Four hundred years of tea culture
In addition to promoting tea culture, Chen’s group is looking to take part in local arts and culture festivals around Europe. These efforts include applying to the Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe Hamburg (“Hamburg Museum of Arts and Crafts”) to organize a Taiwanese Tea Culture Day, and working with the Berlin Tea Festival and the Hamburg Ministry of Culture and Media to promote a number of programs, as well as helping with the application process for Oriental Beauty tea to receive the European Union’s Protected Geographical Indication (PGI) and Traditional Specialties Guaranteed (TSG) designations.
Chen thinks that Taiwan’s Oriental Beauty tea has a good chance of obtaining the EU designations. The tea originated in a distinct region, the Hsinchu-Miaoli area, and has a unique production process. The latter involves insects known as tea jassids (Jacobiasca formosana) biting the tea leaves, causing the leaves to release terpenes that give the tea a honey- or fruit-like flavor. Obtaining the designations would facilitate the marketing and distribution of Oriental Beauty within the EU, and help raise the international profile of Taiwanese specialty teas in general.
A large part of Angie Chen’s motivation for promoting Taiwanese specialty tea culture has to do with affirming her own identity while living overseas. “We expats want to tell people who we are, what Taiwanese tea is, and what makes it special.”
By promoting Taiwanese specialty teas with her partners and choosing to use tea to tell stories, Chen has dedicated herself to a kind of tea culture mission. “We want to inform people about the 400-year relationship between Taiwanese people, Taiwanese tea and Taiwanese society.” The many elements to the story of Taiwanese tea make the past four centuries “epic and fascinating!”
Taiwanese tea is more than just a tasty beverage. Taiwan’s tea culture includes teahouses that were hotbeds of free thinking and played an important role in the birth of Taiwan’s democracy.
Taiwan is a world leader in the craft of tea making. Getting Taiwanese teas certified by the European Union will further the effort to raise their international profile.