Gong Fu Tea|chA - Episode 26 - Gong Fu Cha as a Lifelong Practice

We’re back, y’all! Welcome to season 3 of Gong Fu Tea|chA! In this episode, So-Han discusses what Gong Fu Cha as a lifelong practice looks and feels like. What is it like when you’re first starting out? How does our relationship to the practice change as we get better? What does it look like to be really really good at steeping and serving tea in the Gong Fu style? To illustrate these points, So-Han walks us through some various stages in his own tea-pouring life. Having poured tea for 20 years (while running a tea house for 10 of those years), So-Han’s style and approach to Gong Fu Cha has changed many times. At various points, he’s had to unlearn some of the forms he adopted when he first started pouring tea, to make space for new forms to emerge. So-Han tells a story about cutting up an ox to help illustrate this vision of skill cultivated over time. At Tea House Ghost, we define Gong Fu as “Skill acquired through mindful practice.“ If we’re paying attention to the tea when we’re making it, we can learn how it likes to be brewed, its various forms of expression (there isn’t only one form for each tea!). The teas featured in this episode include: Purple Grace Sheng Tea Coin - Music by: B. Glenn Copeland () Production Credits: Produced/Directed by: Echo Duemig Edited by: Henry Arrambide Cha Xi (“tea stage“ - the tea “set up“ for this episode) by: Montsho Thoth