Garam chay ki pyali h..

If in my life I got a chance to thank somebody then first I will thank my parents for all their selfless love, care and manners, which they taught us and after that I will thank to the person who introduce me to my first love...
Tea; my first love...

I promised to myself years back that whenever I will be able to write something I will write about tea and I am keeping my words by giving it some space in my blog...
I think in India, after vvs laxman, if some one is not getting the respect they deserve then it is tea. I don’t know whether hadappa people used to take tea or not but from the time I knew about modern world, tea is serving people....Though I am little disappointed with the way people treating tea...

Because I believe that something so much multipurpose like tea should be respected. Personally in my life tea has supreme importance as lots of my experiences are based around tea...Tea is oldest friend I have. Me and tea have spend almost 20 years together......It always help me to get over the tough time...Whenever I want to think over something, it was there with me...In all my up-downs as far as i can remember apart from my family and some friends,it was there.

As my life has seen many up and downs in the same way tea has also seen many forms...In my views tea is not only used to wake up in the morning besides it serves many other purposes....

Now i am going to tell some of my experiences with having tea in background.
TEA AT GEC, UJJAIN: - As I can remember when I was doing graduation from GEC, Ujjain...there all our gossips were based around tea since at that time we were short of money usually so the scene was like 4-5 friends are sited around a stove or heater and gossiping or leg pulling each other while tea is getting ready and whenever any new person joins we put some more water in tea (without considering the quality) and start gossiping again....At that we had hardly 2-3 glasses so all 10-12 people take their tea in those limited glasses together.
Lots of proposals(poor gals!!!) were planed around tea. Lots of arguments settled around tea. All our tensions related to love, luck, carrier and life were ressolved(basically forgetted..) at tea. At the time of exam, we used to study together and at around 1-2 am we took a break for tea and did lots of gossips(Usually we did gossip all the time but that was official time). I still remember about a friend vikrant who always called us in evening and said “oye!! Main aa raha hu.. chay pilana”..then he came to our room by driving his scooter almost 1 km. sometimes I ask him “yar!!why don’t you take tea at your own place instead of burning your petrol and coming here.” Then he always replied proudly “kanjar!! You will not understand the pleasure when some one is owing you a tea(people are damn rascle) ". So this was our bond with tea.

TEA AT INDORE:-

When I was in Indore preparing for GATE, we (me, upendra, jayant and arun) drink tea more then we drink water. It was like we used to take it to start our day, tea after lunch so that we can read something before taking noon's nap(mind it wasn't sleep). After waking up in noon, we take tea to resume the day(From then i assume,tea is dominating my blood). Then we go to our GATE coaching, in case we reach their early, we went straight to a tea stall to make ourself fresh for class (our prejudice). In case someone is going staright to the class without tea, it was almost like insult to rest of the people(our rules-our regulations).
Hmmm after 1 week or 2 we started feeling that no longer we can afford tea now the primary reason was that a cup of tea cost us 2 Rs/- hence each day 4 tea costs us around 8 Rs per day. But we were not in mood to leave our 5th companion (the tea) so decided to think some alternative .One fine day we got something (which we considered as “bhagwan ne hamari sun li”) That in a nearby poor colony area there is a tea shop where tea cost 1rs/- but the problem was that all labors, rikshawalas kind of people came there .Well after some mind digging arguments we compromised to our status(Now you can imagine our love for tea) .But soon we found there was a new problem ,that shop owner was an ex –freedom fighter .so he always used to speak a lot about old people, old time, new generation etc. Sometimes it was tough to bear him but still we never mind that old man just for sake of our tea. Many times things became severe when that old man drank because then he started his lectures in English. One of his famous dialogue was “peoples are damn rascal”.
Anyway as long as we live there, we bear all this tortures just to mak sure a regular and affordable tea. This was one of sacrifices we made for tea.
TEA AT IIITM:-
After this I qualified GATE and reaches to IIITM, There I got some new friends and retained one old friend (my tea). In IIITM me and my friends (ankit and tushar) gossips a lot around tea. That tea listens very patiently our discussions about all the girls of IIITM (particularly who have boyfriends), some geeks, some bullies, our guide and god (ypp even he can’t save his ass from us). Tea was like ‘amrat’ for us…We became im-mortal during our tea time. All our creativity came in to the picture when we are having tea. I still claim that one of the binding factors of my friendship with tushar and ankit, besides our bad luck was our gossips around tea.
Tea with Vijay: - Besides tushar and ankit, vijay was my good friend (at least from my side) there. Well he was a stub-born critic (I mean it). He was a critic of everything (I mean people, girls, guards, mess workers, seniors, juniors, teachers ,everything ) so when I take tea with him I became the victim of all his frustration. But I never complained just because I don’t want to loose my tea.
STATIONS TEA:-
In any family some people are good which spread the good name of family while some are bad which did bad deeds and whole family suffers for which. In the same way, station’s tea is bad member of otherwise good tea family. This tea has everything that is defaming the tea i.e. more costly, more water then milk, no taste etc.
CORPORATE TEA:-
Till now I have told you about my experiences with tea when i was in college. After my college I joined NSN and reaches to ALTTC Ghaziabad. It was start of my corporate life so my tea has also got some corporate touch. ALTTC was first place where on the name of corporate my tea has bear lots of humiliation and insult. Here on the name of tea we got hot water, milk powder, tea powder, sugar powder everything separately. The scene was like a body is divided into its basic elements. Personally for me it was like separation of a great gang of friends which when together forget their individual colors. In short ALTTC people raped my first love. But soon I discover that everywhere in corporate tea got the same treatment.
FIGHT TO SURVIVE:-
The biggest competition of tea is coffee. The coffee is becoming the status symbol now. With some nice slogans like “a lot can happen over coffee” it is replacing the tea slowly. But I strongly feel that besides corruption, tea is other thing that connects nation. Coffee belongs to rich people while tea belongs to ‘ aam aadmi’. In different states the form of breakfast may change but tea will be integral part everywhere.
Me and my father is very good friend and I feel there are 3 reasons for this:
(1) We have good understanding. (2) Cricket (3) ready for tea anytime.
Out of this I know 3rd reason is most irrelevant but believe me that is most important.
So whatever I am writing here, you can take it as genetic motivation. I can confidently say that in my blood there will be more tea then any other liquid.
As a true lover of tea this was my salute to tea.