Sweetened Tea Houses
In Tibet By PUNCOG ZHAXI
Photos by WANGQUG
Sipping tea in the Xoigunggyai Tea House is really entertaining.
Outside a sweetened tea house
in Lhasa are parked numerous bicycles and motorcycles. Inside
are seated crowds of people.
In Lhasa and other parts of Tibet, there are
many tea houses like this. Drinking sweetened tea has become
a Tibetan tradition. Many say Tibetans learned to drink sweetened
tea from the British invaders. But many others argue that
the Tibetans learned it from the Indians and Nepalese. While
most Tibetans make sweetened tea in a way unique to themselves,
people in Yadong and Gyangze, close to India, follow a method
similar to that in India.
The Tibetans make sweetened tea also with black
tea, but with a taste different from that made by the British,
Indians or Nepalese.
People in their 80s still remember the few
sweetened tea houses in Lhasa and Xigaze. Beggars went there
to seek money, and prostitutes looked for customers. Facing
this situation, people of decent status and women tried to
shun these tea houses as much as possible.
Nonetheless, the Tibetans loved sipping sweetened
tea at home. Ordinary people made sweetened tea with home
milk, while the rich did so with canned milk imported from
India. Be they poor or rich, they drank two or three cups
of sweetened tea generally in the afternoon. Sweetened tea
was also served at wedding feasts.
Famous sweetened houses in the past included
the Bottom Leaking Tea House, which sold bottomless dumplings
stuffed with minced meat; the Owl Tea House, open at night
only; and the Donkey Drivers?Tea House, where people from
rural areas gathered.
Cezhoi Tea House, also called Guangming store Restaurant,
is one of the most attractive.
Brewing sweetened tea.
Locang Tea House, one of the oldest.
A Mosque tea house.
Outside a sweetened tea house.
MODERN TEA HOUSES.
Before the notorious "cultural revolution",
in which the whole of China reeled from 1966-76, most sweetened
tea houses in Lhasa were privately owned. They were all banned
and didn¡¯t reopen until China¡¯s introduction of the reform
and opening program.
Market economy being practiced in Tibet proves
to be a hotbed for the revival of sweetened tea houses. Over
the last 20 years, they flourished with each passing day.
In order to attract customers, many play pop music, and add
entertainment facilities such as caroms, Chinese chess and
playing cards. There are also those who install large color
Tvs, VCD and DVD players.
Most of these tea houses are not elegantly
decorated. Drinkers get their own glasses from a plate. Each
is required to use only the one allotted to him. They sit
around a wooden table, on which they put their coins. Whenever
the girls come to fill their glasses, they give them coins
to pay for the tea and possibly also as a tip.
Most tea sippers are Tibetans. People with
a high education tend to shun tea houses which lure customers
with entertainment facilities. They tend to chat while sipping
tea in a quiet atmosphere. Old Lhasans love to talk loudly
in certain tea houses....
It has become a custom for working Lhasans
to drink tea in the morning, but not in the afternoon. However,
people from the rural areas, who do odd jobs in Lhasa, love
to join the jobless in drinking sweetened tea in the afternoon
and playing caroms.
