Page 12 - Seniorstoday December 2022 Issue

Alaimentary

Chai pe Charcha,

Ek Chai Katha

In celebration of International Tea Day, Nagesh Alai is smitten. He writes,
“Yeh sirf ek chai katha nahin, ek prem katha hai”

Camellia Sinensis sounds so exotic. So does the Bharatiya praja and jana as ‘Chai pe
Shennong sound very alien and heritage. Charcha’.
Then we have some eclectic acronyms
like OP, BOP, FOP, GFOP, TGFOP, FBOP
and many such quizzical sounding ones.
There are more intriguing ones like Pu’er,
Oolong, Rooibos, Sancha, Matcha, Sencha,
Suochong, Gyokura.
If I were to randomly quiz around about
these, I am fairly certain that most will not
have an answer nor any idea. To give a
clue, they all have a common vein running
through them and have been satiating the
buds of the world palate and fuelling the
daily charcha of our own people.
Yes, Camellia Sinensis is nothing but the
botanical name of the ubiquitous tea or
chai that we all love to quaff many a day. Is
it any wonder that our country’s Pradhan
Mantri, a branding expert nonpareil,
chose to name his weekly interaction with

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