Tea, anyone?

There is no doubt that coffee reigns supreme. It fills our cups and is a mainstay at all restaurants and cafes. The proof is (a) in the pouring, which happens on a regular basis, and often before you've even finished your cup, and (b) in the queueing and consuming, which seems never ending. For the most part, coffee drinkers are well taken care of, but what about the tea aficionados?

Despite its "unparalleled and enduring popularity" and reputation as "the world's most prevalent hot beverage", tea has remained, in many ways, a secondary commodity. You would think that given the diverse menu on offer and the much-promoted medicinal benefits, tea would be considered of at least equal importance to its caffeine counterpart. However, in many locales, tea drinkers are regularly overlooked, sometimes even ignored and completely forgotten about, as servers tend to the coffee drinkers.

As a part-time devotea, I have personally been on the receiving end of such treatment. That I survived is not the point. That it happens at all, is. And it was never demonstrated better than on our recent visit to a caffeine-beverage installation with one of our friends.

Put simply, we were amazed and a little embarrassed by the attention we received compared to our friend, who, more often than not, is frequently left to her own devices. Generally, these range from appropriate signals (opening the teapot lid) and passive actions (rudimentary hand gestures, and desperate, pleading looks around the room) to direct communication (going up and asking someone, anyone) and all-out declarations of independence (filling up the teapot herself).

Merely so she can partake in the simple pleasure of infusing tea leaves in hot water and sipping the wonderful, aromatic, extraordinary result, preferably while her dining companions are guzzling down innumerable gallons of coffee.

In this particular instance, device #3 won the day, but #4 was only seconds away.

As far as I am aware, the international signal for tea instead of coffee is still a teaspoon in one's cup, and an open teapot lid still says, "More hot water, please". It's a small ask, but if serving staff and managers make the effort to infuse themselves with these time-honoured traditions, I guarantee it will make the tea drinkers among us very, very happy.