A jumbo ‘earthquake,’ from the eyes of a nine-year-old

by Sudipta Bhattacharjee

I was delighted to get an email from Sudipta. She wrote: "I decided to put my work aside for an hour and write about the elephants in the tea garden. I just let some words tumble out from my memories..." So glad you did, Sudipta. I loved reading this. So will you, dear reader. - Gowri

This season of earthquakes and tsunamis across the globe reminded me of the terrifying sensations of feeling a house, especially a wooden one in a tea garden, rattle incessantly in the dead of night, aeons ago, when I was a little girl. My uncle, Sukumar (Dhruba) Sengupta, a tea planter, was then posted in Assam’s Udalguri district, bordering Bhutan, in a garden called Majuli. To a nine-year-old from the bustling city of Calcutta, the flight to Guwahati and the long but smooth drive through scenic countryside to the sylvan foothills was nothing short of a magical journey.

Majuli. Pic sourced from the internet by the author

 We visited my uncle once in four years, and this as the first time I was old enough for the impressions to register. Once the blue hills, possibly those of Bhutan, began to materialize in the distance, my genes (being the granddaughter of forest officers and being blessed with botanist parents) exerted themselves into a random dance of joie de vivre.

Once the neat rows of tea bushes heralded the garden zone, we wallowed in the fresh fragrance that nature bequeaths on the plantations. As we left the main road for the garden trail, there was a delicious sense of anticipation of seeing the manager’s bungalow.

We loved it on sight! My aunt Tanima, famed for her flower gardens, had also made fruit and vegetable patches along the lawn. She took me on a tour to show the raspberry patch before we could sample her delicious raspberry jam for tea. Of course, we had not been inducted into the joys of drinking tea then; a huge glass of milk, courtesy the garden cows, was in store for us!

We were tired from the lengthy journey and the excitement of travel and went to sleep after an early dinner. The call of crickets was the last sound I registered, before the calls of the boukathakou bird (possibly the Indian cuckoo or Cuculus Micropterus) woke us up at the crack of dawn.

My uncle had two dogs. A German Shepherd called Rex and a tiny pup named Tipu Sultan! I was terrified of dogs at that time and avoided the duo all morning. I was perched on the swing near the gate when my uncle returned from his morning rounds. He disembarked from the jeep and strode purposefully in my direction carrying something. Before I realized his intention, he dumped Tipu on my lap! Frozen with terror on the swing, my feet separated from the sanctuary of terra ferma, it took me a few minutes to realise that the warm bundle nestling on me was looking up with more than a modicum of trust and craving a touch. Guided by my uncle, I tentatively touched the little head. The tail wagged a wee bit, encouraging and fostering what has turned out to be a lifetime of canine adoration!

That night, high on the accomplishment of my foray into the animal world, we went to sleep. Only to be jolted awake a little later with a thundering sound. There was the unified chorus of a herd of wild elephants trumpeting at the bungalow doorstep. The rooms shook and rattled. As we cowered in fear on our beds, the sounds were compounded by shrieks and shouts of the garden workers, beating on metal and holding burning torches to drive away the jumbo family.

The chaos continued with Rex and Tipu Sultan barking inexorably, adding to the cacophony. Finally, after what seemed like ages, the sounds subsided and the herd possibly moved off. But not before leaving their mark on the vegetable patch and devastating my aunt’s prized flower garden.

We were on tenterhooks every night for the rest of our brief stay, but other than seeing mashaal (burning torches) in the distance, we were spared other close encounters with the pachyderms. Years later, I learnt that Udalguri was an elephant corridor and can now applaud the efforts being undertaken for their conservation in the tea garden zone and elsewhere in this Assam district.

Meet the writer:

 Sudipta is a career journalist who joined The Telegraph in Kolkata as a trainee in 1985 and retired at the end of August as Resident Editor (Northeast). She moved to Shillong in 1992 after her husband was transferred to Meghalaya on a three-year posting and continued to report for The Telegraph from there. She travelled to the United States on a Fulbright Research Fellowship in 2004-5 and returned to base thereafter. Her tryst with tea gardens began as a four-year-old to Kakajan in Upper Assam, where her uncle, Sukumar (Dhruba) Sengupta was posted. She and her family visited him in Majuli Tea Estate in Assam in 1970 and 1973 and by herself in December 1975 to the Dooars, when he was posted at Damdim Tea Estate. She has visited gardens in Darjeeling (where a tea tasting session was hosted for her), the Nilgiris and Munnar, Sri Lanka and hopes to share her experiences through this blog, of which she is an avid follower.

Sudipta is now adjunct professor of media science and journalism at Brainware University. 

Here is the link to all the stories Sudipta has written for this blog: http://teastorytellers.blogspot.com/search/label/Sudipta%20Bhattacharjee

Is this your first visit here? Welcome to Indian Chai Stories! Do you have a chai story of your own to share? Send it to me here, please : indianchaistories@gmail.com.

My name is Gowri Mohanakrishnan and I'm a tea planter's wife. I started this blog because one of the things that I wouldn't want us to lose in a fast changing world is the tea story - a story always told with great seriousness, no matter how funny - always true (always), maybe a tall tale, maybe long, short, impossible, scary, funny or exciting but never dull. You will find yourself transported to another world!

Happy reading! Cheers to the spirit of Indian Tea!

ADD THIS LINK TO YOUR FAVOURITES :

https://teastorytellers.blogspot.com/

A Taste of Honey

 by Gayathri Ramachandran

Hello again, dear readers! I am most happy to bring you another piece by Gayathri, who loves her cup of tea and everything to do with it. Read on to see how she makes a most interesting connection between tea and honey. - Gowri

When I went to a workshop titled 'Ghats Honey- Wild Honey Hunters'…little did I know that I would be tasting, squeezing the combs, chewing a little bit of the comb with the honey and wax still intact !!

Honey is a brown, sticky, sugar-saturated solution made by bees. Honey bees or forage bees collect nectar from flowers and add some enzymes to the nectar. Voila! Pure honey! The similarities between tea and honey are mind boggling. 

What is the connect between tea and honey? Tea plantations have highly skilled workers at various levels. Apiculture has specialized skill in people who locate, harvest, taste and recommend honey that we are looking for. We know how sommeliers explain with such elan how different types of tea, coffee, wine or honey challenge your taste buds and you are left with a lingering memory such as ‘Wah Taj’, ‘Want a Cupa’ or ‘Hi Honey’. For example, the Stingless bee honey leaves a fruity and lemony taste first and leaves a sweet taste on the second helping.

Honey differs in aroma, taste and feel on the tongue and these are specific to the region. So also with tea, and it is this quality that makes some prefer one type of tea or honey over the other!!

As in tea plantations, the specialists - in this case apiarists - know the terrain, the season and the location, furthermore how nimbly you can take out honey with just hands without any machinery to harvest it. The hills, the forests, the thick growth are easily accessed by the hill people and hill tribes. They have special skills to locate, and then to climb the daunting terrain and get to the beehive. The tea plantations don't have such challenging terrain to harvest tea leaves! Note from editor: I know planters will disagree!

The benefits of both are innumerable. Have you ever tasted the best tea served with brown sugar, karupatti (palm candy) or honey ? 

In the one-liner 'Coffee, Tea, or Me' I would love to replace 'me' with 'honey'. Pure honey without going through the factory regimen, stays completely pure and unadulterated. The health benefits of tea and honey combinations are numerous.

Bee keeping or apiculture is an awesome industry. Technology helps to develop and extract honey as a cottage industry. In the Western Ghats the apiculturists strive hard to get unadulterated medicinal honey. They call it Ghat wild honey.

The expert in the 'sensory attributes of honey', or honey sommelier, is an authority in the way honeys taste, smell and feel in the mouth. They assist people in understanding the differences and subtleties that arise from different regions, flora and seasons, so they can gain a much deeper appreciation for honey. So also expert tea tasters.

Similar to tea, the health benefits of a spoonful of honey everyday include diabetes management, healing bones and joints, cancer management and better heart health. By adding a teaspoonful of honey to tea, we can enjoy a plethora of metabolic boosters.

Meet the writer:

Gayathri Ramachandran

 

 

My grandfather Mr TS Mani Iyer and his younger brother Natesan Iyer had a transport Company in Pollachi which transported chests of tea from Valparai to various places. My grandmother, clad in the traditional nine yards sari, would entertain her British guests - the 'dorasanis' - to tea with impeccable taste. 

 

However, I was brought up on a diet of coffee till I moved to New Delhi after marriage. There Tea became 'the word' gaining all importance. Living among the Punjabis, this exotic beverage became a centre point in socialising during wintry afternoons. I was introduced to kadak chai, adhrak chai, masala chai, cardamom chai, green chai and white chai. 

 

'Chai ho jaye!' is familiar sweet music welcomed with cheer while you play cards or just have some plain 'gup shup'. Oh! my taste for tea grew and the bitter 'after taste' of coffee was replaced with the milder invigorating drink. I enjoy tea in various forms, white, green or golden, with or with out milk, sweet or just black!!!  

 

Read more by Gayathri here: http://teastorytellers.blogspot.com/search/label/Gayathri%20Ramachandran

 

Is this your first visit here? Welcome to Indian Chai Stories! Do you have a chai story of your own to share? Send it to me here, please : indianchaistories@gmail.com. My name is Gowri Mohanakrishnan and I'm a tea planter's wife.

I started this blog in 2018 because one of the things that I wouldn't want us to lose in a fast changing world is the tea story - a story always told with great seriousness, no matter how funny - always true (always) - maybe a tall tale, maybe long, short, impossible, scary, funny or exciting but never dull. You will find yourself transported to another world! 

This is the link to all the stories on this blog: https://teastorytellers.blogspot.com/ Be sure to add it to your list of favourites! Happy reading!! Cheers to the spirit of Indian tea!