Darjeeling Tea

According to the Healthline website, ‘Darjeeling tea is often called the “Champagne” of tea, as it boasts top-quality flavour, aroma, and quality.’ It goes on to list the various health benefits and caffeine ratios (as much as strong coffee, I understand). It may well be the champagne of the tea world, but I have yet to find pictures of it being used by lottery winners to toast their good fortune. Last month, I was bought a packet for my birthday by someone at the chapel. At first I could not distinguish it from that dreadful Green Tea about which I have already written, though I soon began to appreciate its rich flavour with every sip.

Darjeeling was developed by Scotsman Archibald Campbell in the 1840s within India’s Darjeeling region. He was an ‘economic botanist’, and sought a method to grow tea commercially outside of China, while developing the poor region in which he worked. From a population of 100 in 1839, there were 10,000 souls living and working there ten years later. He planted the tea in 1841 from seeds and plants smuggled out of the Chinese empire. Campbell also abolished slave labour in the region, which not only bred cruelty and resentment, but retarded economic development. Darjeeling tea therefore improved the lives of many thousands of people over the years, providing paid jobs and infrastructure from which the great nation of India continues to benefit. Perhaps this is another reason why I like the stuff. It does not just have a pleasant taste, but its sales benefit people who lived and live many miles away. In Isaiah 58, the Lord chides His people for their religious fasts while exploiting their labourers. God cares about people who work, the conditions under which they toil and the remuneration they receive.

And so should we.