Teaclipse Recap (pics inside)

Thanks so much to everyone who came out during the Teaclipse.

This afternoon was a blast and all 4 of of our tea bars were full!

Here's a great post written by So-Han Fan about the event:

Our teahouse was in the path of totality for the 2024 solar eclipse. We didn’t have any special events but the teahouse was and continues to be flooded with people from out of town who came here for the eclipse.

Seeing the effect of the eclipse from the perspective of a resident is interesting because of the degree to which people are striving to capitalize on it - we’ve heard horror stories about overbooked festivals and unpredictable Texas weather threatening to spoil the spectacle - from tornado warnings to harmless clouds.

It reminds me of one time, walking home from Marley Fest and seeing hundreds of tourists lined up on Congress Bridge, under the bridge, and crowded on boats on the river. They were all there to experience one of Austin’s most famous spectacles - the emergence of a massive colony of migratory Mexican free-tail bats at sunset.

My first time seeing it changed my life, as I was stuck in traffic on that same bridge on my way from California to New Orleans. Spontaneously a cloud of tiny bats erupted from under the bridge, flapping furiously and drifting as a single mass over the water. For years I drew that image of bats against the sunset over and over; that experience was then beginning of my special connection with bats, the reason the bat is the retainer for the West China Tea logo, and it’s why Austin is called Bat City.

It’s a breathtaking expression of the power of nature - when it happens. Sometimes they don’t, and that afternoon after Marley Fest they didn’t. Periodically a single bat would flitter out and be met with a cascade of flashes like an A-list celebrity stepping onto a red carpet. The frustration and disappointment in the air was palpable - but bats, like the sun, the moon, the clouds, and the rain can’t be controlled, and what can’t be controlled can’t be bought or sold.

Tea is a force of nature. We can buy it and sell it but we can’t capture it. Year over year it will change with the weather or with age, steeping by steeping it is different and new. You can’t drink the same tea twice. You can’t make it obey you. Trying to is like trying to grasp the flame off of a candle.