▲ In front of the booth of "Youshan Tea House", the staff handed customers cups of heart-warming tea.
On the morning of November 8, the temperature in Shanghai plummeted due to the influence of cold air. At the "Visiting Mountain Tea" booth in the food and agricultural products exhibition area of the Expo, 30-year-old Fu Weicheng handed the cup of oolong tea brewed by hand to the passing audience. In an instant, the smell of tea and hand-warming teacups warmed the entire exhibition area.
At this moment, more than 1,000 kilometers away from the Expo pavilion, in Zhushan Town, Nantou County, Taiwan, Chen Guanlin, the 32-year-old manager of Youshan Tea Visiting Company, is repeatedly studying the traditional family fermentation technique under the guidance of his father Chen Chongjia. The sun shines softly on the faces of fathers and sons through the tea plantations of the frozen-topped mountains.
Tea tasting and tea making scenes appear in Shanghai and Taiwan at the same time, although the locations are different, but they are a warm picture.
"Remembering that you are Chinese"
"I am a fifth-generation tea maker, the first three generations of the family are engaged in traditional tea making, and my father and I are marketing brands." Chen Guanlin named himself the "new generation of tea making".
Chen Guanlin said that "visiting the mountain tea" takes the meaning of "visiting the famous mountains and visiting the famous tea", which represents the lofty ambitions of the ancestors. Their family has a history of growing tea for more than 100 years, making "Youshan Tea Visit" a household name in Taiwan. "We have been at the Shanghai Expo for three consecutive years to publicize and display our long-standing tea culture and traditional tea-making skills on the stage of world commodity display."
▲ The "Mountain Tea House" has used the traditional drying method to this day.
In order to inherit the family's tea-making skills, Chen Guanlin studied biochemistry at university, with the aim of better understanding the study of tea ingredients and tea elements, and reserve knowledge for the deep processing of future tea products. "For example, the degree of fermentation of oolong tea and black tea is not the same, and now we still rely on the experience of the master, if we set a unified temperature and humidity, through modern technology to monitor the internal composition of tea, so that people can be liberated from heavy labor."
Influenced by his father and grandfather since childhood, Chen Guanlin has a deep affection for the family's traditional tea making process. "Although modern tea-making techniques can improve the production efficiency of finished tea, the old craftsmanship left by the ancestors is the root and soul of brand development."
"Although our tea factory is in Taiwan, our tea cultures in the two places have the same roots, and we always remember that we are Chinese." Chen Guanlin said that the Expo has created a very rare display opportunity for Taiwanese enterprises, "we have not only gained popularity, but also improved the reputation of our products."
"She gave Grandpa a cup of tea"
Fu Weicheng is the manager of YouShancha's suzhou store. "I am a native of Fujian, and since I was a child, I have listened to the elders tell the story of 'one family on both sides of the strait', but at that time I didn't understand much, until I went to middle school and read Mr. Yu Guangzhong's 'Nostalgia', I understood our flesh and blood relationship with Taiwan that blood is thicker than water." Fu Weicheng said that after graduating from college, he chose a Taiwanese company in Fujian and "wanted to go to the other side of the sea from the bottom of his heart."
▲ Fu Weicheng is introducing new tea products to customers.
In December 2014, during a chance tea drinking opportunity, Fu Weicheng met Chen Chongjia, chairman of Taiwan Youshan Tea Visit Company, in Shanghai, and agreed to work at the company's stores in the mainland. Because of his excellent work, in July 2015, Fu Weicheng was given the opportunity to go to the headquarters of the Taiwan company and the tea factory to observe and learn. "As soon as I got there, I was deeply impressed by the rigorous attitude of the company in making tea, and I felt that this enterprise was worth my hard work." Fu Weicheng said that in his early years, in order to dry the tea well, Chen Chongjia could even carry a tea basket to chase the sun in the mountain field, "The trip to Taiwan left a very deep impression on me."
After returning to Suzhou, Fu Weicheng spent all his energy on store operations. He said: "I have been working in 'Visiting Shancha' for 6 years, and few people from the headquarters come to visit the store, and we trust each other. ”
One night in May 2020, when Fu Weicheng was about to turn off the lights of the store and prepare to leave work, a girl with a dignified expression and her hair wet by the rain rushed into the store. "She wants to buy pure Taiwanese oolong tea." After a brief chat with the girl, Fu Weicheng learned that "the girl's grandfather died in Taiwan, and because of the epidemic control and other reasons, she could not return to Taiwan to fulfill her filial piety, so she wanted to toast her grandfather with a cup of tea from afar."
Since then, Fu Weicheng often told this story to the store staff. "Whenever I talk about this story, I will be inexplicably moved in my heart, Taiwan and the mainland are actually not far away, they are in each other's hearts."
"The place with the smell of tea is home"
Allowing people in the world who love Chinese tea culture to drink good tea made by upstream camellia has always been the common ideal of Chen Guanlin and his father Chen Chongjia. In addition to opening shops in the mainland, they also opened up visits to the United States, Britain, South Korea and Japan. "Good things should be learned to share with friends, which is a traditional virtue of our Chinese culture." Chen Guanlin said that the company's overseas layout is to better spread the traditional tea culture, make friends, and "make our circle of friends bigger and bigger."
"My father in Taiwan is mainly responsible for growing tea and making tea, strictly controlling the quality of tea imports, I am currently mainly doing the company's domestic and foreign brands, we are one after the other, both father and son, but also partners." Chen Guanlin said that the family business can do well because the family is united and working together in one direction.
"Holding the Ciie For four consecutive years, we Taiwan businessmen obviously feel that the door of the motherland's opening up to the outside world is getting wider and wider. I often talk to overseas Chinese and overseas Chinese friends about the current development of the motherland, and they are also proud of the growing strength and prosperity of the motherland from the bottom of their hearts. Chen Guanlin said that in the United States and britain, many Chinese who are wandering abroad, in order to drink a sip of tea from their hometown, even spend a few hours driving to the store in the city where you visit the mountain tea, "take a sip of tea, smell the tea, they are very satisfied." ”
▲ A cup of oolong tea has the taste of home.
In Los Angeles, a 70-year-old man with Fujian ancestry brings his wife, son and grandson to a store in Accadic every weekend for tea. "When people are old, they will inevitably miss their homeland, even if they can't return to China often, but drink a sip of oolong tea, the old two will be happy and happy for a long time." Chen Guanlin said, "There is a tea fragrance where the home is, the Chinese and wanderers who have been wandering outside for many years, they each have their own stories, in front of them is not a simple cup of oolong tea, tea has their faint nostalgia and the taste of distant home."
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Reporter: Horsepower