Proposed suggestions include:
> 1. hei cha
> 2. dark tea
> 3. fu tea (note: a new name meaning "happiness")
> 4. return to original, direct chinese tranlation: black tea
None of these is compelling, though I'd favor hei cha. Following on Lew's point, it's a pronounceable term that might carry the cachet of exoticism before becoming a mainstream term.
However, there seem to remain plenty of alternatives. In the West, more usually equates to better. What about twice-cured, fully cured, perfectly ripe, 100% ripe, mature, complete, etc.?
Seems like a good place to look for market-embraced terminology would be other affordable-luxury consumables that have undergone somewhat similar processing like wine, spirits, cigars, c***** and cheese.
if following other recipes like cheese, wine, etc is the way, then the name must be given by a chinese, because then not only you are giving a name to a thing but adding to the product/proccess attributes that are fully developed in the mind of the ones that receive in first hand the tea, i.e. chinese people, the one that invented it. i mean, not the tea i general, this particular tea...
the same way it happened with jerez, porto, parmigiano, ... for a foreigner are just names, for a local is more than that. in the translation you are loosing much information, isn't it? the rest of us will have to adapt our mind to what they mind. i don't translate wulong (yes, my pronunciation is far away from the original), the same way i can't translate lemon curd, and when i here paprika for pimentón, or prosciutto for jamón, i think the one that say it didn't understand nothing, just they don't know what it is.
so that, it's not only a matter of a name, but culture. and translating or adapting to a foreigners mind is maybe 'misculture', 'disculture'...
so that, we are talking only about market, aren't we? ;)
Very good point, I will run that by the Chinese. This guy added on his QQ, so we chat often. He did say Hei Cha is not well understood even in the Chinese market. So not only do they have to develop the Chinese market and educate people, they also want to explore market opportunities abroad. The problem though, lies in what to name the tea
- and be acceptable and embraced by the foreign market. Which is precisely why I ask all of you for your input, since everyone here is pretty knowledgeable about tea. So in effect, you're all helping to shape the history of "hei cha" in the Western world - by deciding and advising on an acceptable alternative name/names.
Another good idea. I don't work for this company so I don't want to get into advising about marketing etc. They will have to figure out how to market hei cha themselves, and how it's described in appealing terms.
That's very true too. That's why I'm asking here to see what everyone thinks is acceptable. It's not up to me. It's up to all of you as knowledgeable tea friends and influencers to decide. For me personally, I speak Chinese, so "hei cha" will always be "hei cha". Perhaps this is not so though, for a non-Chinese speaker.
If "hei cha" doesn't sound nice in Spanish, what word would be acceptable then? How about Te Madurado? Jeicha Te? How about Ancha Te? (An ? is a synonym for black in Chinese).
well, 'ancha' means wide, female, so it would be: 'And here we have té Ancha', ¿té ancho? (wide tea?) no, it's not wide, it's the name, 'Té- An-cha' maybe 'té jeicha' not sounding serious was too personal, i'm seeing maybe i'm not a serious person...
following with cheese and wine, maybe 'té curado' (cured tea), would be astonishing at first sight. 'is it possible to cure tea?', so could be a good way to begin a conversation to go into tea in depth. also 'té maduro' (ripe tea, 'madurado' is ripened), they talk about a long time of processing. it that sense 'crianza' (~aging) like wine, or 'reserva' (~vintage) also in wine. also 'viejo' (old) is popular for cheese. and in any case (the way i see it) only as an explanation, not as a name or a category.
as a category i prefer 'chinese black tea' as i said, accepting 'heicha' for the next level of understanding. anyway if chinese has given 'black' to these teas i don't have nothing to add. english called black to red, it's a matter or past times. now china decide in first person how to appear to the rest of the world, so if they say this tea is black, who is going to say the contrary? and of course adding an official seal of 'protected origin', 'protected name' or something in the like, will be deffinitive for finishing any foreigner discussion.
if we were talking about olive oil or cigars maybe this discussion has any sense, but this tea is chinese. so we are the ones to ask you, chinese people, how do you call this and what and how and when, etc. do you use it... i think
by the way, have you searched in this group 'hei cha'? there are some good discussions about colours and futures some years ago.
I thought of an idea. Everyone knows puer - exactly by the name, puer; or puer cha ???. Puer is the name of a place and the name of a tea. Yet it's also hei cha. So, since the hei cha they are marketing is not from Yunnan, but Hunan, maybe they could call it xiang cha ??; or even Hunan Xiang Cha ? ???.
I like Xiang Cha, as an option as well. I really think it needs to be a true word with real meaning, history, and tradition. I shy away from fakely named teas, and I think culture and tradition are the most valuable aspects of life left. Too much of it is getting lost in an effort to homogenize and pander to a lowest common denominator. Once that is lost, you can't get it back. I say fight to keep it something real and meaningful. People have no trouble ordering their "Matcha Latte's" so I have hope hat Hei Cha, Xiang Cha, Hunan Cha, or whatever is settled on will be fine.
Yes, they use the term Xiang Cha in China. I'm sure almost everyone is familiar with "xiang". Xiang is just like an abbreviation or symbol to mean Hunan province. But other types of tea besides "hei cha" are produced there too. I don't know. Just have to see.
Forgive the oversimplification, but I think heicha tends to be tea not destined for consumption by Han people. Those post-fermented teas from Hunan and Sichuan are mostly drunk by Mongolians, Uighurs, Tibetans, and others far from the Han heartland, I think. (I know there are exceptions: Lu'An, for one.)
Come to think of it, maybe those who are trying to find a marketing angle for heicha should think of emphasizing the Central Asian aspect of the tea. There's lots of Chinese tea sloshing around the world - maybe consumers would be intrigued by a different kind of exoticism. (Disclaimer: accepting marketing advice from me may be fatal to your bottom line.)
Sorry, I'm confused. Are you saying that significant numbers of Chinese tea lovers use the term Xiang Cha to mean post-fermented teas, even though there are lots of well-known Hunan green teas?
Xiang just means Hunan (simply stated). It could mean any tea produced in Hunan - as in Xiang Hei ?? (Hunan black), Xiang Lv ?? (Hunan green), etc. It's not generally used in China to mean post-fermented teas, though it could; as in Xiang Hei. But, just like Puer is a place, and applied to the name of a tea, perhaps Xiang could work in the West to be associated with Hunan black tea. Puer and Hunan black are the same tea type: post-fermented tea (known as black tea [hei cha] in China).
Both Puer and Hunan black tea are compressed teas (in bricks, cakes, etc.). So not all compressed tea can be called Puer. Moreover, Hunan black tea, just like Puer, is also aged tea; and the longer it stores, the better it gets. However, puer and Xiang hei have distinctly different taste characteristics.
I think Xiang Cha or Xiang Hei works as a better name to emphasize its distinctness from Puer, which everyone is so familiar with.
But Pu'er is a small place that historically traded the tea we now call Pu'er. Hunan is a vast place where countless teas are grown, most of them, as you know, *not* heicha. So it would be a distortion, then, just to call the tea in question Xiang Cha, right?
What about marketing it as Lubiancha? Chinese people who know the tea in question will know that name, I think. And maybe non-Chinese will be beguiled by the romantic Silk Road aura it has?
To illustrate my point for the need for a specific word or words for the tea category "hei cha":
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Why do tea vendors place western black tea (hong cha) and hei cha into the same category? That will just lead to confusion in the marketplace. This is exactly the point I'm trying to get across.
My friend said "bian cha" just won't cut it today. Historically, that's what it was. But today, he said it's an old concept. They are trying to get out of the old attitudes/conceptions toward the tea as low-quality, I suppose.
To illustrate my point for the need for a specific word or words for the tea category "hei cha":
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Why do tea vendors place western black tea (hong cha) and hei cha into the same category? That will just lead to confusion in the marketplace. This is exactly the point I'm trying to get across. It makes it harder for Chinese producers of hei cha to introduce their product to the western market - since they're not quite sure what to call it.
My friend said "bian cha" just won't cut it today. Historically, that's what it was. But today, he said it's an old concept. They are trying to get out of the old attitudes/conceptions toward the tea as low-quality, I suppose.
I think the wine industry has done a good job educating the consumer on the difference between champagne and sparkling wines. The biggest misnomer you will have to deal with are Indian black teas. All you would have to say Chinese black teas are completely different. I think Puer has established an identity. Everybody at the Puer tastings recognizes differences in black teas like Liuan and LiuBao. I would recommend something more branded or distinct than Hunan heicha.
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