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By Jane Pettigrew
The international tea symposium held in Seoul last year was part of a concerted effort to co-ordinate three aspects of South Korean tea – tea education, tea culture and tea production. By bringing together key people from those different areas of work, a new awareness and focus on tea is becoming evident in the country; tea consumption is increasing, more and more ordinary citizens are interested in learning about tea and many are involving themselves in the international world of tea. At the conference, as well as presentations given by specialists from outside the country, eminent Korean speakers also gave an insight into the way in which tea education is gaining momentum in South Korea. And in the days following the conference, as delegates traveled around Korea to visit the two major tea growing regions of Boseong and Hadong, their guide and tea mentor president Lee (president of the Tea Association) explained further how tea now holds an important place in Korean society.
National tea events
Listening to those influential and revered leaders of the tea movement and browsing through tourist brochures, guide books and local information flyers, one starts to realize that South Koreans today visit tea festivals and tea culture events in much the same way that people in the UK or US might go to a music festival, a fun fair or amusement park. The Boseong Dahyangje Festival, organized and funded by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, attracts people from all over the country and from abroad, is listed amongst the country’s leading attractions and has been rated ‘the place that students most wish to visit’.
The region’s tea fields also host an annual Festival of Light which attracts thousands of visitors every year. At other times of the year, tourists flock to Boseong to enjoy the calm and romance of the tea mountains which are so beautiful that they are often chosen as the setting for movies and adverts.
In Hadong, the Tea Culture Centre has a museum of tea history and culture, offers seminars and lectures, invites visitors to participate in the manufacture of roasted hand-made green tea and offers the chance to take part in the traditional tea brewing and drinking ceremony. Every summer the town holds the Hadong Wild Tea Cultural Festival in the region’s Tea Culture Square.
Around the country, there are also temples to priests who were influential in spreading knowledge of tea, monuments to the ‘God of Tea’, sacred places of pilgrimage that mark important events in Korean tea history, statues of ancient monks holding teacups, and potteries that specialize in manufacturing the exquisite traditional tea bowls. A ‘tea amusement park’ is planned for the city of Iksan.
Tea events are major national attractions and the exquisite traditional silk dress, the ‘hanbock’, worn by women and girls, has been developed into a sort of uniform for those taking part in such events. These beautiful dresses have already been showcased at fashion events in Washington, Japan, Moscow and Shanghai.
Educational CoursesAt Iksan University, the Tea Culture Management Department runs courses in music, costume, yoga, meditation, food and art to link with tea studies. At Seowon University, Professor Byung gun Park runs a Department of Teaics which aims to coordinate the various areas of study and research. The Department is structured to include social science, humanities, natural science and art and includes such study areas as the ‘The Sociology of Tea’, ‘Tea Manners Education’, ‘History of Tea’, ‘ Botany of Tea’, ‘Tea Chemistry’, ‘Nutrition and Tea’, ‘Theory of Tea Music’, ‘Theory of the Tea Ceremony’ and much more. Each of those subject areas breaks down into more specific and detailed topics and a growing number of teachers, professors and research students are becoming involved. Symposiums are held every month and material from those study sessions is sent to the relevant educational institutions to help them with their programming and planning.
Tea studies are also being taught in junior schools where the children learn about tea etiquette, methods of brewing, and the tea ceremony and there is a plan to start running such courses in high schools in five years’ time. Adult training courses are offered around the country, in colleges and universities, for those who wish to become qualified ‘tea masters’, and on-line courses are available for those who live in more remote areas. Tea students are encouraged to travel abroad to China, Japan, India, the UK, Europe, etc., to learn from other tea cultures and strengthen their own understanding and experience.
As students qualify, they become involved in teaching others or help with the organization of events. Since 2007, the leaders of the new tea movement have created courses and examinations, organized conferences, symposiums and cultural events, have recruited more than 40 professors and tutors and are even planning to set up a chain of tea rooms where different teas would be beautifully and efficiently served and where all sorts of tea accessories would be displayed and sold. For 30 years, the South Korean tea specialists have been trying to establish a stronger movement and they are now beginning to see the fruits of their hard work.
"We want to connect the past with the present through our tea traditions," president Lee explained. "We want to make tea popular through education and culture. The contents of the program need to be developed but we hope that a focus on tea, meditation, art, music and the general spiritual well-being that can be achieved through tea will help South Korea to combat some of the social problems that, like so many nations, we face today – the use and abuse of drugs, violence and aggression amongst young people, and a lack of direction in young people’s lives. Those of us working in the Tea Culture movement would like to think that an involvement in the tea movement, with its purity and simplicity, its honesty, integrity and quality of life will give young people a focus, purpose and direction."
Tea rooms and tea tastesThe first signs of a new interest in specialty teas from outside South Korea were evident in 2003 when Seoul’s first Food & Hotel Exhibition attracted black and green tea packagers from China, India, Taiwan, Sri Lanka and Japan. As the tea trend grows, so more and more tea rooms are opening and steadily increasing their business. Some traditional tea houses still exist where the focus is on locally produced green teas and herbal infusions but in the fashionable parts of Seoul and other large cities, European and British-style tearooms are attracting young consumers who like to go out with their friends to drink typical Breakfast or Afternoon blends and trendy flavored black and green teas mixed with flowers and fruits. The first black tea shop opened some 10 years ago and now there are several.
Rose House is typical with its chintz interior and its menu that offers a Victoria Afternoon Tea Time set or a Diana Afternoon Tea Time set, served with scones, pastries and sandwiches in true British style. And regular customers choose from blends with such names as British Royal Academy, Scotch Whisky, Valentines, English Rose, Royal Blend, Orange Blossom, Ambassador and Irish Cream. And the fact that the menu includes teas from named regions or estates such as Namring Darjeeling, Ceylon Uva and Dimbula Gunpowder indicates that tea drinkers are well-enough informed to know the difference.
But importing teas from other countries is by no means a lucrative part of any tea room’s business. Heejib Byun, who owns Pekoe Tea Room in the centre of Seoul, explained just how expensive this can be.
"All tea imported into South Korea is heavily taxed – 40% + 10% VAT on black tea and 513% + VAT on green teas. And every single tea has to be tested and analyzed by the Korean Tea Authority at a cost of US$1,000 per tea! The inspectors can turn up at your shop at any time and take any tea off the shelf for testing. It usually takes between 10 and 15 days to get the results back," she said.
Heejib relies heavily on blended black and green teas from Germany and Britain and these regulations, which she says are not likely to change in the near future, make running her shop a very expensive business. But, like similar new businesses, she’s doing well. "I have a wide variety of teas and my customers have very varied tastes so it’s hard to say which teas are more popular. But Assams, Darjeelings, Ceylon Orange Pekoes, and English Breakfast always sell well. A number of my customers have switched from coffee to these specialty teas." She sells more tea during the colder seasons but despite the downturn in the economy, she has a good regular clientele and all her happy and satisfied customers bring more friends and family and so the word spreads.
In Gunsan-city, Hairi Jeong recently opened Tea Salon Napolee, her new store with a tiny tearoom where little groups can enjoy elegant tea parties in the British style. She too has recognized the new desire to look beyond South Korea’s boundaries and explore other international tea cultures. Certainly the retail area of her beautiful shop is full of oriental bowls and pots but also offers pretty silver tea strainers, sugar bowls, tea spoons and three tier cake stands that you might find in any British antiques market or American tea room. It’s a charming mix and is a sign of the desire to learn, enjoy, teach, and share the expanding world of tea. In April this year, Haeri also organized a fashion tea which combined the color and refined style of the traditional Hanbok with the elegance of Afternoon Tea.
A paragraph in a brochure that from Boseong sums up the Korean way of tea: "Drinking a cup of tea is not merely an act of drinking a beverage; it is tantamount to realizing spiritual value." Monk Chouiseonsa (1786-1866) a tea ceremony monk and Zen monk of the late Joseong Dynasty, once said, ‘From ancient times, saints all loved drinking tea and this is because of their righteous character, like true gentlemen’ and considered tea drinking as helping to soundly maintain the soul and the body."