Why do the Chinese drink tea? How do you spell tea in Chinese?

Question

Help me! China project again...

Answer 1

i agree with destiny.. chai or chaya is the indian way of callingtea/... south indian.. i am a south indian living in malaysia..

Answer 2

British drink tea too

Answer 3

Chinese tea has been around for thousands of years. Chinese tea was first discovered and used as medicine. Then it evolved into a beverage, and further in to part of Chinese culture.



   Chinese Tea's Infancy

Before 8th century B.C., Chinese tea was primarily used as a medicine.

During the Chun Qiu Period (770 BC - 476 BC), Chinese people chewed tea leaves and enjoyed the taste of tea juicy itself.

Chinese Tea Became Food & Beverage

In the next stage, Chinese tea was cooked like a soup. Tea leaves were eaten along with the soup. Tea leaves were even mixed with food. Ancient Chinese books documented that tea was eaten and used with other spices to cook at this stage.

During the Qin, Han Dynasty (221 BC - 8 AD), simple processing of Chinese tea emerged. Tea leaves were pressed into ball shapes, dried and stored. When served, tea balls were crushed and mixed with green onion, ginger, etc., and then boiled in teapots. This is the point where Chinese tea turned from a medicine into a beverage. Also, it marked the beginning of Chinese tea being used to treat guests.

Chinese Tea as Part of Chinese Culture

Chinese tea evolved from a palace treat to a common beverage during the Jin Dynasty and Nan Bei Zhao (265 AD - 589 AD).

Later during the Tang Dynasty (618 AD - 907 AD), Chinese tea trading had became extremely busy. Techniques in tea plantation and processing advanced in great speed. Lots of famous teas were developed.  

In the Tang Era, Chinese tea was processed and circulated in the form of tea cakes. People started to get serious about making tea. Specialized tea tools were used and tea books were published - including the most famous "Literature of Tea" by Lu Yue. The art of Chinese tea started to take shape. That was a big leap of Chinese tea into the cultural territory.

"Tea became popular in Tang and prospered in Song (960 - 1276)". In the beginning of Song Dynasty, Chinese tea was kept in the shape of balls and cakes. When served, tea was crushed and boiled with seasoning material. But as tea drinkers became more particular, they paid more respect to the original shape, color, and taste of tea leaves. Seasoning material faded out and loose leave tea started to take the center stage.

Chinese Tea from Boiling to Brewing

From the Ming Dynasty (1368 - 1644) onward, loose leave tea had completely taken over. During 1531 to 1595, Chinese tea completed the process of moving from boiling to brewing. Specialty tea tools like YiXing teapots became popular from then on.

Chinese Tea Today

After Ming, numerous types of Chinese teas were invented. The Art of Chinese Tea is being perfected continuously. The famous Kung Fu Cha (or Kung Fu Tea) is one of the landmark development of Chinese tea brewing.



  

China is the origin of tea. It was in the South-West part of China that Chinese tea was first found.

South-Western China falls in the tropical and sub-tropical climate zone. It is covered by large areas of primeval forests. The warm and moist environment is the perfect cradle for tea trees. Huge, 2,700 years old wild tea trees and 800 years old planted tea trees can still be found there.



The Legend

, God of Agriculture (GoA), was one of the prehistoric representatives of Chinese people. He was know to have invented agriculture, medicine. And he was said to be the one who found tea.

In (GoA's Book of Herb), it says "GoA personally tasted hundreds of herb. In a single day, he was hit by 72 poisons. But he discovered the tea tree and used the tea leaves to neutralize all poisons."

That is probably the earliest record of tea among Chinese people.

"CHA", "TAY", "TEA"

The Chinese character "TEA" written with Chinese calligraphy brush.

In Chinese dialects, pronunciation of "tea" is divided into two classes based on phonetic similarity. In mandarin, "tea" is "CHA"; in XiaMenese (FuJian province), "tea" is "TAY".

CHA and TAY had different time and route spreading out to the rest of the world.

It dated back to the 5th century that CHA went beyond the Chinese border. Japanese simply use the Chinese character of tea (see insert on right) for tea. In Persia, tea was CHA and then later evolved into CHAI in Arabic, CHAY in Turkish and CHAI in Russian. Tea was also brought to India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, and Bangladesh where it's called CHA.

TAY started spreading later than CHA but had reached much further than CHA did. Near the end of the Ming Dynasty, AD 1644, British merchants set up trading posts in XiaMen and came into contact with Chinese tea. What the XiaMen people called TAY, the British spelled as TEA. "Tea" then later has become wildly accepted by the English-speaking world. The French THE and German TEE are also decedents of TAY.

Answer 4

because its good for you also they called chay

Answer 5

For the first question, it's healthier than other drinks because they are mostly made out of herbs.

For the second question, "茶"; Cha (meaning :tea).

Here's a blog post regarding Chinese characters you may be interested:

Answer 6

I drink Chinese tea because:

- I'm Chinese, and I've been drinking it since I was a little girl.

- It's good for digestion

- My husband claims that he lost 20 lbs drinking tea after a meal (and he does not diet, he eat whatever he likes, but in moderation of course), so I'm drinking more tea after meals now, hoping that I can lose that final 10 lbs.  (I lost 10 lbs through eating well, exercising, and drinking tea).

Tea in Chinese is "CHA", hence going to dim sum lunch (where you eat bite size portions of everything and drink tea while you're at it) is called "YUM CHA"  ("Yum", meaning "drink".)

p.s.: I think "Chai", as you see in coffee shops, like Chai Latte, is a sort of tea created / formulated by the Natives; so it is not to be confused with "Cha".

Answer 7

I drink tea every day ,so take my word.

Tea is some kind of cordial and is like coffee in this way.

But the feel after drinking tea is much better than drinking coffee.

Drinking tea help me considering questions ,sometime my ability of logic analysis increases and i dont feel tired for several hours.

The feeling of drinking coffee is worse and it motives my angery hided in myself.

Coffee increase the rhythm of my heart too.

After drinking coffee  i  must  relax myself through smoking or watching light movie to break away the angery that coffee brings to me.

I love tea(茶 char） better。

Answer 8

don't get chai or chay confused with the traditional east indian tea drink... :)

~cheers!

Answer 9

The Chinese believed it was good for health (though no one had heard of anti-oxidants back then), improves digestion during & after meals and helps to 'wash' down greasy food (not washing in the sense of removing oils like using detergent but I think more like detoxification). It is also an important social activity (eg. dim sum or yum cha), with a part to play in major functions eg. the tea ceremony in Chinese weddings.

The Chinese character for tea is 茶 or cha (pronounced to the 2nd tone of standard Mandarin)  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Ma...