December 26, 2011

Meet the Teamakers

Here’s Tiffany:  Retail Renegade, Photographer and Tea Maven. Tiffany will  graciously serve you a flight of tea or may be found with a cap on packing boxes.

Q: Best cup of tea you’ve ever had?

A: Milk Tea in the mountain tea houses of Nepal, Chai bought on Indian railway platforms, hot Apple Tea in even hotter Eastern Turkey, High Tea in London (served with champagne!), Darjeeling Tea with Steve, Kim and our boys in Darjeeling, and Red Bush Tea in South Africa.

Q: Worst cup of tea?

A: Yak tea (also called Tibetean tea) in Nepal. Absolutely vile. Black tea, yak butter and salt – an acquired taste I never acquired.

Q: Which famous figures in history would you most like to have tea with?

A: Dorothy Parker. You can’t go wrong with a woman who said, “If you can’t say something nice about someone, sit next to me”.

Q: What do you most hope to read in the tea leaves?

A: I don’t read tea leaves, I read books like a normal person.

Q: What do you think about while your tea is steeping?

A: Ha ha. As if I have time to “think” while the tea is steeping. I’ve got a dishwasher to unload, clothes to fold, a certain child’s breakfast to make . . . well, you get the picture.

Q: What gets you really steamed?

A: Cruelty to animals.

Q: What’s your motto?

A: “I have found out there ain’t no surer way to find out whether you like people or hate them than to travel with them.” Tom Sawyer Abroad (Mark Twain)

A: What is your auto?

A  Land Rover Discovery. It is my one of my dream cars (my other dream car? a Land Rover Defender). When I was young(er) and backpacking around the world I met a guy in Istanbul who’d driven his 1952 Land Rover to India and was headed back to England. Okay, I mainly drive my car between Beaverton and Portland and will likely never drive it to India but it gives me a little thrill to know I could.

Q: Do you have any bumper stickers on your auto?

A: I love bumper stickers! They allow a person to be preachy from the safety of a moving vehicle. My car sports one bumper sticker, “A dog is for life, not just for Christmas”.

Q: What is the shortest path to peace?

A: 42.

Q: If you were a tea bush, what kind would you be?

A: Is this a trick question?

Photo courtesy of Elaine Lowry ¦ SapphireStudio