More Tea Talk

I could get really obsessed with the visitor stat counter thing. My latest fav thing is looking at the search words to see how surfers have found my blog.

After recounting the story a few weeks ago of the headless rabbit in Younger Niece’s wardrobe, I was amused horrified … it was interesting to see that a search for ‘headless rabbit, witchcraft’ had caused someone to stumble upon tea stains. I bet that was a disappointment to them. But really, who searches stuff like that?

Today on my search list was ‘pg tips bangkok where’ so I clicked on that search link and at page 23 of Google’s list of hits I still hadn’t found tea stains. Where was I? How many pages did they trawl through to find me?

Anyway, I’ve decided that it isn’t good enough: how can I call myself tea stains and barely a mention of PG Tips? So to answer anyone interested in the purchase of PG Tips in Bangkok …

You can buy them here in Central but I’ve only seen them in boxes of 40 (which might not last me much more than a week!) And they cost 16p a teabag and at that price I can’t afford my tea habit.

When visitors and guests come I ask them to bring as big a quantity as they can carry. Lovely Sister in law brought two GARGANTUAN catering bags which made me very happy … until I noticed they were … NOOOOOO … single cup strength … for wimps. For a while I used two teabags in one mug, until a friend declared my cups of tea ‘disgusting.’

Lovely Caroline sent me a box of teabags, but I was mortified by how much it costs to send a box of teabags to Bangkok so that’s not the way to keep up a supply without bankrupting friends and family.

I didn’t bring any back from my recent trip because my suitcase was full of books and ‘Soft and Gentle’ which is another story altogether, and now my rations are running low. I’m not sure that they will last until I leave for the UK in July so my dealer Husband has found a carrier coming in June. An email has been issued requesting and detailing the procurement of the correct teabags:

• PG Tips
• Not One Cups
• No leaves
• Pyramid bags
• No poncy tea claiming pretensions: just PG Tips

Tea post

I know it’s meant to be about writing, but I think it’s kind of crucial that there has to be the occasional tea monologue (or is that monoblog?)

I was getting a bit anxious last week because I refilled the pot in which I keep my PG Tips and I noticed that the box was nearly empty … My palms got a bit clammy and whenever I took a teabag out of the pot I hyperventilated.

Over recent weeks a couple of people here have huffed and puffed at me, thrown their arms up in irritation at my OCTD (Obsessive Compulsive Teabag Disorder) and say ‘you can buy PG Tips here; I’ve seen them.’ Every time I’m in a shop, I have a look and I don’t see any… So last week I went off to Central Foodhall – Bangkok’s version of Harrods, maybe?

And, guess what I found? PG Tips. A box of 4o teabags: 398 Thai Baht.

That, for any of you who don’t instantly know the Thailand Baht to pounds Sterling exchange rate, is £6.53 for a box of teabags! 40 teabags; that’s 16p per teabag. On Tesco.com (no, they don’t deliver to Bangkok) the same box is 79p – just under 2p per teabag. I could only cope with this trauma by sitting down with a cup of tea (brewed for a minimum of 4 minutes, just enough skimmed milk).

I’m slightly mystified as to how this price is justified.

Anyway, Husband was in the UK on business, so I sent off a swift email, requesting some PG Tips, and began the task of eking out my remaining supplies.

Yesterday, after a week in the UK, Husband returned to Bangkok and it was so lovely to see the teabags him.