warm, so I might go for either Hojicha or Pu’er or rock oolong. So it depends on the time of day. It depends on the season as well. I like cold brew in summer, and I feel like Japanese teas are so delicious. Japanese green teas and in cold brew is so good. But in winter, I’m more of a Pu’er, black tea. Kind of. Yeah, kind of guy. Yeah. So it really changes. I think it’s very common, this kind of drinking habit of, like, changing the teas that you’re drinking every day, depending on the temperature, depending on the mood, things like that. Yeah.”

George [09:08 – 09:34]: “Well, I mean, connected to that. Then I have a question where, like, if you can imagine yourself in a place with your favourite tea and, you know, it sounds like you have a lot of favourites. So if you can just pick one or generalise like generally your favourite teas, where are you drinking it and who are you with.”

Jean [09:40 – 11:04]: “I really, really like the tea room in the tea rooms in Japan. And I think this past year I lived in the house. So that has a Japanese traditional tea room with a small garden in front of it. And I would just open the the walls that are also doors in that tea room and sit on the tatami and then use the company’s tea boat. Right. And then just brew the tea the way I want and put water everywhere. And just enjoying the the calm of the tea room and the small garden. Who I am with is I don’t know, I, I feel like as long friends, obviously, like really good friends. And not necessarily somebody that’s really into Tea. I like either going into very big detail about like the Tea and Tea in general with people who have a lot of already a strong relationship to Tea. But I also really like introducing people who have no idea in this setting, about Tea, I think. But then I think the type of Tea I would choose would be different depending on the person I’m with. I think I would tend to, when I’m with somebody, take into consideration more what the other person want, I think rather.”

George [11:05 – 11:06]: “You’re very kind, Tea brewer.”

Jean [11:06 – 12:24]: “I don’t think so. You know. You know, why is because I don’t want to handle judgement. So, for instance, if I. With somebody who doesn’t know Tea, I will tend to. I will not brew a I will not brew a white tea. Because if I brew white tea, I’ve heard things like, oh, like it’s it doesn’t taste like anything to me. Or oh, this tastes like I mean, Pu’er can taste very fermented, right. And and it can taste very animal. So it can, you know, I don’t want to handle that. And then with somebody that’s like, very into tea, I feel like I don’t want to I don’t brew a very like common tea like especially for instance in Japan, I wouldn’t be like brewing genmaicha with teapot with like and being like, oh, this is delicious. Best Genmaicha ever. Even though I love Genmaicha and I would go more for something that maybe a personal tea batch that I have something that they might not have drank before, rather than just going with very common tea because I don’t want to handle judgement, I think, rather than because I want them to have a nice time. Because I feel like if I brew Genmaicha, they’re gonna have a nice time, right? Because it’s delicious.”

George [12:25 – 12:41]: “So maybe, maybe it’s a bit of both, you know, because the way you’re saying it, like you’re if you take judgement out of the equation, you’re focusing on what are they going to enjoy the most. You know, they might not appreciate Pu’er they might not appreciate a White Tea.”

Jean [12:41 – 12:44]: “Yeah. It’s true. Yeah. Because I want them to like Tea. Right?”

George [12:44 – 12:44]: “Right, right.”

Jean [12:44 – 12:50]: “Yeah. So I’ll be like, oh, if I give them something, it’s so difficult to drink, then they’ll be like, oh, that’s not for me.”

George [12:52 – 12:57]: “It was very nice. It was very nice. You’re a kind tea brewer Jean. I had no idea.”

Jean [12:59 – 13:00]: “Not all the time.”

George [13:01 – 13:41]: “But, you know, I don’t know about you, but there’s something to be said for finding a Tea that you haven’t tasted before and just sitting down by yourself and just drinking through it, too, and drinking through the different infusions to really get to know the tea a bit better. I’m a big fan of that. I don’t do it a lot, but it has such a peaceful, like relaxing quality to it to like, critically analyse the tea itself and just think about the production that went into it, which is, you know, very selfish. Just sit there and brew tea by myself. I don’t offer it to other people.”

Jean [13:41 – 14:09]: “But no, I totally understand. I am a lonely tea, tea drinker as well, so I would. Honestly, when you ask me the question I almost answered, I would rather have nobody around to be honest. But most of the time, yeah, I drink tea alone, so I totally understand because I don’t have to handle this. Oh, what tea should I pick for the person? I can just pick the tea I want to drink either. So I totally understand.”

George [14:09 – 14:23]: “Why it’s there’s many different ways to enjoy tea, and I think that’s one of the beauties of it. Right. You can enjoy with a lot of people. Or you can sit by yourself and think about the tea you’re brewing or just enjoy the moment. There’s so many ways to enjoy tea.”

Jean [14:23 – 14:48]: “When I’m when I’m brewing tea with very close friends that I’ve been knowing for a long time, or that have known tea for a long time as well. I tend to to brew tea that are extremely unexpected, and then I don’t say what it is, and then I’m just like, oh, so what do you think of this tea? And I did it recently in the office at Obubu, where I brewed oat with Rose, I think.”

George [14:48 – 14:49]: “Yeah, yeah, yeah.”

Jean [14:49 – 15:35]: “And I asked people what it was, and of course everybody was a little bit confused, like, what is this? I don’t think it’s tea. I don’t like this. I think like that, which I think is a more of a genuine answer, because if I said, oh, it’s all oat and rose, a lot of people who don’t don’t like Rose would have said, oh no, I won’t like that and will not like that. But I know that I gave this to to Sarah, one of who who usually doesn’t like Rose, and she liked it better than she expected. So I like I like doing this, but I need to make sure that people won’t think like, oh, Jean is the type of person who drinks this. It’s more, oh, I sometimes I like I enjoy different things.”

George [15:35 – 15:44]: “I guess also, you should probably make sure they don’t have any allergies. Because we do have one assistant manager at the moment that’s allergic to ginger.”

Jean [15:45 – 16:16]: “Oh no. So I mean yeah, I never but at the same time, I feel like when I if I give you a cup, like if I give somebody a cup of tea and they’re allergic to something, like they should tell me like, oh, like I’m allergic to this. So I hope that’s not in there like I don’t. Yeah, I don’t I’m not careful about this, to be honest. Maybe I should be more careful. I don’t know if anybody can be allergic to rose and oat. Oat, oat. I mean, you are allergic to the dust of it, but then I don’t know.”

George [16:16 – 16:18]: “I don’t know either. Yeah.”

Jean [16:19 – 16:22]: “Maybe you’re right. Maybe I should start thinking about this now.”

George [16:22 – 16:33]: “I don’t know, but there are some, you know, weird allergies out there now. Yeah. So, I mean, for me, if you’d put cat hair in it, I’d have been. I’d have been out. You’d have killed me.”

Jean [16:33 – 16:35]: “I mean, I would have never done that.”

George [16:35 – 16:36]: “Yeah. I mean, yeah.”

Jean [16:36 – 16:39]: “Okay, I’ll I’ll think about it. But it’s funny to not tell.”

George [16:40 – 17:56]: “But. No, I do agree with you. When you give somebody a Tea. Cause it’s something I do in the office all the time. You know, when I’m brewing a tea in the office, I give it to people and I say, you tell me what it is. Because it’s a fun guessing game. And it also helps people train their tongue to, like, connect the flavours that they’re experiencing. With what type of tea could it be, what cultivar is it, and all of those parts. And I think it’s a really helpful activity to do. And, you know, I don’t do it enough for myself. And it’s something that I wish I did more because when you did that and you brewed Oh. Oat and Rose Tea. I was a bit bamboozled. I was like, what is this? What is this? What is this? So it’s a it’s a fun activity to do. I enjoy doing it, but on both sides, you know, it’s really good training for you. So thank you. Thank you for the opportunity. Okay, so on to another question. Now this is it sounds like a similar question to one we’ve already had. But actually I think the answer could be quite different. It doesn’t have to be but it could be. How often are you drinking tea per day or week and what is your most regularly drunk tea? Don’t read that as what is your favourite tea? Yes, read that as what is your most regularly drunk tea?”

Jean [17:59 – 20:17]: “A very recently and so far it has. It really depends on where I am because that’s where different teas are mostly available. So here I drink a lot of Hojicha because it’s very easy to drink and I drink quite a lot. So I always, I always brew Hojicha at home at least. And also in the office, there’s always a Hojicha brewing because I think at Obubu we are Hojicha lovers, so there’s always Hojicha brewing. So I think right now any kind of Hojicha, any kind of roasted tea. But for instance, in Nepal, obviously I didn’t have Hojicha, but I had an oolong that was a little bit light, light lightly oxidised, and that was extremely floral that we were drinking all the time, all day long, very strong, brewed as well. And then when I was in France, I had a lot of silver needle because even though it’s very high in caffeine, you can brew it so many times that you just have to put the leaves in the kettle, in the kettle, in the teapot in the morning, and then keep brewing the whole day. And it’s easier. You don’t have to clean the teapot and then choose the next tea and then and you don’t even have to think about the white tea, because it can brew for very long without being so strong in flavour. And I love it. It’s one of my favourite teas. When it comes to the quantity, it depends. Sometimes I don’t drink tea the whole day. When I’m in France, I would drink coffee instead, and I would. I wouldn’t drink tea, but in Japan I drink tea all the time. I don’t really have a choice because even if I don’t perform myself, there will be somebody during the day. They’ll be like, here, have a cup of tea. So yeah, it really depends where I am, I think, and who I’m with because my family is not into. They’re not big tea drinkers. They will drink tea when they’re gathering, when we’re gathering together in the afternoon with the French 4 p.m. break where we’ll eat as well. So we’ll drink tea once in the afternoon and not every day. So the only way I can drink tea in France is usually when I brew it for myself. So it really depends where I am and who I’m with. Yeah.”

George [20:18 – 22:25]: “Souka. I don’t think, but, you know, that’s very true. I’m just thinking back because I drink a lot of tea like I start my day with, I never thought this would be me, but I start my day with about 500ml to a litre of green tea every morning. Like, that’s my just morning thing I do. I sit down, brew some tea, but when I’m travelling, if I’m going to different places, it’s hard to do that. So, you know, in the in the summer when I was out of Japan and in China. I was, I took a little like individual sachets of Matcha with me. And so if I’m on the go and I didn’t have any tea in the hotel or something, then I was able to buy a 500ml bottle of water, empty this 1.5g into the bottle, shake it, and then I’ve got like a tea or matcha infused water, water infused matcha Matcha infused water and I could just drink that. And that would be that would be enough. But it’s Yeah, like, I definitely need my tea every single morning. Otherwise I feel a bit weird. And more than that, I usually have to have a certain type of tea. Otherwise I feel a bit weird. So like I have to have green tea in the morning. If I have black tea, it throws me off kilter. It’s a bit strange, okay, but it’s also something you get a little bit used to as well. So I just need some, like adjustment time. And then those things go away. But, you know, when I was in Nepal as well, of course, I wasn’t drinking green tea every morning. I was drinking a black tea. Yeah. And, you know, drinking a lot more white teas and other stuff like that. So I think it just changes where you are. But, you know, I can’t live without tea. I think I’d probably, I don’t know, I don’t go crazy. Yeah. Even coffee like you said that sometimes you would probably drink coffee over tea when you were in France. Yeah. Which, you know, is understandable, but I don’t. I don’t think I could do it. Okay. I think I’d struggle.”

Jean [22:25 – 22:29]: “Okay. You could have coffee, but you can’t have only coffee, right? Or. Yeah.”

George [22:29 – 22:54]: “Yeah. Right. I really like a nice coffee. So even, you know, when I’m working from home or over the weekend, perhaps sometimes I’ll have a coffee after lunch. That’s quite nice. I quite like that. A nice pick me up. And actually, with some dried dates, coffee and dried dates after lunch. Great combo. Great combo. Anyway, sorry. Enough about my coffee drinking. No. No, please.”

Jean [22:55 – 23:04]: “I always forget to send back the questions because I’m so focussed and I’m stressed and I’m like, I need to answer properly and I shouldn’t say anything that’s politically incorrect.”

George [23:04 – 23:05]: “No, I mean, you.”

Jean [23:05 – 23:07]: “Know, problematic.”

George [23:07 – 23:49]: “Well, it’s not really about me having an interview here, right? So, like, if the questions don’t come back, it’s absolutely fine. It’s about finding out a little bit about more about Jean and Tea. So it’s we have a lot of questions as well. Okay. Don’t worry. So. Okay. I have a question that you’ll be familiar with. What? Tea related purchase of $100, euros pounds or what did we say? Under ¥20,000 or less. Have you enjoyed most enjoyed in the last six months or in recent memory? Please give as much detail as possible. Tea people are always looking for good recommendations, so shop name, website location, something like that.”

Jean [23:52 – 25:20]: “So I think the it’s more than than 100. So I can’t I can’t add it. I can’t say that but it’s really the one I, I, I’ve used the most. It’s Tokoname Teapot from Japan. But it was very expensive. But nonetheless, there are other Tokoname Teapot that are a little bit cheaper that are they’re just there’s something magical to this teapot. And I think there’s something magical about most of the Tokoname teapots. The one I got, I bought it directly from the pottery maker. And it’s a tiny, tiny style teapot, so it really doesn’t look like a Japanese teapot. And it’s beautiful and it’s very small, and I love it. And I and I use it all the time, and I like very small teapots because you can bring them everywhere. And because they’re small, you’re usually putting teas that you’re infusing many times. So for this teapot, I chose to brew mostly Pu’ers. So I would just drink it all day the same Pu’er all day. So it’s it’s very I don’t know, it’s very practical and very nice. Yeah. I think when you go to Tokoname, you can find a lot of really nice.”

George [25:20 – 25:22]: “For those that don’t know, could you introduce Tokoname?”

Jean [25:22 – 27:25]: “So Tokoname is a town that is just below. Right. But I think for people who don’t know Japan so much, it’s like it’s a very it’s south of Nagoya and it’s next to the not far, so far from the sea, right on the ocean. And it’s on the ocean and it’s beautiful. And the town and this is where there’s a lot of pottery history in this town, and there are a lot of pottery shops, and it’s very specific, centred around Tea also a lot I mean, not only, but a lot of teaware potteries and the, the clay there has specific colours. It’s very beautiful, like a red, reddish colour. And there are a lot of pottery artists that have different styles. So when you go from one shop to the other, they look completely different. And there was also an anime movie that was that takes place in Tokoname, a whisker away. It’s a little bit of a it’s a strange like anime, a little bit crazy anime, but it’s it’s also a little bit cute. And it takes place in Tokonami. I didn’t realise that. Yeah, yeah. And and the, the main character just walks around the streets in this very recognisable because the streets have big pots. Tokoname pots. It’s very pretty. I think it’s a very good day trip because there’s not a lot of things to do. It’s mostly pottery shops, but the place is so pretty that going around and walking around the town is really nice. And in a day you can do everything and you can. Yeah, it’s I would definitely recommend.

George [27:25 – 27:30] Okay, so here’s one that, you know, I don’t know whether you’ll be able to answer this. And if you can’t please don’t worry. Just go. Yeah. I don’t have anything. What is the book or books you’ve most gifted and why? Or what are 1 to 3 books that have greatly influenced your life? Gifted.”

George [27:25 – 27:30]: “Yeah. Or what are the 1 to 3 books that have most greatly influenced your life?”

Jean [27:38 – 27:42]: “I don’t gift books. I don’t. Yeah. That’s fine.”

George [27:42 – 27:42]: “Okay. It’s not.”

Jean [27:42 – 29:51]: “It’s not a gift I think about because Yeah. However, the the books that, like most influenced my life are absolutely not related to Tea. So I hope that’s okay. Yeah. And I’m very much of a bookworm. But I especially when I was a kid, and I think the one that obviously most influenced my life is were the one I read as a kid. And they’re all fantasy and fiction books. And so when I was very young, there was a series of book called the. It’s in French, the title La Caverne magique, which is very much for kids and introduced me to reading. And there’s like maybe 50 books, and it’s the story of two children who find a small house in the in the woods on top of a tree, and that has a lot of books. And when they open the book, they go into the book, and it’s mostly history books or books related to places, so they will travel to ancient Greece or and always trying to find a way back home to the to the forest home. And I think it was quite I was very young, I was maybe 7 or 6. So when I just started reading books. So I think it really influenced my life because I was like, oh, there are all of those cool places in history and on the planet. So that and then I think another fantasy book that was written by Robin Hobb, which is not the name of the writer, it’s the writer’s pen name. Pen name which is about a. Royalty bastard. Like”

George [29:51 – 29:53]: “He is illegitimate.”

Jean [29:54 – 29:54]: “Yeah, yeah.”

George [29:54 – 29:55]: “He’s an illegitimate child.”

Jean [29:55 – 31:13]: “And he’s used as an assassin to in the, in the royal like social place, an assassin or a not necessarily an assassin, but like a spy or something like that. And we followed the story of this child whose first let down because he’s illegitimate. And then the royal family realises that he may be used as a weapon against them. So they think maybe we should use that person as a weapon. Anyway, it’s very nice and it’s very fantastic. There are even, like magical beings involved, but I really liked it because it felt mm. It was a very complex story, I think. I like that, I don’t know, there’s no depth to it in terms of like, oh, because it has this meaning, or it says that it’s just a very long book and I read very fast. So the fact that it was very long allowed me to like, read a lot. It’s very much not related to Tea. I think the only moment when they talk about Tea is when the character puts poison in the tea to, like, kill somebody, so it’s maybe not. Yeah. So maybe it teach me to be careful and to like, you know, not drink things without knowing what it is.”

George [31:13 – 31:15]: “Yeah, but you’re happy to give. But I’m happy.”

Jean [31:15 – 31:24]: “To do it myself and, like, be like, oh, you don’t know what it’s. Maybe it’s poison. Interesting. Okay. Very much not related to tea. Yeah.”

George [31:25 – 31:59]: “Well. Fair enough, fair enough. I mean, novels are always a good way to escape into, like, a new world and experience new things. And I think that also reflects in what you’ve already said about tea as well. You always like to find new things with tea, too. So, yeah, I’m seeing a theme. Okay. So let’s do. Yeah, maybe I could add a a book. Okay. This is a good one. This is. Yeah, maybe I could add a a book. Doesn’t even necessarily need to be tea related. What is one of the best or most worthwhile investments you’ve ever made? Could be money, time, energy. Anything.”

Jean [32:04 – 34:53]: “Investing. Investment. Yeah. I think I think my studies in terms of time, in terms of money, for sure, because it’s a private school in France and it’s expensive when it comes to when you compare it to public schools in France, because public schools in France are free. But it’s not really about the money because my parents paid for that. So it doesn’t feel like I paid. But time definitely, because it was six years because I did two masters, so it had to be longer than five years. So six years is a long time where I was not necessarily able to work as much as I wanted or to make money or to learn always what I wanted to learn. Because in Europe, and especially in France, you you get a master’s degree in order to get a master’s degree and not always necessary to actually get actual knowledge. I’ve been lucky because I chose master’s degrees that were very practical as well, and very down to earth, like very down to earth, down to earth. And and I did learn a lot of things that were useful, but I also learned a lot of things that were useless or that not because they’re useless in itself, but that they were useless to me and to what I wanted to do with my my future. So like, for instance, I learned I had classes about mechanics or physics that I hated so much, and it used a lot of my energy and time. But I’m really happy I did it because now I have degrees that I can put forward and use. But not only that, it actually gave me a lot of opportunities as well, because I got to do a lot of internships. And internships are really good to experience things their short experience where you can go anywhere without feeling like your How to say when you. Yeah. Commitment. Exactly. You’re not making a huge commitment and and you’re not it’s not an it’s not going to last a long time. And you can leave it if it doesn’t, like, if you don’t like it or things like that. So it’s, it’s very it’s more flexible. So I think yes, this was a really good investment. I think now that I’m, that I’ve finished it one year ago only. So maybe I’ll, I’ll even like learn about how, how good of an investment it was in the future as well.”

George [34:53 – 34:55]: “It’ll be interesting to look back on it five years later.”

Jean [34:56 – 35:03]: “Yeah, definitely. Maybe I’ll be like, oh, that was useless. But why did I lose so much time? I don’t think so, but I don’t think so, No.”

George [35:04 – 35:13]: “Awesome. Thank you. Okay. In the last five years, what new belief, behaviour or habit has most improved your life.”

Jean [35:13 – 35:14]: “In the last five years?”

George [35:14 – 35:16]: “In the last five years.”

Jean [35:17 – 35:53]: “Well, I started drinking tea very regularly five years ago, so I think. I think that counts. I actually the amount of tea I drink has changed as well as we were saying before, and it’s been only one year and a half that I’ve been drinking a lot of tea every day. And that’s because in Nepal I was surrounded by it. And in Japan, I’m surrounded by it. And I feel like when I come back to France, I have to keep drinking a lot, maybe a little bit less. But before that I would I could go several days without drinking tea. Yeah.”

George [35:53 – 35:54]: “Unbelievable.”

Jean [35:54 – 36:39]: “Yeah. But I still really loved tea. And I still really wanted to work in tea, but I think how to say it’s very difficult to access very high quality in France. And when you do, it’s also very expensive. And I was still a student, so I think I was not necessarily drinking tea very often. I was always drinking tea during the week at least once, of course, but more as a like, oh, it’s it’s kind of a luxury because the tea I like are very expensive. So yeah. And it’s not as much even Hojicha feels expensive in France. It feels always like, why is it so expensive?”

George [36:41 – 36:56]: “But, you know, having experienced all the different tea places you’ve now experienced, you, I think, probably have a lot of tea contacts who you could contact, purchase tea from them, ship it over and that makes things a lot cheaper.”

Jean [36:56 – 37:59]: “Yeah, I’m also a different tea drinker, so I wouldn’t mind buying a huge amount of tea at once and ship it to France directly from the producers. Yeah. So it’s it’s it’s it’s gonna be easier. I think it has improved my life because it’s just a way of slowing down. Yeah. And just being like, okay, now I will take time to brew the tea because. Because I also have very, like, high expectations when it comes to tea. I also have to brew in a certain way. So it’s and that way takes time. And yeah, it’s, it’s really good. I think it’s also even in France, it’s kind of socially accepted, like I worked in companies or I worked in tea companies, so that helped. But the tea companies would always let us time, give us time on our working hours to stop and just brew tea for ten minutes and drink tea and, and that kind of really helped, I think. Yeah.”

George [38:00 – 38:15]: “I don’t know about you, but when I start brewing a tea, like for me, I don’t get that feeling of satisfaction after having brewed it just once. I want to have brewed it maybe three times or four times before I have that feeling of, oh, that was nice.”

Jean [38:15 – 38:16]: “Okay.”

George [38:16 – 38:17]: “Do you know what I mean?”

Jean [38:18 – 38:22]: “I think for me it depends on the tea. Obviously if I drink, if I brew tea on.”

George [38:23 – 38:23]: “Matcha.”

Jean [38:23 – 38:48]: “I mean yeah. You can’t, you can’t. Yeah. But I mean if I, if I brew white tea only one time I feel like I wasted it and it and I feel a little bit anxious. I’m like, oh I wasted like very good tea. But for instance, I wouldn’t mind brewing Hojicha one time, and to be honest. But I know you don’t do that. I know you brew even hojicha very like a lot of times. Yeah.”

George [38:48 – 40:10]: “I think, I guess, I guess the purpose is different. Now, now, you know, I’m thinking about what I’ve said. And if I’m in the office, I’ll probably brew. In what I’ve copyrighted as the waterfall method, where you have one picture where you’re pouring the tea into, you have the teapot, which is angled, and then you have another pitcher full of hot water. So then you can just pour it like a pour over and it flows into the teapot, then straight into the pitcher. And this way you can brew a lot of tea in a short space of time, and you can hand it out to everybody in the office. And that way round, I don’t feel like that so much, because I’m not focussed on the tea so much. I’m more focussed on work and brewing quickly and being able to enjoy delicious tea, share it with other people, but also just get back to work. If I’m brewing a tea that’s, you know, not during work hours or it’s a tea that I need to concentrate on. I have to brew it a few times. Yeah. Otherwise I don’t feel good about it. And not in a way that’s like, oh, I’m wasting this leaf, but in a like feeling of like, oh, I haven’t had a break to enjoy the Tea. So I think it’s more of a lazy thing rather than, you know, or wanting to focus and have more of a break to enjoy the Tea. I don’t have that satisfaction if I haven’t sat down and brewed it a longer time anyway.”

Jean [40:11 – 40:51]: “No, but I no, no, see. Yeah, I, I see what you mean because it feels like there’s two different ways of drinking tea when you are actually drinking tea and you’re drinking tea with work like working and drinking tea at the same time. But you’re doing this because you can do that. I can’t do that. That’s what I mean, is, like, if I do something else while I’m brewing tea, I will suffer the consequences because. Because I will either forget that I’m brewing tea so it will be over brewed and too strong and or I will forget I have tea in my cup so it will just go cold. So I can’t do both at the same time. Okay, well, yeah.”

George [40:51 – 41:04]: “I mean, there’s many different ways to enjoy tea, right? And actually sometimes when I come across a green tea which has gone cold, I taste it and I think, oh wow, that’s good. That’s really good. So I think it depends on the tea.”

Jean [41:04 – 41:04]: “It’s not always bad.”

George [41:04 – 41:21]: “Yeah, it’s not always bad if it’s a black tea. Some black teas. When it goes cold you’re a bit like oh this is not so nice. Or I often feel like that about hojicha. It needs to be either really hot or it needs to have been cold. Yeah, yeah. I struggle with a lukewarm hojicha. It’s like, oh, what’s this?”

Jean [41:21 – 41:24]: “Yeah. What’s this? Yeah, exactly. Yeah I see. Oh.”

George [41:25 – 41:54]: “Okay. Right. Let’s let’s knock through a few questions. And then I’m thinking maybe in maybe ten, 15 minutes, we take a time out, we start brewing another tea. Okay. Is that all right? Yeah. Okay, so I had one lined up for you. Okay. Yes. Connected to to tea. This is more of a tea related question. Okay. What are bad recommendations? You hear people giving about tea, and you don’t have to name names if you don’t want.”

Jean [41:54 – 41:58]: “So that person a bad recommendation?”

George [41:58 – 42:00]: “Yeah. Bad recommendations from people?”

Jean [42:02 – 45:25]: “So many. Okay. Bad recommendation would be No, actually, it’s it’s I, I don’t know, because many little ones, but not a lot. Bad recommendations, bad recommendations. I think it’s difficult, I think. Okay, one that is a little bit strange, but I don’t I don’t like when I talk about Tea and or other people talk about Tea and give very rigid, very strong rules and limit as in like, oh, you shouldn’t do it like that, or you or you should do it like that. It it’s it’s because to me, it’s more of a oh, if you like, if you like it this way, or if you don’t like it this way, then yes, you should or shouldn’t. It’s not. Oh, there’s a proper way of brewing, making tea or bring tea that if you do not follow, then it’s bad. I don’t know how it can be bad, but it’s bad. I don’t know It’s more. I think it’s always the drinkers and the consumers expectations and and wants and needs that needs to be considered, and then from there giving recommendations rather than coming first, going with the recommendations. So for instance, if you have, I don’t know, a tea drinker that tells you or somebody who doesn’t necessarily know tea, that tells you like, I don’t like cold brew because it’s bitter. Then you try and investigate why, how they make the cold brews, and if they and if they brew it hard and then cool it down, then the recommendations would be, oh, maybe you should recall from the start and then for a long time, rather than bring it this way. But it shouldn’t be. Oh, cold brew should always be cold brewed. Because in the end, if you want to do cocktails or mixes or if you want to add things after, or if you really like very bitter teas, then yes, it’s totally fine to first brew it hot and then cool it down because you will extract all of the aromas, right, with the warm or hot brew. So it’s, it’s I think yeah. The recommendations I don’t like are when the it’s only useless like recommendations given given out of the blue. Just like this. Even when I hear a lot in Japan, people say you shouldn’t brew a green tea at a high temperature. I think it is true that you shouldn’t only and always brew tea at a high temperature, as in you should try other ways of bringing it. That is true. I would, I would always recommend to everybody to try different things. But if you like it strong, if you like it at a high temperature, then please do. I know Akky-san brews his green tea at high temperatures for very long with a lot of leaves, and nobody’s going to tell him you’re not doing it the right way because it’s Akky-san, a tea farmer. So. So yeah, I think that’s the bad recommendation. I don’t have specific examples though.”

George [45:25 – 45:42]: “That’s fine. That’s fine. Yeah, I do recommend it or it’s not No recommendation. But someone told me one time. Oh, white Tea silver needle tea. Super low caffeine. Because it’s only the buds. Yeah. Yeah. And at the time, I was like, oh, that’s kind of nice.”

Jean [45:42 – 45:43]: “A bad recommendation.”

George [45:43 – 46:20]: “But then over time, I was. I found that actually it’s totally the opposite. So when people like try and teach me things, I usually have to try and find at least a second source to corroborate to be able to say, okay, that’s true. So sometimes people, you know, give some funky education, but it’s also true that, you know, different tea producing countries have different sources of information from their research bodies. So those things change too. So it depends on. Yeah.”

Jean [46:21 – 46:25]: “Well, if you brew your silver needle on ice, then you don’t have that much caffeine,”

George [46:25 – 46:25]: “Right.”

Jean [46:25 – 46:39]: “But yeah, I see what you mean. Yeah. It’s true. I think it’s the most commonly heard recommendation that it’s not only a bad recommendation, it’s just not true. Like, as in, like.”

George [46:40 – 46:40]: “It’s lies.”

Jean [46:40 – 47:11]: “Yeah. Lies. But it’s also, there is a very fixed relationship between a tea that tastes strong and a tea that tastes mild, and how good or bad they are for your body. So the stronger it tastes, usually it’s considered to be more caffeinated. Better for your health or, like, actual tea. Well, when it’s very light, it’s more like, oh, because it’s very light. It should be light in caffeine as well, which is obviously not related. But yeah, it’s a it’s a quite a bad one. Yeah.”

George [47:12 – 47:44]: “There’s, there’s, there’s a lot of those out there though. It makes it difficult for people. So I mean okay, related to the end of this topic, let’s have one more question before we take a time out. And this one is a little bit strange, but we’ll give it a go. Okay. What advice would you give to a college student who is interested in working with Tea, or university student who’s interested in working with Tea? And what advice should they ignore?”

Jean [47:49 – 47:55]: “A college student. So when you say that, you mean maybe somebody is young or doesn’t have a lot of experience yet.”

George [47:55 – 48:01]: “Between like what, 16 to 21, 22 or in your case, 24?”

Jean [48:01 – 50:03]: “Yeah. Don’t don’t. Like I would say, don’t be afraid to just go out there, travel and invest a lot of your energy and time into things because you’re afraid that maybe something bad will happen. Because in the end, if you plan correctly, and if you not necessarily planning, but if you make sure that you are safe then nothing will happen to you. So of course I wouldn’t recommend that you rush into a New Delhi in India as a very young like teenager or young college student alone, without any kind of help, of course, but I would recommend that you try and travel the world or not necessarily travel the world, but even sometimes look around you because for instance, if you’re French, there are Tea farms in France that are have more of a touristic kind of like an experimental way of doing things. But learning about Tea there is, is, is very good. So even if you’re not, it’s not about Tea, even if it’s about something else, usually it’s the same thing. Like if you want to learn about coffee, then there are coffee roasters probably next to you that have connections. And don’t be afraid to just knock at their door and and put yourself forward. Also, do not underestimate your skills. Do not underestimate them either. But honestly, I would recommend that you overestimate rather than you underestimate them. Because if you overestimate your skills, maybe you’ll piss people off around. But then you’ll try and try and try and you’ll get to a point where you’ll have you will experience something great. So I would rather like, say, please overestimate yourself rather than underestimate yourself. And a bad recommendation would be to.”

George [50:03 – 50:05]: “Some bad advice to ignore.”

Jean [50:05 – 51:49]: “Bad advice to ignore? Yeah. When? Especially when people who think they have a lot of experience or actually do have a lot of experience with life in general that they will tell you, like, believe my experience, don’t do this or don’t do that. We are all different. And maybe that person. Doesn’t like to, I don’t know, settle in a place and I don’t know have have kids or. It’s just an example, of course. But like, that person may be. Is regret regretting that they were not travelling or going around the world and it’s telling you to do it. But the thing is, if if you as a person don’t wants to settle, just listen to yourself. When I’m saying, oh, you should you should try and discover things. I’m saying you should do it if you want to. And I don’t know how to explain it. I feel like you shouldn’t let people just change your life because. Oh, you should do that because it’s socially acceptable. No. You should do whatever you want, as long as you’re not putting yourself into a very bad situation. Or as long as you’re not, like, harming people or people around you, then you should just do whatever. And I think I would give this advice because when I did my first internship and I came in Japan, I never travelled before. I never went out of France either. And it was a little bit crazy. And a lot of people told me like, but what are you going to do there? Like, you know, like what? Like what is happening? But yeah, I, I did it anyway, so. Yeah. Thank you. I don’t know. This is very messy. This is not very clear. I think it’s.”

George [51:50 – 52:36]: “A good answer because, you know, a lot of the time I. You know, you must have felt like this perhaps when you were younger. But you’re, you know, you’re not quite sure which way to go or or or how to how to tackle something. But, you know, it’s important for people to just go and try, go and talk to people. Go and go and make mistakes. Go and try and intern somewhere. And if it’s, you know, totally crazy. You know, it’s not that long and you’ve got a lifelong journey ahead of you where you’ve had this crazy experience that you can look back on and you can compare things to. So especially when you’re you’re young, like you should plan, but, you know, give it give it a go, right?”

Jean [52:37 – 54:44]: “Yeah. I mean it definitely I think. It’s it’s more about doing whatever you feel like doing without putting yourself into a situation where you can’t really come back to a secured place. And I think that’s also why I decided to do long studies, because I felt like there would be a point in my life where I would like to have like a, I would like to settle. But the thing is, if you do not have degrees in France. If you do not have a professional experiences and you just have nothing to put forward, then then it’s difficult to find a job and settle. I think I was a little bit scared of being unemployed, basically. And I kind of always invested time to get like, new skills. But in the end, there’s also a lot of pressure for a lot of people about, oh, everything you should do should make sense so that you can, like, get a job or something like this. But in the end, if it feels right to you, it probably makes sense, as in a lot of people would would say, why would I go at the opposite side of the planet? And how do I justify that I did that Well, if you if you feel like it and you feel like you can learn something from it, and it’s not because you want to. You’re not going away like from your problems in your country. You’re just wanting to discover something new. Then I think you should do it. I think you shouldn’t think like, oh, I shouldn’t go to Japan for three months because it’s crazy. Or go to Japan for one year because what am I going to do after that? It’s it’s it’s it’s always sometimes good to think about. Oh, I want to do it now and it will make me happy. So maybe I should like, I should do it. Yeah. I don’t know if it makes a lot of sense.”

George [54:44 – 56:51]: “No, it makes sense. And, you know, actually, what you’ve just said is what happened to me when I was younger. You know, I, before I came, ever thought of dreamt of coming to Japan like Japan never entered my sphere of, oh, that would be cool to go to. Never, ever. I went to Darjeeling and I did a tea tasting course just south of Darjeeling, and I had no plans after that. That was the only thing that was planned during that trip. And it just so happened that on that course I met a lady who co-owned a factory in Nepal. So that’s the only reason I then went, oh, okay, let’s go to Nepal. And I spent a whole bunch of time there. I met a load of cool people there who then took me around to other Tea projects and did some consulting there, did teaching on two different courses during my time there. Talking to farmers and tasting their teas. Tell them how to improve their teas. And it’s, you know, none of those things would have happened if I hadn’t have decided I’m going to go and do a tea tasting course in Darjeeling. And having the course there helped me have something secure planned. And I knew a bit about before I went. So I had like a kind of a secure base to start from, and then I was able to kind of find my way from there, you know. If you were if you were a friendly, kind, polite person, then you can’t go far wrong. Yeah. You know, good people find good people. So but just having the confidence to be able to go and do it. Yeah. But I received very mixed information from within my own family. Some members of my family were like, you’re young, George, just go and do it. You’re not going to regret it when you’re older, having gone away for a while. Other members of my family were, you know, George, you’ve got this far in whatever You’ve got this far in what you’re doing right now. Why do you want to throw that away? And all that progress you’ve made to go and do something completely unrelated, like it doesn’t make sense. So, you know, you take all of these inputs, but you’ve got to eventually decide for yourself. Otherwise you know someone else running your life. As long as you’re happy making other people happy around you as well altogether, then I think it’s a good thing.”

Jean [56:51 – 56:55]: “What would you say is a bad recommendation?”

George [56:57 – 57:49]: “Something that makes you feel. That doesn’t feel right. Because you have it inside like you have a gut feeling. Some people it takes longer for you to formulate a gut feeling than others, I know that but some people they know immediately. But if your gut feels wrong about a decision, there’s a reason for it. And maybe you’ve got to go, oh, okay. That’s why I feel bad about it. But it’s going to be better in the long term anyway. And you just make make the most of the situation you’re putting yourself in. Or you go actually no. Like I don’t feel good about that. That’s not going to be right for me. And then you can make a decision that way and it’s it’s a bit easier. So follow your gut. Don’t follow other people dictating your life. Okay. For me, that’s what I would say.”

Jean [57:50 – 58:48]: “But yeah, I agree. I think it’s like, oh, will that make me happy? Yes. Then can I do it? If you can, then maybe. Probably you should. But if it’s like, oh, it’s not gonna make me happy, then you shouldn’t do it. And even if it it would make you happy and you can’t do it, then what can you do to make it happen anyway? What is what what can you, like invest to make it happen? And I think for me, when I realised that I wanted to work in the industry, I saw all of the barriers and I saw all of the problems and the fact that it’s a very small world and it’s very difficult to get in. And I thought, what should I do to make it easier for me to work in the industry? And I felt like, oh, I should take all of the opportunities possible to go and learn about Tea. Yeah. And so and then get a, get a job in Tea. Yeah.”

George [58:50 – 58:55]: “And you’ve, you know, spent a year doing that. You came back and spent a year doing that.”

Jean [58:55 – 59:15]: “So I also looked for it. I tried to work in a tea shop. I tried everything I could and I thought if I want to work in tea then I should go 100% or not at all. That’s the only way you can actually stay in the tea industry, because it’s very small world, difficult to get in. Yeah, yeah.”

George [59:15 – 59:27]: “I found that I tried to, like, get loads of tea jobs in the UK, but it never worked out, so yeah, now you’ve got to be in the right place at the right time and you’ve got to be a good person.”

Jean [59:27 – 59:32]: “And luck is a little bit in the balance as well. It’s true a little bit.”

George [59:32 – 59:43]: “Yeah. No that’s true. Yeah. I often say I am the luckiest person in the world and yeah. Anyway. Right. I’m sorry if you’ve been able to hear my stomach, but.”

Jean [59:44 – 59:46]: “I’m actually I actually don’t know if it’s me or you, so it’s definitely.”

George [59:46 – 59:49]: “Me. Okay. 100% me. Okay, so I apologise.”

Jean [59:49 – 59:50]: “No, no, no.”

George [59:50 – 60:21]: “But let’s take a time out there. Yeah, and we’ll be back. Yeah. And we’ve we’ve had a little bit to eat. We’ve had, we’ve got some different tea. We’ve got some black tea now. And this is a purple purple leaf black tea. And it was produced in 2022. And it’s from the same same farmer. And it’s a very delicious tea. It’s very nice. I’ve stored it very gently in this clay jar. For how many months? Three. About six months.”

Jean [60:21 – 60:21]: “Oh.”

George [60:22 – 60:34]: “Yeah. So it’s just been hanging out and yeah, that’s actually something I want to play around with this year is different storage methods. I want to test out the chabako. chabako storage. Just straight in the chabako.”

Jean [60:35 – 60:36]: “Do you have a chabako?”

George [60:36 – 60:44]: “I have a source. No, I’ve got, I’ve got. How many? One. Two. Three. Four. I’ve got five chabako.”

Jean [60:45 – 60:45]: “Oh.”

George [60:45 – 61:14]: “But all different sizes. So I have one very small one, which you could put probably 150g of Tea. So I want to put in some very fresh er Sencha of the Spring Sun and then test that storage against regular packaging, against vacuum packaging, and then also storing like in a glass jar or whatever, and just see, see how that how that differs. Anyway, before we dive in, is there anything that you need to have, adjust, Anyway, before we dive in, is there anything that you need to have, adjust,”

Jean [61:15 – 61:16]: “More tea, perfect.”

George [61:16 – 61:18]: “You need more tea. Do you need to adjust the heater at all or.”

Jean [61:18 – 61:19]: “Do you want the heater?”

George [61:19 – 61:20]: “I’m fine.”

Jean [61:20 – 61:20]: “Okay.”

George [61:20 – 61:21]: “Are you okay?”

Jean [61:21 – 61:21]: “Yeah.”

George [61:22 – 62:19]: “Okay. So. So what is an unusual habit or strange thing you enjoy? You know what? It’s a very difficult question. Do you think you could answer it for yourself. And then maybe that would give me an idea. Okay. Unusual habit or strange thing you enjoy. Unusual habit or strange thing you enjoy. Okay, here we go. Whenever I am in Tea fields or walking on a just a country walk. If I see a large, wide blade piece of grass, I have to pick it and turn it into a trumpet because it makes this crazy noise. It’s a lot of fun. And it’s a strange thing I enjoy.”

Jean [62:19 – 62:21]: “Okay. Okay. Interesting.”

George [62:22 – 62:28]: “I mean, I it’s difficult to say. It’s a difficult question. I know, but that’s the I just had a think and that’s the first thing that popped into my head. Okay.”

Jean [62:28 – 62:55]: “What what do I Hum. What what do I Hum. I, I guess I don’t know. Strange thing. Maybe it’s something my friend could answer better than I would, because I don’t think I do anything that’s, like, super strange. I mean, I. I don’t know.”

George [62:56 – 62:56]: “That’s fine.”

Jean [62:56 – 63:00]: “I like vacuuming, but it is. No, it’s not a hobby. I mean.”

George [63:00 – 63:01]: “It is a bit strange.”

Jean [63:01 – 63:04]: “It is a bit strange that I like vacuuming.”

George [63:05 – 63:08]: “What if you want to have a think? Have a think. We’ll come back to it.”

Jean [63:08 – 63:09]: “Yeah. Okay.”

George [63:09 – 63:22]: “Going back to it at the end. Okay. When you feel overwhelmed, unfocused, or have temporarily lost your focus, what do you do to regain your focus?”

Jean [63:24 – 65:10]: “Something else. I do something else. Yeah, I yeah, if if I can’t focus on something, I just do something else, and I don’t put myself on myself. The pressure of I’ll do something else and then I’ll come back to it. I just think, okay, I need to stop and maybe I won’t come back to it. It’s not the end of the world. Of course, when it comes to work, I. And when I have to come back to it I do the same, but I, I had a little bit higher pressure of, like, I’ll have to go back to it at some point. But when I’m very lost and and unfocused. Yeah, I, I do something else. When I realised that I’m, I’m forgetting a lot of things, I just maybe sometimes I just sit on the chair and I’m just like, okay. Calm down. Or. Okay, what? What, like, focus on one thing and do that and then. Yeah, I mean, I think I just stopped I just stopped doing whatever I’m doing. And, and then I decide whether I do something else or whether I keep going. But most of the time I just do something else. I just give up. I just like, okay, I can’t. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I, I, I mean, in my private time, let’s say if I read a book and I can, which honestly never happens. But let’s say I read a book and I and I don’t feel super focussed. Then I’m like, oh, maybe I’m hungry, or maybe I don’t know, maybe I need to drink something or or or you know what? I feel a little bit like or I’ll get a hot shower because that will help me, like, relax and cool down or something like that. But I don’t necessarily think about. And then after I’ll be able to focus, I just think, oh, I’m not. Well, I need to do something to fix that. Yeah.”

George [65:11 – 65:13]: “Fair enough. Thank you for sharing.”

Jean [65:13 – 65:14]: “What about you. What do you do.”

George [65:15 – 66:07]: “If I can’t focus on something? Usually this will happen if I’ve been sat down for too long. If I’m sat down at the computer for too long, I’ll then like. I’ll. To be honest, it’s not really focus. It’s more like I’ll fall asleep. So I would or like if I get, like I’m struggling to focus on something, I’m getting a bit tired. I just get up, walk around, maybe go make a cup of tea and have a talk to somebody and talking to someone else kind of gets my brain juices flowing again. And then I can go, okay, great, that was the break I needed. Go and sit back down and have another crack at it. Okay, so when somebody wants to dive into Tea head first for an extensive education about Tea, what books, courses, or Experiences do you recommend?”

Jean [66:09 – 66:10]: “Head first.”

George [66:11 – 66:12]: “Well, I mean, feet first is also okay.”

Jean [66:12 – 66:13]: “I mean.”

George [66:13 – 66:14]: “Like, they want to immerse themselves in everything.”

Jean [66:16 – 68:21]: “Well, if you’re ready to invest a lot of your time and, and actually also money and energy I think the best thing I’ve saw so far is the internship at Obubu. I know it’s an easy answer, but I think if it’s if it’s easy to answer that, it means it’s the correct answer. It’s like it’s. Yeah, it’s three months of intensive knowledge about Tea. Where? Because it’s intensive. Because you’re leaving on a Tea farm. So you have no other choice but to always talk about Tea. I feel like if you do not like Tea enough, you may not be super, super happy as an intern at Obubu because everybody’s always drinking tea. Talking about tea. Everything is about tea. Even when you go in Wazuka, you will see tea farmers everywhere. Tea is everywhere. So I think the head first like it would be that Especially when you don’t know much about tea, because it’s such a friendly place for people who don’t know about it. Well, if you you can’t. I don’t think you can just go to any type of tea garden in the world if you don’t know tea and just learn from that because you’ll be considered as a novice everywhere you’ll go, and people will not necessarily take you seriously. There’s that. And then in France, if you have the possibility to work in a tea shop that offers training is a good thing as well. There are independent tea shops that offer training. I think you’ll get a lot of information about more the drinking part, and maybe a little bit how the tea teas are processed rather than the actual a farming and cultural aspects of Tea. But it’s very good. And I worked in a tea shop that would do that, and that had so many teas from around the world that I could just explore and experience, and I think it works very well. Yeah.”

George [68:22 – 68:25]: “Excellent advice, very sound advice, Jean.”

Jean [68:27 – 68:33]: “I actually I am a bookworm, but when it comes to tea, I don’t read a lot about tea.”

George [68:35 – 68:37]: “How do you how do you get your tea knowledge then?”

Jean [68:38 – 69:42]: “People, people. And I have a very good memory when it comes to what people tell me. Like conversations with people. I remember what they said. So I think, honestly, I got all of my knowledge from start from one person. I’m not. I’m not. It’s true, it’s true. Everything comes from George Guttridge-Smith. And when I was an intern, I was asking a lot of, like, more and more questions. And I had such amazing tips and tricks about Tea and that sometimes here I say to interns and they’re like, or even assistant managers and they’re like, I know so much about Tea and I can’t help but say I do. I mean, I can’t help but say, oh, that trick that just what I just said comes directly from George to me, to you, like, and it feels like I’m passing down what I learned from you. I think. I mean.”

George [69:42 – 69:46]: “I can only say the same, though, right? Because I learned this from somebody else.”

Jean [69:46 – 71:44]: “Yeah. Yeah, definitely. But I think there are a lot of things that you are teaching from your own experience, and I do too, as well. But I think it started with that. And then because of this, I started to ask Questions to other people in Tea, and I usually trust this more and I ask more questions about your the people personal relationship to Tea rather than oh, do you know how black tea is supposed to work? I mean, I have, I have read tea books and I have learned things from tea books, but I always try to learn the very basic things, because when it gets very complicated, then there’s a lot of the more I know about it, the more I read about tea. I’m like, yes, this is true, but also not not everywhere, not all the time. And there’s more nuances to this. So I always feel a little bit like I’m not reading lies, but by reading books like this, I always I there’s a rigid and strict image of tea that builds up into my mind. And I don’t like that because I find it. I find that it’s not the truth. And here as assistant manager being able to process my own Tea, being able to harvest my own Tea and selling the Tea as well, and doing basically everything has built most of my knowledge today. Like, I think most of what I know come from this and my experience in Nepal, where I also processed it a lot, and where I was working in the field, hand plucking the teas and, and processing and then and then asking questions as well. I think it’s on the field. I think what I learned the more the most is in the field and in the factories. But it started with a lot of advices from you, I think, especially when it comes to brewing and tasting, I think. Yeah.”

George [71:45 – 72:29]: “I’m glad to hear that. Thank you very much. But I the. Oh I see. I think there’s not much that can replace actually being in a situation where you’re going to be doing something with Tea like, there’s the theoretical side where you can read about it or hear about it, but when you’re, you know, wanting a hands on experience, like you have a real connection with what’s happening at right at that point in time of the Tea production or brewing or something like that. And that is hard to replace if you have a teacher at the same time, helping you understand whilst you’re having that experience is really valuable. Yeah.”

Jean [72:30 – 74:22]: “So I, I definitely had a lot of knowledge also passed down by Hiro-san, who’s been my teacher at Obubu. So every time I was processing Tea, I could always ask questions. And then Hiro-san was more taking care of my training, so I got a lot of information. But then I also got a small, very, very good tips from Akky-san by going in the evening with Akky-san and asking questions or, or asking Akky, like, what do you think, like tomorrow, Akky tomorrow I’m supposed to process Tea and that’ll be a little bit more alone. Like like do you have, like, what do you think I should be careful of? And everybody, every, especially people who process tea, they all have a different way of doing it. And they all have different tips and tricks that all work. And I just have to build my own and make mistakes. And being like, oh, this tea is too dry. Why? Because I did this wrong. Or I could have done this better. And the why is usually always comes from giving me advices and explaining to me what I did that was not good or what I did also, and very often what I did that was good. So Hiro-san is also very good at telling from the finished product what was done, so he would look at the leaves and say, oh, you did this and this well, or you did this, this and this. No, I’m not as good. But it’s it’s very it’s great to know all of that, to be able to have access to this. And I think Hiro-san is a great, great manager when it comes to the processing factory because of of the amount of knowledge he has. Yeah.”

George [74:23 – 74:25]: “He ran the Tencha a factory for a while. Did you know that?”

Jean [74:25 – 74:26]: “For how long?”

George [74:27 – 74:28]: “A few years.”

Jean [74:28 – 74:28]: “Okay.”

George [74:29 – 74:31]: “Him and Akky they ran it together way before Obubu.”

Jean [74:32 – 74:33]: “Okay I didn’t know, I didn’t know.”

George [74:34 – 76:20]: “Yeah anyway. Yeah. But I think at one point you said about how when you’re reading a book, like, it can feel like the writer is trying to say, this is, this is like a the absolute facts of whatever they’re talking about. I think one way in which I got around that, and because I experienced Nepal first, India and Nepal, and then I came to Japan, and I found that the ways of doing things over there were very different to over here in terms of, you know, what are their standards for particular processes during production? I began to formulate a way of or began to formulate sounds a bit fancy, but basically I changed my way of thinking about knowledge, where I categorise the knowledge I get from people based on where they are in the supply chain, but also where they are geographically. Because each area has its own cultural spin on everything, including Tea production. And on top of that, depending on which part of the supply chain they’re in, they have a different viewpoint, so their information changes as well. So I try and look at it from those perspectives so that when I hear something from someone which really contradicts what I know, I try and place it in the correct part of the supply chain or part of the world to help appreciate how they’re looking at Tea as a product or whatever they’re specifically talking about at that time. And so it’s not necessarily right or wrong, but I can then go and fact check it later to see how does that compare to different areas, different people in the Tea industry, and try and build a more holistic view of Tea in that respect. But yeah, there’s a lot of grey.”

Jean [76:21 – 77:53]: “Yeah, it’s true. I think also there are different expectations when it comes to team, the different places. So like in Japan there’s like ‘oh, tea should be like this and like that it should look like this and like that’. There’s a specific aroma and taste that is aimed towards and therefore the rules are easier to follow because they’re more strict. They’re more because we want this, we do this. In Nepal, and this is one of my other very important and amazing teacher Absara, who is a tea maker in she is a tea maker in Nepal, right, in the tea factory, kalapani. And she is not about it should taste a certain way. She’s more about I want it. I want to make this tea taste the way I want to make it taste like. And she goes to that. And she was really good at teaching me how you can make the tea taste more fruity, more more like stronger aromas, etc. she is an artist that more she’s she’s more an artist than a person who follows the rules. She follows her own rules and she makes amazing tea. And I think I learned different things there than I learned here in Japan. So I totally understand what you’re saying when you’re saying like, Oh Depends on how you categorise the knowledge, where it is and from who said it and what context. And yeah, I totally understand that.”

George [77:53 – 78:04]: “This makes you really difficult as somebody who’s entering the Tea industry or would like to know more about the Tea industry because you often find a lot of conflicting information. Yes. And that’s really confusing.”

Jean [78:05 – 78:11]: “But even later, even when you get to know Tea a lot, you get like different informations. Yeah.”

George [78:11 – 78:15]: “So finding like reliable sources of information is really tricky.”

Jean [78:15 – 79:19]: “I think the best source of information that you can find on a book about Tea is when the author says, this farmer in this place said that and does his tea this way, rather than saying, In China they do this. I think I really trust when you know that the author has met a Tea farmer and is reporting what the farmer Former Tea farmer has said. But most of the time the author puts their own opinions through the message and they also implement their own view of the things. So because it’s it’s very often biased. But when they say something like the Tea farmer said this and the Tea farmer does that very factual and that’s that’s what happened then it’s very interesting. But this is very rare. You don’t you can’t find it very easily. And that is one of the reasons why I like the 80 magazine, because it’s a lot of interviews from people. So that’s really good. Yeah.”

George [79:19 – 79:42]: “So actually what I want to try and do with this is you’ll be able to sit down and talk to people and you’ll be able to, like, hear it directly from the people that are involved with that, you know, product. And they’re able to like, communicate exactly how they are thinking about this. And I think that’s a really interesting part of the process as well.”

Jean [79:43 – 80:12]: “Yeah. What’s difficult with Tea also is that there are different aspects of Tea. You can know a lot about the drink. You can know a lot about the leaves. You can know a lot about the cultivation. You can know a lot about the history. You can know. And I think everybody has every Tea expert. I don’t know how to say that. People who have been in the Tea for a long time, they always have a weakness in Tea knowledge, something they don’t know very well or as much.”

George [80:12 – 80:25]: “And you would hope that people were honest about that, right? You know, if they if they don’t know much about a particular topic, you would hope that they say, actually, I’m not I’m not, you know, an expert on this area. And they have the confidence to do that.”

Jean [80:26 – 80:28]: “But don’t you think a lot of people are not?”

George [80:29 – 81:55]: “It’s difficult because I forget the exact way that this is phrased or the exact name for this, but there is a very well known name out there. But when you start learning something, you first feel like you know nothing. Very quickly you begin to feel like, oh yeah, I’ve got it. And you become an expert. But then the more you learn about it, you then actually realise you know nothing. And then it becomes a journey of, like trying to fill in all the gaps along the way. And so depending on which part of the journey people are in, you know, maybe they feel that way about Tea in general. Maybe they feel it about a specific part of Tea. But everybody’s always learning more. And so depending on what part of the journey you find somebody, they come with a different feeling. Like somebody might leave the internship that we have here and be very confident in the fact that they know everything there is to know about Japanese Tea. Where do you go and talk to our president at Obubu, Akky-san and or any of the other tea farmers around Wazuka. And they’ll be like, yeah, you know, I know nothing. I don’t know much about tea. Like I’m not a novice, but like, I’m always learning more. Yeah. And so you get a very different perspective from those people because they are the experts. And yet they feel themselves that they don’t know that much.”

Jean [81:56 – 82:01]: “But it’s, it’s because you know how much you don’t know, but. Yeah.”

George [82:02 – 82:28]: “But there is a word for this I forget, I don’t know. So it really depends on the people you find. Yeah. And so sometimes I can’t say every time. But some books you read are written by people who have done some research and then written a book, and then those ones are the dangerous ones to go for because they haven’t had the long history with tea and, you know, dived into all these different areas.”

Jean [82:28 – 83:23]: “Yeah. I think personally I can say that I can I can talk about topics like I can talk about tea brewing, but I don’t know Tea brewing because it’s so difficult and white. But there are there are topics that I know I can’t even talk about, about tea. And I’m really bad at tea history. Like, if you ask me anything, I’ll be like I don’t know. Or I know like very general things like oh like very like basic things like, oh tea in, in China is first believed to be, to have been drunk as a medicine rather than like, you know, like very, very like general things. But I don’t know when. I don’t know by who. I don’t know how. I forget all the names. It’s very bad. Yeah.”

George [83:23 – 83:25]: “What about Japan? Do you know.”

Jean [83:25 – 83:25]: “It’s the same?”

George [83:25 – 83:26]: “Really?”

Jean [83:26 – 84:07]: “Yeah, I forget everything. I go into one of the amazing education for us to manage that we have now called AME, where it’s a four hour course and I take a lot of notes, and we have one about history. And I took a lot of notes, and I have this information on paper, but in my head, it’s just not going in and it’s not staying there. Yeah. It’s I think it’s just that I don’t actually really care. Like I’m like, okay, there’s this guy who invented Sencha. Okay, fine. I’m like, what? Yeah. No. I’m like, okay, thank you. Thank you to this guy. I respect him, but I forget his name all the time. It’s terrible. It’s terrible. Yeah. It’s terrible.”

George [84:08 – 84:09]: “So yeah, Nagatani Souen.”

Jean [84:09 – 84:14]: “I feel like. Yeah, yeah. Like if you tell me, I’ll be like, oh, yeah, this guy, that guy. Yeah.”

George [84:14 – 84:16]: “But you’d be able to pick him out of a Line-Up.”

Jean [84:17 – 84:44]: “Yeah, but that’s it. I can’t, I can’t give you his name. It’s really bad because we talk about this all the time. And here at Obubu, a lot of people are very, very passionate about history. So I feel bad because I don’t I can’t even spell out Nagatani Souen properly, you know, like I because I’m like, yeah, there’s this guy who invented who is believed to have invented Sencha.”

George [84:45 – 85:00]: “But I would, I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t I wouldn’t worry too much because there are so many. This is one of the beautiful things about Tea. There are so many different ways to enjoy Tea. And, you know, you know, history. Maybe not. Not your thing.”

Jean [85:00 – 85:26]: “I but even from my from school, like history as a topic outside of Tea has been always the worst. So for me, I don’t relate. I think two things that happened very long time ago. I’m thankful for many of the things that happened, and I’m scared about a lot of things that happened as well. And I I’m interested when we talk about it, but I don’t remember that. No.”

George [85:27 – 85:42]: “That’s fine you have plent.. That. You know, everybody has different focuses, right? There’s I’m sure a whole lot of stuff, like, you know, so much about the agricultural side, which is much more than me because you come from an agricultural background, from your studies.”

Jean [85:42 – 85:44]: “Well, it’s more interesting to me as well than.”

George [85:45 – 85:50]: “I find it interesting, too. But like, the amount of knowledge you have about that way surpasses anything that I have.”

Jean [85:50 – 85:59]: “So, honestly, I know actually more about wine and viticulture. Yeah. Than Tea cultivation.”

George [85:59 – 86:01]: “Yeah. Because of your studies, right?”

Jean [86:01 – 86:28]: “Yeah, because I studied it like very closely and I have I know I can find like a trustful, trustful, truthful, truthful. Thank you. I can’t pronounce it. Okay. Anyway like real resources about viticulture. Yeah. And if I have a question about viticulture, I know where to find the answer. And I know, I know, I know more about viticulture than I know about tea cultivation.”

George [86:28 – 86:29]: “Yeah.”

Jean [86:30 – 86:34]: “Tea cultivation is always the answer is always depends.”

George [86:34 – 86:38]: “So which in itself is really difficult. Yeah.”

Jean [86:39 – 86:44]: “Yeah. It’s the same with processing when you have questions like depends.”

George [86:44 – 87:36]: “Well, a lot of the time that happens when you’re talking with Akky, like he stops and starts and he really has to think for a minute about how to answer your question, because the question you’ve asked is not as simple as you might think it is. It depends on three other variables that have happened earlier that day. And if any one of those were different, then the answer he gives you then is very, very different. So he has to really think about, okay, based on this current situation, what is the answer that I should give Jean. So there’s so many like grey areas and different variables to play around with. It’s one of the really interesting things about tea and something that is always helping us produce different teas and enjoy teas in different ways. So yeah, tea is magic, that’s for sure.”

Jean [87:38 – 87:39]: “Yes.”

George [87:39 – 87:58]: “Okay, so how are we doing with this tea? Okay. Well, before we. Before we jump on to another Tea, let me ask you a couple of questions and a little bit easier ones. The first questions I’ve asked you are more general questions, but I’m going to whittle those down into a few smaller, shorter questions for other people.”

Jean [87:58 – 87:59]: “So you always say that.”

George [87:59 – 88:02]: “And then I appreciate you for being the first person that I do this with.”

Jean [88:02 – 88:04]: “This is so you can anticipate.”

George [88:04 – 88:13]: “Yeah I mean, it’s very, very kind of you. So what are your three favourite Japanese tea cultivars?”

Jean [88:15 – 88:15]: “Japanese tea.”

George [88:16 – 88:17]: “Japanese tea cultivars.”

Jean [88:17 – 88:26]: “Okay. I, I don’t know that many because we are not using so many at Obubu, and they’re the ones that I know the most.”

George [88:26 – 88:31]: “Okay, well, then let’s just do tea cultivars in general, it doesn’t have to be Japanese tea.”

Jean [88:31 – 89:27]: “I can go with Japanese tea and then and then go with other cultivars I like. But for sure even, like, out of all of the cultivars, I feel like Okumidori is a really good cultivar. It’s my favourite Matcha so far. So far. And it’s delicious, even for Sencha. It’s it’s feels like in the taste of it. It’s very it’s very flexible. You can make a lot of things. It will always taste very good. And when it comes to other cultivars, I, I like Samidori as well. I think in the taste the punch it has the the strong aromas. It has it’s very delicious. And then the third one is Yabukita.”

George [89:29 – 89:29]: “Okay.”

Jean [89:29 – 90:08]: “Because I feel like, the reason why I wouldn’t tend to say that it’s Yabukita is because almost all of the tea’s are Yabukita. So it’s not a very rare cultivars. But you have to say that all of the tea’s, when you are being served Yabukita tastes great, and it’s more a matter of oh, it’s because 70% of all the sencha is Yabukita. So I would rather drink something else because I’m used to drinking Yabukita rather than because I don’t like the cultivar. I can also see in the tea fields that it is quite a resistant cultivars because we’ve, we have cultivars a little bit more…”

George [90:08 – 90:10]: “Weak?”

Jean [90:10 – 90:46]: “Weak. Yeah. Okumidori is one of them. It’s a little bit more weak. The the the the stronger cultivar than Yabukita is being Sayamakori is very strong, but it doesn’t taste as good in my opinion. So yeah, I would go with Yabukita, Okumidori and Samidori, I think and that’s also because we have two matches Samidori Matcha and Okumidori Matcha and Matcha is my favourite Japanese tea, so maybe that influences my choice. Yeah, yeah, yeah.”

George [90:46 – 90:51]: “I was thinking, you know, when you said first Okumidori, then Samidori, I was waiting for you to say Gokou.”

Jean [90:52 – 90:57]: “Which I really like gokou, I really Gokou is very good. Especially for Gyokuro.”

George [90:57 – 90:58]: “Yeah.”

Jean [90:58 – 91:18]: “But I don’t like Gyokuro as much as I like Matcha. And I like the Matcha the Gokou Matcha. But I feel like every time I drink one of our Spring Sun. Yabukita Spring Sun or even Kabuse Sencha. Yabukita I I love it so. Yeah,”

George [91:19 – 91:19]: “It’s a good Tea.”

Jean [91:20 – 91:20]: “It is.”

George [91:20 – 91:24]: “It is a good Tea. I mean, it’s a standard Tea of Japan for a reason, right? Yeah, yeah.”

Jean [91:24 – 92:07]: “I think so. I think there’s a reason. There’s a cultivation reason, but also it tastes reason. I think when it comes to other cultures in Japan, I also really like But actually, I, I’m a very, like, basic person because I really like Av2, which is a very important cultivar in Darjeeling, Nepal and, and even China, but it’s like it’s very floral, it’s very tasty. It’s delicious. And it’s usually blended with other cultures in Darjeeling and Nepal. But it gives, it gives to the tea this, like rose like floral, like taste that I really like.”

George [92:09 – 92:10]: “Av2.”

Jean [92:10 – 92:53]: “Av2. Yes. Av2. It’s a very common cultivar. And my favourite tea is the silver needle from Fujian in China. And they use a specific cultivar that has huge, huge buds. And I’m not saying that I know this cultivar, because the only thing I drink from this cultivar is the silver needle. But because it’s my favourite tea, I guess I can also say that that cultivar is great, but I don’t remember the name. So, you know, it feels. I feel a little bit like, should I really say that if I don’t even know how it’s called? But it’s usually this cultivar is usually used only for that specific tea. So. Yeah.”

George [92:54 – 92:58]: “Well, I hope to find out what it is one day. I have my fingers crossed.”

Jean [92:58 – 93:02]: “I think the name is very close to Fujian because it’s from there.”

George [93:02 – 93:24]: “It’s a Fujianese cultivar. Okay, well, while you have a little Google, I will ask you another question as well.

And this one’s quite a quite a well, I think it’s quite an easy one for you because you’ve spoken a little bit about it earlier. Do you have a favourite piece of teaware to brew with.”

George [] And this one’s quite a, quite a, well, I think it’s quite an easy one for you because you’ve spoken a little bit about it earlier. Do you have a favourite piece of teaware to brew with.”

Jean [93:31 – 94:03]: “Specific piece of teaware. There’s the teapot I already talked about that I love. But the thing is, it’s not very flexible. It’s not a very flexible teapot. I can’t do anything in it. So as much as I love it, I don’t think I’ll pick that one for this question because, yes, I love it. But yeah, it’s not I can’t I don’t want to brew green tea in there. And I’m going to say I have very strong unpopular opinion when it comes to tea. I think, you know. I think, you know.”

George [94:03 – 94:04]: “A hot take.”

Jean [94:04 – 96:17]: “Oh, no. I like green tea in glass or pitchers or like, why is, because even though I know that the temperature is very difficult to control with the tea, the glass tea where you can brew anything in it, it won’t be impacted by the previous teas you’ve you’ve brought in. So it feels like you’re tasting the tea a bit more raw, like natural, kind of like normal taste. But also I love watching the leaves when brewing. It’s my favourite. I think. To me brew drinking tea is not only about drinking the liquor, it’s also about looking at the the water, the brewing and even I, I like the steam that the hot water makes, etc. I think it’s very pretty. And watching the leaves open is one of my favourite thing. And when you use a glass pitcher, it’s beautiful because the glass usually also zooms on the leaf so you can see them a little bit better as well. I really like it. Then you can also see the the water gets coloured in the with the tea as well. So at home I have I had because glass has many problems and it’s very fragile. I had a filter into a teapot and the filter was in glass and the teapot was in glass, and so I could see the water turn in colour and the leaves open in the glass filter. Very pretty. And because it was quite a big teapot, I was able to control temperature, because when you added lots of hot water, the temperature tends to drop. Not as fast, but it has a lot of problems. It’s, it’s it breaks all the time. It doesn’t keep the tea warm at all. So when you brew black tea, you will definitely brew the black tea at a lower temperature than you should, because it’s a glass pitcher, but I don’t mind brewing teas at lower temperatures, so it’s okay. Yeah, I think any kind of glass is really good for me. I like it, but everybody would be like, especially tea lovers. They’ll be like, what?”

George [96:18 – 96:29]: “I don’t know, because if you brew with with glass or a glazed ceramic, you’re able to taste the tea like it’s better for evaluation, right? So you’re better able to judge the tea.”

Jean [96:29 – 96:37]: “So for evaluation, I would rather use porcelain in that case to keep the want a little bit more. I guess you.”

George [96:37 – 96:39]: “Can see the colour more clearly against the white.”

Jean [96:39 – 97:01]: “And usually for evaluation you don’t really look at the leaves open. You look at the list once they’re open, once they’re brewed before the brewing and you look at the liquor. So you don’t need to look at the leaf brewing. And also for evaluation, you put a timer specific timer so you won’t use porcelain. You will. You would use porcelain. Sorry. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, but.”

George [97:03 – 97:14]: “Yeah. But you if I, if I, if I really want to get into a Tea and like have a look at it clearly as it’s brewing. Not for like a standardised evaluation. I have a little tiny. Yeah. Exactly. Glass teapot.”

Jean [97:14 – 97:15]: “Yeah. Right.”

George [97:15 – 97:40]: “It’s really nice. Yeah. Very good point Jean. Well no, it’s an excellent answer. Now I’ve got, I’ve got a difficult question for you. Oh this is a tough one. Okay. If you had to sum up the French, Nepalese and Japanese tea scenes in a few sentences each, what would you say? You can tackle each one individually.”

Jean [97:40 – 97:41]: “Let’s start with France. Okay.”

George [97:41 – 97:42]: “Let’s start with France. Yes.”

Jean [97:43 – 98:49]: “France. Tea culture is not about the Tea. It’s about the people. And the. The things around the tea, the cake, the teapots. It looks pretty. And France has more perfumes approach for a lot of things. For a lot of things. But for tea, if it doesn’t smell and taste like perfume, then it’s not good enough. And I think that’s why jasmine teas and Earl Greys are very popular in France. And I think that’s why also we drink tea during the afternoon 4 p.m. break called gouter. And it’s a very familial thing as well. A French friend thing as well. And usually tea is more about the other things you eat with it and the other people you drink it with, I think. And it’s, it’s there’s not as much focus on the quality of the tea.”

George [98:50 – 98:52]: “More about.The perfume, the people around.”

Jean [98:52 – 98:54]: “Yeah. Yeah I think so.”

George [98:56 – 99:06]: “So okay. No no I don’t, I don’t want to, I don’t want to deep dive at this point. Okay. So Japanese or Nepalese. Well that’s what I think.”

Jean [99:06 – 99:13]: “I’m not saying that’s what it is. I don’t I don’t know. I don’t know every tea drinkers in France of course, but yeah.”

George [99:13 – 99:15]: “Generally speaking. Okay.”

Jean [99:17 – 102:39]: “Okay. In Nepal. In Nepal. I think there are two different worlds in Nepal as well, because there’s a place where they do a lot of cut tear crush Tea where they will sell it as more of a product to make chai or to, to sell it to big wholesalers. And then there’s the other side that is a little bit more speciality that is supposed to be drink. Not with milk, not with anything, just the way it is. So I don’t actually really know very much the crush, tear curl culture that is produced mostly in the Terai. So the, the flat part of like Nepal, I don’t know what the culture, the people relationship to there and I’m not saying I know the mountain part, but I’ve witnessed it so I can talk about it more. And there is a very strong, especially for Tea farmers, a pride in and love for making tea. It’s not only about drinking tea, it’s also about for the communities in the in the mountains, about having their tea fields, having tea fields that look pretty and good and selling good quality fresh leaves where I was because it was almost tea farmers, almost everywhere. And I think even for the tea, there’s a primeness of the promise of like, serving really good tea to people. And then there is also the Chai culture in Nepal that is very strong and there is chai everywhere. You can order chai everywhere. I think in Nepal they drink tea a little bit more like French people would drink coffee very strong. And as a, an energy drink rather than because it tastes good. But the thing is, I’m very much biased because I lived in a tea factory where the tea needed to taste good. But when I was going to restaurant or in the towns or in the cities, they were drinking tea because it’s so much, so strongly input into the culture there that tea is everywhere. And it’s also a very like, if you have guests, you serve them tea. And it’s not like as much like that in France. In Nepal it’s, I think there’s a lot of politeness and it’s very rooted, deeply rooted in the culture. I think, and it’s at almost every stage, every classes, social classes in Nepal, one in France is more the wealthy people, the rich people who will serve tea, and Earl grey, I think. I don’t know, it’s it’s a difficult question.”

George [102:40 – 103:13]: “It’s interesting though. It’s interesting to think about. You know, I can’t help but think about those things in connection to the UK culture as well, you know, where everybody brews tea. It’s not like a higher class thing. It’s everyone in British society would brew a cup of tea like happy brew some tea, sad brew some tea, you know, celebration, or let’s have a cup of tea, maybe a biscuit or, you know, but there’s, you know, things like that. It’s just a bit different.”

Jean [103:13 – 103:40]: “So I mean, in France everybody can have Lipton tea. Yeah. So I’m not really. There’s a lot of there’s a big, big individual. How do you call that? Tea bags culture in France? I think the tea bag culture in France is very strong. Okay. At at every level. But loose leaf tea it’s only like high social classes. Like rich social classes in France would do.”

George [103:41 – 103:51]: “Well, that’s actually one of the things that shocked me a little bit when I got to know a bit more about French tea culture as I got older, is that actually French people drink a lot better tea than than the British.”

Jean [103:51 – 103:53]: “So better tea, much better.”

George [103:53 – 104:53]: “You know, it it. Almost everybody in the UK, regardless of class, will think of tea as teabag tea and they’ll brew a nice tea bag tea and they’ll buy their nice tea bag tea if they’re, you know, a bit more posh from the more expensive, well-known places Whittards of Chelsea, maybe Twinings, Harrogate’s. But There are this bog standard teas. Tea brands that everybody would buy. Pg tips Yorkshire tea. Everyone has their favourite. So when it comes to loose leaf tea, you don’t really get that so much. Like if you find somebody who has loose leaf tea in their house, it’s either they are from the 1800s and partly fossilised, or they are someone who’s interested in tea, a little bit like we are. You know who would be more likely to have loose leaf tea in the house? So you don’t really find that in the UK? I would say.”

Jean [104:54 – 106:30]: “Well, in France we have a very we actually have still a strong especially in the higher the with like wealthy people. There are two brands that kind of dominate the fancy posh like not posh. Both fancy and high quality. High grades, loose leaf and tea bags that are called mariage Freres and Damon Freres. And they sell a lot of loose leaf. And there are a lot of places in France where the leaf tea. But most importantly, they sell tea bags where it’s not crush tear curl inside. It looks a little bit more powdery because the tea bag doesn’t protect the leaves as well as much, but they sell whole leaf tea in tea bags, and the quality of the tea bags is extremely good. And they have. It’s not necessarily it’s not plastic, it’s not paper. It’s very high quality tea bag. For instance those cotton cotton tea bags. Some cotton. I don’t like it, but yeah, I don’t like it. I feel like drinking cotton. It’s weird. But But it’s really good. I personally don’t like it, but I think it’s really good because it really protects the leaves and it makes the it gives a lot of space for the leaves to open in the back. Anyway but I don’t know about the UK. If you can find, like, whole leaf tea in a tea bag.”

George [106:30 – 107:48]: “Oh you can. Yeah. Very easily. Like you go into some of the higher end supermarkets. If you go to Waitrose for example, they have, they stock Rare Tea Company. I don’t know if you’ve heard of that with a lady called Henrietta runs this rare tea company and they, they source, you know, good quality loose leaf tea and you can buy it’s all in tins and you can buy, you know, silver needle tea if you want. And also you know, all sorts of tea from all over the world. And it’s called the Rare Tea Company, but, you know, it’s quite expensive. Or you can buy something a little bit more mid market in the Tea world, which is Tea pigs. I don’t know if you’ve heard of Tea. Pigs. Pigs? Yeah. Tea pigs. And they have the pyramid shape sachet or a tea bags, which have loose leaf tea in them. And then you just brew with that. So that’s something kind of in between the loose leaf and the, the standard tea bags you would get. And it’s something that people it’s quite accessible. But on the whole people don’t normally start off with that. They normally start off with CTC tea.”

Jean [107:48 – 108:02]: “Yes. Because that’s what you find in the supermarkets as well. The only whole leaf tea you can find in a supermarket in France is gunpowder that is a tea that is kind of meant to be mixed with something else.”

George [108:02 – 108:02]: “Yeah.”

Jean [108:03 – 108:27]: “And it’s I’m, I don’t I don’t dislike it, but it’s just very it’s not when you think about a very high grade whole leaf tea, you don’t think about gunpowder. But in the supermarket, it’s the highest grade you can find. Otherwise it’s only CTC. That’s a shame. Yeah, I think it’s better in the UK. I think you have more options in the supermarkets.”

George [108:27 – 108:36]: “I think so, but I just don’t think we have the culture or, you know, the French have always had the culture edge on the UK. I think.”

Jean [108:36 – 108:37]: “About what.”

George [108:37 – 108:38]: “About just generally.”

Jean [108:41 – 108:44]: “I think a lot of.”

George [108:44 – 108:48]: “The fancy stuff we have comes from from French culture, you know.”

Jean [108:48 – 108:50]: “We like fancy, fancy things.”

George [108:50 – 108:50]: “I’m not.”

Jean [108:51 – 108:52]: “Fancy looking like…”

George [108:52 – 109:24]: “In a negative way. I think it’s great, but we it comes back from we had William the Conqueror coming. Right. And all the, the ruling class of the UK changed or England changed and, they kept all the fancy French stuff. I think it’s quite nice. We’ve been able to have a wonderful blend of cultures. Unfortunately, you do have better tea than us. I think on the whole. Like, we don’t typically have, like, Mariage Freres.”

Jean [109:25 – 109:50]: “But they sell a lot of CTC as well as being the, the best tea out there. Like they sell it as being like, this is really high grade tea, which not necessarily is not necessarily not high grade, but it’s still CTC. So it’s going to taste very strongly. You’re going to have to add things with it. Yeah I don’t know. Do you have any fancy fancy.”

George [109:50 – 109:58]: “I know I’m just thinking back because when I did my tea tasting course in, in Darjeeling, we tasted predominantly CTC tea.”

Jean [109:58 – 109:59]: “Yeah.”

George [109:59 – 110:59]: “And it was differentiated with either CTC or Orthodox. Those are the two ways to talk about tea and Orthodox had such a huge variety in it because, you know, it’s like an artisan Tea. Yeah, it’s hard to categorise it, but CTC has very strict rules. And so when we’re drinking our CTC tea, it was quite easy to be tasting it and then see the differences in everything. And so there was I tasted some really delicious CTC teas and also some really terrible CTC teas. So finding what is good for you I think is another important thing. And we don’t typically drink CTC tea. You know, I don’t it’s not my favourite tea, but I would say it’s if you find a really if you go to the factory that produces it and then they have a nice raw material, it’s not bad.”

Jean [110:59 – 111:03]: “Yeah. It’s going to do a nice tea. Yeah. But even if it’s a CTC tea.”

George [111:03 – 111:04]: “Of production.”

Jean [111:04 – 111:14]: “I think it’s just there’s a lot of tea company who brings this forward as being the only way of, like, doing like, this is the good way. This is the high quality now.”

George [111:15 – 111:32]: “And that I find difficult sometimes because, you know, I don’t think anyone can say that because there’s so many different ways to produce Tea, so many different Tea cultures out there. If anybody says to you this is or this is the best. I’m always a bit sceptical. I’m always a bit unsure. Oh, really? Really?”

Jean [111:32 – 111:33]: “Yeah.”

George [111:34 – 111:40]: “According to who? According to what? Like, do you have an award? But yes,”

Jean [111:40 – 112:11]: “For japan, I don’t I don’t know how to resume because I feel like it’s such a big country. You know, in Nepal, they produce most of the teas in either in Terai or in Ilam. So because it’s quite located around Ilam, but there’s a there are other places, but it’s where they produce most of it. You can kind of say, oh, where in Ilam and in Terai where they do the, the Crush Tea Curl is where. That’s where we can resume the the Tea. But in Japan.”

George [112:12 – 112:27]: “Well, there’s so many. Japan’s an interesting case, I think, because there’s so many different cultures depending on the prefecture you’re in. So you add that together with the long, long history of Tea, there’s naturally going to be very different cultures in different places.”

Jean [112:28 – 113:13]: “Because if we take the example of Kansai, everything is tea flavoured. If you go in a supermarket, you get like everything Matcha or hojicha or get Matcha. I’m a little bit exaggerating here, but when you go to when you go to Kyoto, like you get whole tea places that serves everything matcha. Even when you go into a souvenir shop, you will find a lot and a lot of sweets with Matcha and with tea in it. And and tea is everywhere, I find, especially in Kyoto, around Kyoto and Nara and Uji and but that’s because I live here, so I see it a lot. That’s true. Uji it’s just everywhere. But”

George [113:13 – 113:14]: “You can get Tea ramen in Uji.”

Jean [113:14 – 113:57]: “You get Tea ramen. Everything’s tea flavoured. Yeah. So here it’s it’s more the cooking with tea that I think is huge. And, and other products around tea. That is huge. I don’t know if it’s the same elsewhere. And also here we have more lightly steamed tea, like, whole leaf needle shape. But in another place in Japan, it will be strongly steamed and not needle shaped or pan fried or pan fired. Sorry. Not fried. Pan fired. So.”

George [113:57 – 113:58]: “It’s tricky.”

Jean [113:59 – 113:59]: “Yeah.”

George [114:00 – 114:06]: “But I would say on the whole. Japan is a more green tea country. Oh yes, of course.”

Jean [114:06 – 114:13]: “I think I should start with the basic things. Yeah. Yeah, definitely. And steaming. Yeah.”

George [114:13 – 114:14]: “Steaming.”

Jean [114:14 – 114:15]: “Yeah.”

George [114:15 – 114:15]: “That’s a big one.”

Jean [114:16 – 114:23]: “It’s very honestly to me, the teas in Japan, they always taste fishy and seaweed.”

George [114:23 – 114:25]: “It’s mind blowing to me because I just don’t get that at all.”

Jean [114:25 – 114:29]: “It’s it’s the steaming. It does that seaweedy fishy thing.”

George [114:29 – 115:05]: “I think it’s more vegetal. I don’t I don’t see it as like a seaweed thing. But I will say, I will caveat that by saying, when I first came to Japan, I hated seaweed and I never felt like I tasted, you know, definitely some teas have like, a seaweed ness to them. But most of the teas I tasted green teas. I had never had that thought. It was never like, oh, that tastes like seaweed to me. All of them taste like seaweed. So I’m interested to know. Like why?”

Jean [115:05 – 115:28]: “I mean, not all of them, but when I, when I drink Japanese green tea, especially steamed green tea, especially Kabuse Sencha, everything is umami and and grassy and it’s, it’s very grassy and vegetal. I taste the ocean every time. So it’s either seaweed or crab or or fish or, yeah.”

George [115:28 – 115:34]: “Even, even an unshaped like spring sun. Sencha the spring sun. Unshaded. Yabukita. Yes. Sencha of the earth.”

Jean [115:34 – 115:55]: “It’s not the main. It’s not the body of the Tea. It’s not the main aromas. Because the the the spring sun, for instance, that we have is actually a little bit slightly floral. Yeah. And and it’s mostly grassy floral, but it has this kind of, like, white fish flesh flavour that you cook in the oven. Like, it’s very specific, I know, but to me it has it.”

George [115:55 – 115:57]: “What temperature? How long?”

Jean [115:57 – 116:23]: “Well, actually high temperature because the skin needs to, to grill and it’s always been like that. And actually in France it’s very common when you tell a, a, a in the Tea companies in Palais du Thés they will tell you, oh, this is Kabuse Sencha and this has marine, marine notes and fish notes and things like that.”

George [116:23 – 116:39]: “Well, I’m familiar with that. When tasting a cooked puerh from China and I would often smell it and the, the Shou Pu’er. And it has this, like, funky fishy smell.”

Jean [116:39 – 116:43]: “But it’s more funky, as in like, fermented rather than.”

George [116:43 – 117:19]: “But some of them are like straight up fish, okay. And it’s really unpleasant. Like I don’t want it in my tea. I don’t enjoy that. And even, you know, many times it’s just a wash. You got to wash it. Maybe it’s the storage was a bit weird, but even then, like, you know, I’m not a fan. Okay, so I think that’s really interesting to hear because I found that more in Europe compared to in Japan. So I think it’s really interesting. And but what about when you’re drinking teas from here in France? How do you feel about those? Is it like more fishy?”

Jean [117:21 – 117:25]: “Oh, that’s a good question. I always think it’s more umami.”

George [117:25 – 117:26]: “In France?”

Jean [117:26 – 117:43]: “Yeah, I always think it’s it’s not only it’s not more umami, but it’s also a little bit more maybe a little bit more fishy, I think because the water is harder, it’s stronger. It attracts maybe too much. And when I brewed kabocha Sencha, it was.”

George [117:44 – 117:48]: “Not good. I mean, I think it’s important to say as well. Fishy doesn’t necessarily mean bad.”

Jean [117:48 – 117:50]: “No no no no no. But for me, it’s a good thing.”

George [117:50 – 118:27]: “Yeah, well, there was one tea that I had here as an intern. Kabuse Sencha as well actually, which I then I took it the same packet, open packet, took it to the UK and I brewed it for my family and it tasted like tuna steak, delicious, delicious tuna steak. But I didn’t want a tuna steak in my tea. So it was a weird, a weird feeling to be drinking this going, wow, that’s really great. I wish I was eating tuna steak and not drinking a green tea, but it was just a weird, weird feeling. So I find it easier to not have those flavours when when in when in Japan.”

Jean [118:27 – 118:38]: “But you’ve never you’ve never had a whole fish put in the oven cooked like that. And then you just open it and it’s a white flesh and you just and it’s very subtle. It’s not.”

George [118:38 – 118:38]: “I have had fish before.”

Jean [118:38 – 118:48]: “It doesn’t have a strong taste. Right. Yeah. You had, you had I believe you I believe you did. So I’m very surprised because it really tastes the same. And crab.”

George [118:49 – 119:05]: “No. See, when you said that I was like, really? But then you know, But to be honest, maybe now I think about it. I’m not the biggest. Or before coming to Japan, I didn’t really eat that much seafood.”

Jean [119:05 – 119:06]: “So you’re not a fan.”

George [119:06 – 119:26]: “Not that I’m not a fan of seafood. Like I really enjoy eating fish. Crab is delicious. Like many other, most seafoods I’m a big fan of. But when I’m drinking tea, I’m not thinking about that. But maybe it’s because I didn’t have it so much growing up.”

Jean [119:27 – 119:28]: “I don’t know.”

George [119:28 – 119:29]: “It’s a mystery.”

Jean [119:29 – 119:31]: “Mystery or I’m crazy.”

George [119:31 – 120:05]: “And I don’t think so. I mean, I’d like to say yes, but honestly, I don’t think so. Okay. Anyway, thank you very much for for for those summaries. Okay. So summary I have a whole host of questions. So we’re going to do if you if we can do some quick fire questions. And then I’ve got two longer questions I want to ask. What are your favourite parts about the Tea community as a whole?”

Jean [120:10 – 121:38]: “The Tea community as a whole. I feel like we always have a way to connect, and that’s Tea, obviously. And it’s very easy because you make friends so fast that way. And I wouldn’t say that the community is always super welcoming with everybody, because we’re still humans and we’re still sometimes bad people as well, and sometimes good people. And I think believing in the fact that, oh Tea people are always nice. Well, it’s not true we are people, but you will always have a common ground, and that’s great, I think. And. And that allows people to connect very, very easily in good, obviously. So even when you are having a conversation with somebody that your personality doesn’t necessarily match, you still have both of you still love Tea. And there’s still a way for like agreeing on something. And I think that’s great. Most of the time, tea people like each other because of this reason, and so the Tea community feels like a safe space. I think so that’s the good thing. But what I’m trying to say is that it’s not like this. Always. Always. Yeah. Yeah. But it still has the safe space, so I think. Yeah. So it’s such a negative.”

George [121:38 – 121:41]: “Space, a safe space. But be careful, but be careful.”

Jean [121:41 – 122:11]: “Yeah, exactly. Yeah, it has a safe space. But be careful. As in like, don’t don’t lose yourself into whatever Tea field in the middle of nowhere just because you think everybody who drinks tea is a good person because it’s not the case? That’s what I’m trying to say. But I think that in general, there’s always something you can connect around with and that’s that’s tea and that’s great. That’s what I like about tea community. Beautiful. I shouldn’t struggle on that one. That one should be easy. And that was like.”

George [122:13 – 122:19]: “Okay, well I’ve got another difficult one for you. Okay. What is the most memorable tea moment you’ve ever had?”

George [122:13 – 122:19]: “Okay, well I’ve got another difficult one for you. Okay. What is the most memorable tea moment you’ve ever had?”

Jean [122:20 – 124:19]: “I think we talked about this last time and it’s very strange because I have I have had many, but I went in my journey to Tea from the normal Tea is flavoured to tea flavoured is bad to tea flavoured is not always bad. Most of it often is bad, but tea flavour with flavours can also be very much imprinted in cultures, people, cultures like jasmine tea or like genmaicha. Genmaicha is a flavoured tea. When you think about it, kind of to actually flavour tea is great and I love it as much as I love not as much as I love plain tea, but it’s it’s it’s still really good. And that happened when we already talked about it, when I tried a flavoured tea that reminded me of my childhood, childhood memory. And I was like, oh, that’s the power of flavours and of perfumes, basically. And it’s great. And it’s still tea and I and I feel like I’m drinking tea. So I think that time when I started realising that flavoured tea is actually really, really good is very memorable to me because it has been such a strong switch in my passion for tea. And I happened in Dammann Freres where they do their own, they do their own flavours so they don’t ask another party to to do flavours for flavouring for them. So they do their own and they test a lot of them, and they are always trying to say something through the recipe they are making. And I think it’s great and it’s beautiful and I love it.”

George [124:19 – 124:20]: “Well that’s great.”

Jean [124:20 – 124:22]: “It’s very memorable for me. Yeah.”

George [124:24 – 124:27]: “It’s a beautiful memory. So thank you so much.”

Jean [124:27 – 124:28]: “For telling.”

George [124:28 – 124:32]: “Me. No, no, no I know I have another question. I have other questions.”

Jean [124:32 – 124:33]: “For you as well. Okay. Please.”

George [124:33 – 124:40]: “Okay. What have you learned from working in the Japanese tea industry over the last year? Okay. What have you learned from working in the Japanese tea industry over the last year?”

Jean [124:40 – 124:47]: “What have I learnt? What have I learned? Many things.”

George [124:48 – 124:51]: “I’m glad I was about to ask you. Have you learned anything over the last year?”

Jean [124:54 – 124:59]: “What would be interesting to talk about? I don’t know.”

George [124:59 – 125:07]: “It doesn’t have to necessarily be something that’s that you think might be super interesting. You can anything’s okay.”

Jean [125:07 – 125:26]: “What did I learn? What did I learn? I guess dedication will always result in something brilliant.”

George [125:27 – 125:27]: “Dedication.”

Jean [125:27 – 126:30]: “Dedication. Putting a lot of energy. A lot of love. A lot of yourself into something will always. Result in positive things and good things, even when you are going for it too much. As in like when you are dedicating yourself too much, you’re sacrificing a bit of yourself. There will be a negative things that will come out of this. Like you know, like being immersed in and drowning yourself in. Something is not always good, but it will not only be bad, there will. There is a result. And I’ve seen Japanese people being so dedicated around here that I’m like, wow, like, this is this is a little bit crazy, but the result is amazing and beautiful. I think this is a very philosophical part of it. It is also like, you know, don’t put your hand into the in the processing machine the way you want the whatever. That’s also something I learned. Please be careful that I learned. Please.”

George [126:30 – 126:32]: “You learned. Please be careful.”

Jean [126:32 – 126:51]: “Machines are dangerous. So there are many different things that I learned. Wear gloves. Wear gloves that I also learned. Because, yeah, I don’t know. Even even the woods can be dangerous. You can get shards in your fingers. I learned.”

George [126:52 – 126:59]: “It’s true safety. Safety. Did you say safety first or safety second or safety third?”

Jean [127:01 – 127:44]: “In life or in life second. Because if you first think about safety, you’re going to be very stressed in your life. But I don’t think any professional should say that. I think professionally I should say, of course, safety first. But in life I feel like if you always only cared about safety, you’re not going to do a lot with your life. That’s true. First, think about oh, how can I have fun? How can I enjoy this? And then think about. And also, how can I do it safely? Rather than being like, how can I do this safely? And then after. Okay, now how can how can I enjoy it? It’s this way around. It’s not. It’s not as good. I think so.”

George [127:44 – 127:46]: “Definitely not as fun.”

Jean [127:46 – 128:35]: “Yeah. And to me that’s the best. Honestly, I know I’m gonna say something. Maybe that will sound depressing to many people, but I would rather die very soon because I wasn’t safe enough or get hurt. Because I wasn’t safe enough, but not really worrying about it too much and being happy and not being my entire life stressed. So I would rather die soon rather than dying in in at 100 years old, but leaving my entire life being like, scared about everything, not doing everything the way I want to because oh, what if this happens? And what if this happens? And what if this happens? I think it’s very important to. Yeah. Die young. Happy your whole life. Rather than die old and have been anxious your whole life.”

George [128:35 – 128:37]: “Ideally, die old and happy.”

Jean [128:37 – 129:01]: “Yeah, that’s the best. That’s the best thing. But you can’t do that if you’re very, very scared about your safety. It’s very true. It’s not going to happen. No. My, don’t be stupid and don’t do like stupid things. But when there’s a big risk, maybe you should be safe more. But yeah, I agree with the fact that, like, okay, there’s a very, very small probability that this will happen badly, but something will bad will happen nonetheless. that this will happen badly, but something will bad will happen nonetheless.”

George [129:01 – 129:04]: “So what’s the point in worrying? So what’s the point in worrying? Yeah.”

Jean [129:04 – 129:09]: “What what’s the point in staying in bed because you’re scared. Stay in bed because you want to stay in bed, not because you’re scared.”

George [129:10 – 129:11]: “Yes, that’s a good point.”

Jean [129:11 – 129:11]: “Yeah.”

George [129:12 – 130:08]: “That’s a good point. Yeah. Okay. I have another couple of questions for you. I’ve got another tea that’s brewing at the moment. So this is a 2011 raw puerh from tea bushes that are about a hundred years old. Older than that actually, but I can’t remember exactly how old. So this is a very interesting tea and we won’t get to drink too much of it, but it’s quite tasty. It has a really nice aroma. I brewed it a few many times in the office at Obubu already, so it should be relatively familiar, but I will just leave that to infuse for a little while. Before pouring for you. So I have a 2 questions for me. And these are not specifically Tea questions to say. But there’s a couple of interesting ones, maybe three questions. Let’s start with a Tea. No, let’s not do that.”

Jean [130:10 – 130:11]: “Please take your time.”

George [130:12 – 130:16]: “Okay. Focus on quick quickfire questions.”

Jean [130:16 – 130:18]: “No no no no, I can do that. You know that.”

George [130:18 – 130:27]: “If you were to recommend three business people or organisations for tea orientated people to investigate, what would you recommend?”

Jean [130:31 – 130:45]: “If I were to Recommend somebody. I would recommend you, I think.”

George [130:47 – 130:48]: “Thank you very much Jean.”

Jean [130:48 – 131:43]: “Because, you know a lot about every Tea like, not not like every Tea, but, like, you know a lot about a lot of different teas. You’re very specialist in Japanese tea, but you also know a lot about other teas. And you have a very open minded vision on tea. And you are very, very nice to talk with as well. So I feel like if somebody wants to know about tea, they’ll know about tea and they’ll have a nice conversation with you. The only thing is, I’ll be worried about you because you are a very busy man. And if you start hearing that, I sent you a lot of people to, like, have a chat. You maybe you’ll be like, please stop doing this. I have other things to do. So I would first ask for your consent. Can I give the consent? Can I give your consent?”

George [131:43 – 131:51]: “I forever consent for that. But please also know that I’m excited for you to get back to France, because I’ll be sending people your way who are interested in Tea and based in France.”

Jean [131:51 – 131:54]: “Please do so. I can say. Oh, actually, you should ask George.”

George [131:55 – 131:58]: “Okay. Okay we will do that for each other.”

Jean [131:59 – 133:52]: “Then I would say that in France, if you want to know more about Tea please enter a Palais des Thes shop and ask questions. Because even if they do not necessarily have people there that have been trained for a long time to answer those questions, they will find a person like this for you. So they might even tell you, oh, sorry, I’m either new here or I don’t know so much, but I don’t know. One of my colleagues has been in the industry for a long time, and he is in the shop on Wednesday. Please come back on Wednesday. They will always try and help you learn about Tea. I’m not saying that all of the information will be 100% correct. Because I don’t know all of the tea shops of Palais des Thes. In France there are 70 or something like this, or 60. I don’t remember, but there’s a lot. But I’m saying that it’s you can go there a little bit more confidently than other tea shops. That’s the second thing. And then I think if you want to know about tea, but we’ve already talked about this earlier, you should do the internship program at Obubu. I think it’s the best place because not only you will learn about Japanese tea, but it will teach you so much about Japanese tea that you will start, I wonder. Oh, but then if it’s like this in Japan, it’s probably like this in the other two countries as well. And this will kind of open your vision and understand more how complex it is. It won’t give you necessarily all of the answers to your questions, but it will tell you there are many answers to a single question, and it will tell you how much how many more questions there might be around Tea. I’m pretty sure that every intern at Obubu will tell you I went out of Obubu with more questions than when I arrived, but it’s a good thing. Yeah.”

George [133:53 – 133:58]: “Well, that’s what happened with me too. Yeah, I came in with 100. I left with 200.”

Jean [133:58 – 134:01]: “200? Yeah. Yeah, exactly.”

George [134:01 – 134:10]: “Well, thank you very much. Okay, then. What t related achievement are you most proud of?”

Jean [134:11 – 136:45]: “Okay. I think the day I harvested, processed my own Gyokuro was the thing I was the most proud of because it was also, it turned out really tasty. I really loved it. I really liked the Tea, and usually I when I don’t like and especially not right away, the things that I make, it’s very difficult. I always have a very I have high expectations and I don’t if there’s a slight like thing problem, I’ll be like, oh no, it’s bad because I didn’t do this properly or it could have been better. And I’m not saying it couldn’t have been better. I’m saying that it was very tasty, the Gyokuro. So I, I really, really I was so proud of myself and it’s, it’s, it’s not something that I don’t think it happens very often in one’s life to be proud of yourself that much. I was also very happy because it felt like I was also. I have an amazing teacher for processing in Japan. Hiro san is great, and the fact that I was able to do a good Gyokuro made me also happy, because it was a way of of also saying to Hiro san, like, you’re a good teacher as well. And it made I was proud of my teacher as well. It felt like it was not only me who did that, it was also the teaching I received. And I was happy to be able to show this to Hiro San. And being like, you see, like I used your teaching, like, as much as I could, and it’s it’s a good result. I was very happy that they. I feel like even if the Tea wouldn’t have been so tasty, I would have been proud anyway, to be honest, because I did it alone for I think it was five hours non-stop processing where I. I didn’t ask for help. I didn’t have any problems. Everything runs smoothly. So I was also quite lucky because our factory at Obubu has like glitches everywhere sometimes. So Anyway, I was very, very happy and I think I was even more happy the next day when when Kayo San tried my Tea and said that my Gyokuro tasted like Gyokuro, and I was like, there’s no way she invented that. There’s no way she just came up with this. As in like, oh, I’m going to say that and I will be happy. So for sure she thinks that and that’s that’s great. That’s just so nice. I think it’s the best compliment I could ever receive.”

George [136:45 – 136:48]: “I think it’s also backed up by Nakai sensei.”

Jean [136:48 – 136:51]: “Oh, right. Yeah. I mean”

George [136:51 – 136:56]: “Moe as well, they both said. It’s really good. You made good tea Jean.”

Jean [136:56 – 137:25]: “But I think even though I. It was really, really nice of it was really nice of me and Nakai sensei for, like, giving me feedback and and I and I and I know it’s it’s it’s true. I think that it’s more of a I, I’m, I’m sometimes very negative person and I feel a little bit like they didn’t really have also a choice to tell me that because it’s a gift you give and they’re not going to tell me if they don’t like it.”

George [137:25 – 137:54]: “Okay, let me put it this way then. I didn’t receive the gift. But I heard before you heard this, I heard Moe telling me and telling me that it was, “George”. And forgive me because this could seem rude, but please don’t take it that way. She was like “George. It was really good!”. She was like almost a bit surprised. And Nakai sensei also, you know, they were tasting it and they said it was so good. So I heard this before. You heard this, okay. And they said exactly the same thing. Okay.”

Jean [137:54 – 137:56]: “I’m happy. So, so.”

George [137:56 – 138:02]: “Honestly don’t feel like it was because of that. And because Moyet also said to me, like genuinely, it was really good, but.”

Jean [138:02 – 138:32]: “I know she liked it. I know, I know she liked it. Yeah, I I’m not saying she lied to me. Yeah, yeah. But Yeah, I don’t know. I think also I like hearing it from. I like when I, I hear this kind of comments from somebody else. I don’t know, like, not directly from the person because I feel like, oh, it’s it’s probably true. Then if they’re telling somebody. Yeah, but yeah. So thank you for saying no. I mean, I, I like, I like, I like this Gyokuro.”

George [138:33 – 138:35]: “So you, you’re a good tea maker.”

Jean [138:36 – 138:47]: “I, I also think maybe I got super lucky. I think I’m I don’t think I’m bad. I think I’m just normal. But on that day, also, Gyokuro is easy to process, to be honest.”

George [138:47 – 138:48]: “Oh, here we go.”

Jean [138:48 – 138:49]: “Yeah. No, it’s true.”

George [138:50 – 139:07]: “I, I, I, I did some Sencha that were not so good as well. It’s Sencha is more difficult. No. It’s true. Yeah. Especially when you have maybe a cultivar that’s more dry or the moisture level is low. For those ones, it’s quite it’s quite tricky to get it right.”

Jean [139:07 – 139:16]: “Autumn was very difficult because I was burning the leaves all the time. And Hiro san would tell me, this is too dry. This is too dry.”

George [139:17 – 139:21]: “It’s difficult to know because, you know, you think maybe it needs a bit more, but actually, it’s dry enough.”

Jean [139:21 – 140:01]: “I learned with spring leaves. Yeah. So I tried to apply what I learned with autumn leaves, and that’s a conversation I had with Miwako, because Miwako first learned with Bancha, with autumn and then spring. So when you are moving to another season, you have to unlearn what you’ve learned, learn new things and apply it. And the thing is, in the processing factory, I had so many things happen at the same time that you kind of you are on automatic mode for most of what you’re doing. Yeah. So when I was doing bancha, I was doing a lot of things that I didn’t need to do because it was bancha and not Sencha. So yeah, I don’t know which one is better to start with, to be honest.”

George [140:01 – 140:37]: “This is tricky for me. I think it’s better to start with Bancha because you get a less pressurised environment to make mistakes. Yeah, because then when you get to spring like, you’re ready to like learn it properly, there’s more steps involved. So but you’ve already had a bit of practice in the bancha, so I preferred it that way round. But you know, I didn’t experience it the other way round. But that was because during my internship I did Autumn, and then I came back as a staff member and did spring, so I just had it naturally that way around. But yeah, it’s it’s good fun though.”

Jean [140:37 – 140:54]: “Also, when I started in spring, I already had quite a full month of making tea with in Nepal with Absala, so I already had a little bit of like knowledge when it comes to like how dry the tea should be at the end. Yeah, yeah.”

George [140:54 – 140:55]: “How it should feel, how it should.”

Jean [140:55 – 140:56]: “Feel and things like that.”

George [140:57 – 141:11]: “I did have a quick question about Absala, Where could someone buy Absala’s Tea if they wanted to buy some Tea from Absala or that Absala had made? Where would they look?”

Jean [141:11 – 142:38]: “As of now if you find a Tea that comes from the factory called Kalapani Kalapani, it’s a Absala made it. Not necessarily. Only her. Maybe it was a team involvement thing where other people from Kalapani industry added some of their the like touch to it, but I think that makes it even more interesting. But she is the Tea maker, so she is the one who makes the Tea. Really. So as of now, she she it will be anything that comes from Kalapani. And I don’t know where you can find it, because in France there is only one place for now that I know where you can find it and its Palais des Thes. And then there is a for instance, I know there is a tea shop in Berlin that sells it. It’s a coffee place that is called a Companion Coffee. So if you want to go to that place and say and tell, ask them, can I have tea from. Do you have tea from Kalapani? They might have some because they buy directly from Absala and from Prakash, who is in charge of the Kalapani factory. But it’s a very small factory and it’s only 16 tea farmers. So. And they hand-picked the tea. So there’s not a lot. It’s very rare. So. And I think it’s a good thing for them that it’s there because it’s delicious. So it kind of”

George [142:38 – 142:39]: “It’s a beautiful place as well.”

Jean [142:39 – 142:44]: “It’s Wow. I would actually. The best thing you could do is go there and visit. Yeah. Really? Really. Yeah.”

George [142:45 – 143:14]: “Well, I don’t know about when you were there, but when I went, there wasn’t a, there was a to get there, you had to leave the main road and go like around a mountain road for a few hours before you reach where the where the factory and some accommodation was. Yes, it was in the middle of nowhere. It was beautiful. And I’d never seen a rhododendron tree until that point.”

Jean [143:15 – 143:15]: “A sorry?”

George [143:15 – 143:18]: “Sorry? A rhododendron tree, a tree, a rhododendron?”

Jean [143:19 – 143:21]: “Yeah. Oh. There’s everywhere. They’re everywhere.”

George [143:21 – 143:22]: “Everywhere. Yeah.”

Jean [143:22 – 143:25]: “It’s beautiful. And in winter.”

George [143:25 – 143:27]: “And there’s the crazy honey.”

Jean [143:28 – 143:30]: “Yes. That’s That’s dangerous.”

George [143:30 – 143:35]: “Honey. And they get the get the pollen from the rhododendron tree. Yeah, yeah.”

Jean [143:35 – 143:37]: “And it gives you a little bit high.”

George [143:37 – 143:38]: “A little bit high. Yeah.”

Jean [143:38 – 143:41]: “I didn’t try though. They didn’t have when I was”

George [143:41 – 143:44]: “No, but I did enjoy the yak cheese.”

Jean [143:44 – 143:45]: “I bet.”

George [143:45 – 143:46]: “You didn’t enjoy.”

Jean [143:46 – 143:48]: “I didn’t like it. Too strong.”

George [143:48 – 143:50]: “Tongba?”

Jean [143:50 – 143:51]: “Is that the very hard cheese?”

George [143:52 – 144:00]: “No, the Tongba is the the metal canisters where they’ve fermented some. I forget what the.”

Jean [144:00 – 144:01]: “Gee. The gee?”

George [144:02 – 144:06]: “No, this is an alcoholic drink with a straw.”

Jean [144:06 – 144:13]: “With the. Yes, yes, yes that I had talked about. Yes, I had a lot. It’s delicious. It’s so delicious. So dangerous. Yeah.”

George [144:13 – 144:14]: “You get pretty drunk.”

Jean [144:14 – 144:15]: “They use millet.”

George [144:16 – 144:17]: “Millet?”

Jean [144:17 – 144:21]: “Millet? Yes. Yeah, it’s very good. It’s very sweet. It’s delicious.”

George [144:21 – 144:29]: “So tasty. Anyway, we’ll have to go back. Yeah, I would actually really enjoy that. I’m always looking for a reason to finally make my way.”

Jean [144:29 – 144:32]: “Let’s actually go back together. That would be nice.”

George [144:33 – 145:01]: “I would really enjoy that. Okay. Right. Here’s one. There’s a little bit different. You haven’t heard this one yet. If you could have a gigantic billboard anywhere with anything on it, metaphorically speaking, getting a message out to millions or billions, What would it say and why? It could be a few words. It could be a paragraph. It can be someone else’s quote. It could be anything.”

Jean [145:04 – 145:14]: “Can I put in, like, enormous. Don’t worry. Tea is good. Would that work?”

George [145:14 – 145:15]: “That works.”

Jean [145:15 – 145:36]: “Yeah. And then people would be like, what? Of course it is. Yeah. And then people who know city, they’ll be like. Yeah. Like. Yeah. Like don’t like. We don’t have to worry because Tea is good. And people who don’t know really about Tea, maybe they’ll be like, this person is crazy. But I, I think I would, I would put that.”

George [145:36 – 145:42]: “Yeah, I love it. I love it okay. Don’t worry. Tea is good. Okay. Okay. And one last question.”

Jean [145:42 – 145:43]: “Yeah.”

George [145:44 – 145:47]: “What is your future with Tea look like?”

Jean [145:49 – 147:00]: “I guess we’ll have to figure out. I don’t know. For now, I don’t know. Okay. Excited? Yes. Because I know that even if I don’t necessarily work in the Tea industry, I will always keep travelling. And meeting farmers. That’s what I want to do, and I’m excited. Unfortunately, in this very capitalist world, we need money. But I feel like I have the knowledge to get me where I want to go. And this is the hardest part. This is more difficult thing to get. And I think, like, I have enough Connections as well to will find and experience more. And I want to visit so many Tea countries and I don’t know what’s going to stop me. Honestly, I don’t and I don’t even need. I just need to to have a job, you know? And I can have that. So it’s okay. Yeah. So I’m excited. Yeah.”

George [147:01 – 147:23]: “Well, this summertime I’ll be in Europe or mainly in the UK, but I’ve already spoken with Obubu people and so I think I’ll be in Europe for a bit longer. So I’m thinking about coming over to France. So we should, we should do a Tea class. I think that’d be a lot of fun. Yes, we might have to do a weekend though Jean. Is that okay?”

Jean [147:24 – 147:26]: “Oh, no. I sleep on weekends.”

George [147:26 – 147:29]: “Well, that’s what I was thinking. Is it going to be possible?”

Jean [147:30 – 147:35]: “Of course, it’s easier on weekends because then I won’t be working, so it’s good. Exactly. Yeah.”

George [147:35 – 147:56]: “Okay, well, I think we could figure that out. And I think at some point I need to go back to Nepal and I want to go see all the cool Tea people I met while I was there. And yeah, I think we could we could bring a bunch of other people along with us. I would love to go to Jun Chiyabari again. There’s a really cool place with cool people.”

Jean [147:56 – 147:57]: “I didn’t go to.”

George [147:57 – 148:09]: “Yeah. Awesome. Really cool place. Yeah. And Yeah, it’s a lot of cool stuff. Well, I’m really excited for Jean’s Tea adventures in the future.”

Jean [148:10 – 148:21]: “I’m actually looking forward to your future in Tea as well. I feel like you’re like me. You. Nothing’s going to stop you to, like, go and visit other places as well, right?”

George [148:21 – 148:58]: “Well, yeah, I mean, I, I love Tea and I want to share Tea with as many people as possible. And if I’m able to share Tea stories along the way and, and promote other people’s Tea adventures and Tea projects, then I think it’s only a positive thing. So I mean, I haven’t really shared with you, like, what is the point of all of this? But I want to be able to, like, introduce other people to other interesting Tea people, you know, all over the world. And you, I have to say a big thank you because you are the first person who has done this and was just like, yeah, okay, I’m happy to do it. Yeah.”

Jean [148:58 – 149:08]: “But honestly, it’s very easy. I just have to sit here and answer questions while you take care of all of the technical stuff and preparation and even like a scheduling. So it’s okay.”

George [149:09 – 149:27]: “You’ve been really nice with your flexibility as well. So I really, really appreciate it. And yeah, as soon as this is available, I’ll I’ll be really excited to, to share it with you. And if people wanted to reach out to you, like where, where would be best to reach out to you?”

Jean [149:28 – 149:37]: “I’m a big Instagram guy. Yeah. So Instagram is good. Okay. Yeah. I don’t know how they can find me though but.”

George [149:37 – 149:41]: “Do you share your Instagram or…”

Jean [149:42 – 149:50]: “I mean, it’s my name, so.. Yes. I think you can find me that way.”

George [149:50 – 149:52]: “Yeah, I think it’s probably the easiest.”

Jean [149:52 – 149:57]: “There are some pictures in the Tea field, so that 100% helps. And it’s a public Instagram.”

George [149:57 – 150:09]: “Head to head to peopleoftea.com and go into tea people and have a look for Jean Rosas. And you’ll be able to find a transcript of today’s interview.”

Jean [150:10 – 150:10]: “Or that.”

George [150:11 – 150:14]: “Some photos and I’ll put some contact details there for you as well.”

Jean [150:14 – 150:15]: “Okay. Great.”

George [150:16 – 150:17]: “Daijobu?”

Jean [150:17 – 150:20]: “Yes. It’s it’s totally okay. Okay. Thank you.”

George [150:20 – 150:23]: “Thank you very much, Jean. Enjoy Japan!”

Jean [150:24 – 150:28]: “Enjoy Japan. I’m leaving two days. What are you talking about?”

George [150:28 – 150:31]: “Well, that’s a bit sad. Oh, Jean.”

Jean [150:31 – 150:31]: “Thank you.”

George [150:31 – 150:34]: “Arigato. I’m so sorry it was so long.”

Jean [150:34 – 150:34]: “No.”

George [150:35 – 150:36]: “Bye bye.”

Jean [150:36 – 150:37]: “Bye.”