Which village started Tieguanyin? Never mind they are all related. Mr. Yan and his vast extended family occupies both villages, but the one depicted here is more prosperous. On Mr. Yan’s side boasts of Scholar Wong’s house, the legend of the would-be civil servant who made some tea with the bushes in his backyard because he needed a bribe for the civil exam. Legend was that he became a magistrate because Emperor Qin Long loved his tea and named it Tieguanyin. But now, the oldest Tieguanyin tree has just been found, and I will hike up to see it tomorrow. There’s even a very old temple. This corresponds to the legend of the old man, some 400 years ago, who prayed to Guanyin at his temple and subsequently, she appeared in a dream, pointed to a tea bush, that after waking, he tracked down and propagated. Of course the tea was named Guanyin tea. Now, that legend has always been just a legend I dismissed. Tomorrow though we’ll find out if it’s actually true, at least the temple and tree part. The villages are now locking horns. Which is the true founding legend and who gets to claim Tieguanyin as their invention?
It’s raining hard and slippery here at 800 meters at Anxi mountain range. Hopefully I won’t fall to my death tomorrow ascending much higher by foot. Or maybe, I’ll see some monkeys picking tea! Anything is possible at this point.
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