Hi!

This is my first post in this newsgroup, so I should start
by saying "Nice to meet you" and introducing myself a
little. My name is Troy Howard. I recently moved to the
Portland area. Before that, I lived in China for a year,
working as an English teacher. While I was there, I met my
wonderful fiance LinLin. One of the things we enjoyed doing
was going to the large wholesale markets and perusing the
goods, finding good deals and interesting items. One day we
found the tea market, and spent the whoel day going from tea
shop to tea shop looking at all the different varieties of
tea and tea pots. Before this, I really had no real
experience with tea. I had a vague notion that Jasmine tea
was scented with flowers and that Green tea was "less
processed" than black tea, but otherwise I was completely
ignorant. We returned to the tea markets very frequently, to
enjoy the good conversation and incredible hospitality of
the tea merchants, who would let us sample any variety of
tea, and talk at end about the difference between the types
of tea and processing methods. We built some very good
relationships with the tea marchants, learned a lot about
tea, and built a great love for the beverage.

Well, a few months ago, due to my mother's unsteady medical
situation, I decided to return to America (and start the
VISA/Immigration process for my fiance). I only brought a
small amount of tea back with me, figuring.. you know.. it's
America... We have EVERYTHING. I can just buy some tea when
I run out... Maybe at the Chinese grocery store, or a
specialty tea shop or something.

Well, unfortunately that's not very true. I went to many
places and finally landed at Tao of Tea. To be completely
honest, I respect them very much for doing what they are
doing, but I was quite shocked at the limited selection,
mediocre quality, lack of freshness to the product, and very
high prices at that shop. Even more surprising was the
selection available at the Chinese grocers I went to. To put
it simply, I have been unable to find any genuinely high
quality Chinese teas here. Maybe I need to search more.. but
I have an easier solution!

I asked my fiance to go down to the tea vendors we visited
so often, buy some tea, and ship it to me.

This was mostly for my own use, but it became pretty obvious
that people around me were really interested in having high
quality tea too, and even more obvious that people just want
to learn about it.

So.. I have decided to write a small book about tea, and do
some small scale reselling. I'm not a business, just a
private individual. I'm not going to deal with cases or
other large quantities, just smallish amounts like.. a pound
or less. And I'm not going to package them in fancy tins
that add to the price, or mark them up 5-10 times the amount
they cost me.

Well that was a lengthy introduction to what I really wanted
to post about which is this:

I'm going to have a small private tea tasting event on
Sunday, January 8th. It will be held at a small sushi
restaurant in downtown Portland. There will be a sushi chef
making some nice nibbles to accompany the tea. It will be
free. I will have 33 varieties of high quality Chinese teas
on hand, and we'll try to taste as many as we can.

I can't invite too many people. The sushi chef works at the
restaurant and offered to host the event in exchange for
some tea, but I don't want to stretch the limits of his
hospitality. I want to have about 8-12 people there, plus
myself and the sushi chef, who will be enjoy the tea with
us. Right now there are 4 people on the list, so I'm hoping
to find 4-8 more people to attend.

I know there are at least two regular posters here from the
Portland area (stePH, crymad), and I hope some more.

Also, I want to make it very clear that this is NOT a
commercial interest. I'm not a business. I'm not asking you
to come so I can sell things to you. I mostly want people's
opinions, and reactions to these teas to help me write the
book I'm working on, and I just want to meet other people
with similar interests to me, since I'm new to this city. If
you DO want to have access to some of these teas on a
regular basis, I can have my fiance send some over you. I
can't ship very much at a time because after a certain point
the governments of both China and America want me to pay
taxes and tariffs and incorporate a business and all this
other crap that I don't want to do.

So, if you're interested in sampling some tea, having some
good sushi, I'd love for you to attend. Just email me to
confirm, and I'll give you the details for the event.


Thanks,
Troy Howard

..

> Thanks,
> Troy Howard
>
> .

By trying the Greeks got into Troy. Took them 10 years though.

JB

> By trying the Greeks got into Troy.
> Took them 10 years though.

Troy peers down to look at his stomache, pokes it a few
times, looks down his throat in the bathroom mirror and
says, "Well, I don't see any Greeks in there!"

Well.. I won't be eating any horses anytime soon!




..

Troy Howard wrote:
> I'm going to have a small private tea tasting event on Sunday,
> January 8th. It will be held at a small sushi restaurant in
> downtown Portland.

Hi, Troy. I emailed you about my interest in this. Contact me if
there's still a seat available.

--crymad

Troy Howard > wrote in news:mzfsf.8$Pt6.713
@news.uswest.net:

> I'm going to have a small private tea tasting event on
> Sunday, January 8th. It will be held at a small sushi
> restaurant in downtown Portland.

Portland, Maine or Portland, Oregon?
--
Larry Weil
Lake Wobegone, NH

Oh, sorry! I forgot about the other one. Portland, Oregon.
..