Tea is botanically camillia senensis. The plant first grew in southern China & Burma & it has spread over Southeast Asia & fanned into a deep history around the world. The "earlier" (British) name for Sri Lanka was Ceylon... carried forward as a common nomenclature for many teas from the island nation.
I had an early love of tea when I was in high school... before I came to prefer drinking coffee in college, as being more "adult"... generally available & later becoming its own obsession... I've mostly ignored tea for decades.
Curiously, my tastes have taken a turn back as I came to enjoy tea again on our trip to Sri Lanka... even though the coffee there was also very good! Since returning home, both Stephen & I are regularly choosing tea.
Leaving Bentota after five nights, we were invited to stop at the home a brother of Nabeel, the very handsome & equally affable liaison of the owner of Boutique 98 (plus two other guest houses Joel had booked for this trip).
He became one of our favorites. The brother had a tea plantation with a beautiful home, also a brand new guest-house. We were traveling/moving about in a new... or being-restored economy, underpinned by deep & valuable history. Happily fresh version of hospitality!
Tea was served... we chuckled when seeing the tag... but yes, the tea in these bags was grown here!
The very modern house crowns a hill, tea plantings dropping down the hillsides. Idyllic.
'Reminds one of Tuscany...
But... next stop: Galle, an old Portuguese Fort...
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