Central Asia Green tea

In Central Asia tea is something more important than a mere beverage to quench one’s thirst with. The long tea drinking process with but a few short breaks to utter a prayer, when ‘tea drinkers’ sit for hours with a piala (a small bowl) of hot tea in hand, talking, is a separate page in the book of the history of the unique Oriental Culture. Tea opens and closes any meal, newcomers are often received with tea, and in the course of the day tea is often served between meals, each time newly made. Tea is usually drunk from a piala, a traditional Central Asian cup in the form of a small bowl. Each guest is received with tea. To refuse to have a cup of tea is considered impolite. The number of bowls placed onto the table with the hot tea-pot is usually one point larger than the number of guests, the extra bowl used in kaytar, a special tea making ritual, consisting of three repetitive acts of pouring tea into the bowl and the…