Mr. Wei, a more talented young tea maker I never saw. I have known him for just around 5-6 years now, and he was great to begin with, but reaching new levels every year. When I told him the Ya Sai plagiarism story, he chuckled and said maybe because there are tons of Ya Sai in the market in his town now, courtesy of the neighbors. By tons, he meant, like a few hundred low mountain lbs. He himself is partially guilty- he loves the Ya Sai so much his offspring clippings of the mother tree can now produce nearly a hundred lbs or more, if the weather was normal this year. The reverse marketing did not work out- Duck Poop tea is now a fashionable tea in his town at Phoenix Mountain because he made such a sensation! But sadly, I told him, the Forbes article was not about his tea, which would have been just free PR for him. The article showed a pearl rolled shaped oolong, like a low end Benshan or something not remotely a Phoenix oolong. He wasn’t sure how to take that either, but Mr. Wei, at heart, is a tea nerd, and the business of people misrepresenting his tea for business reasons doesn’t bother him. He loves investigation of technique and improvement in all areas- from agriculture to production to innovative finishes, just to explore. He has just mastered the difficult charcoal pit firing for the highest end teas, and next on his list is pan firing his oolongs. This season, there have only been 2 days of harvest- so I picked up the April 9 Honey Phoenix, and the April 5 Phoenix Honey Red- Red tea he made with Honey Phoenix that was made with the Almond last year, that we call Phoenix Almond Red. Superb, very sophisticated, and blows all other producers on the mountain away. And in exchange? All I brought was some chocolate for his 4 year old son.
The Ya Sai will be harvested in another 5 days. We can’t wait! I guess at least we get the real stuff, while the plagiarizers and their customers get….crappy Benshan.
But just to be sure, I asked if an American tea company had come to buy or interview him on Ya Sai, at all? He stared at me as if I asked if there was alien visitation from Mars. I guess, here at the peak of Wudong Mountain, it’s about the same.
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