Chai Na

Nothing unites the diaspora more than our outrage over chai tea lattes. But what if it's not actually our fight?

The word chai stems directly from the Mandarin word for tea - cha. Why do we use the Chinese word for tea? Because that's who we got tea from in the first place!

The situation was this: in the 1800s, the British had a problem. All of their citizens were obsessed with ☕ but it was getting to be really expensive buying tea from the original source - China. 🇬🇧 decided they needed to create their own tea supply.

So 🇬🇧

• brought a bunch of Chinese tea into India

• created gigantic plantations in the eastern state of Assam

• and forced indentured laborers from other parts of India to work the fields.

✨Ta-da, “British”-made tea done cheaply✨

Since tea was a foreign substance to most Indians, they simply adapted its original name: Cha → Chai

All that to say, chai isn't really a Desi word. And, as established in the previous post, masala chai isn't some ancient, sacred tradition. So should we still be angry about chai tea lattes? 🤷🏽‍♀️🤷🏽‍♀️🤷🏽‍♀️

100% yes. Find out why in our next post 💁🏽‍♀️

Photo Credit: @rumanamin