Dear friends of the world, I hope you are well.
Thank you for visiting the digital landscape of my home: Guizhou. My name is Rui (pronounced as “Ray”) and I am the founder of Grass People Tree.
As a girl growing up in the wild mountains, I spent my days floating amongst the water buffaloes in the river and watching the fishermen on their bamboo rafts with their hungry pelicans diving for fish. Before primary school, I was taught first by mother nature and by my community which lived and worked in harmony with nature.
When I was old enough to hang out in the tea house, besides school, I got to learn from the elders around the tea table. The oldest one, of course, being the tea itself. Each and every day, wisdom, guidance, and untold stories were passed down through countless cups of tea. Growing up I didn't realise how precious this way of living and learning was, until 2008 when I moved to the West.
What I experienced was a world so fast-paced that I felt constantly overwhelmed, exhausted and confused. I started sharing tea with friends in London who felt the same way and, through intentional sitting with tea, we were able to step out of the tension and complexities, to hold a grounding place for us city dwellers to return to nature, to the naturalness of ourselves.
I began to understand the importance of that silent teaching from tea and how our elders were showing us the wisdom of simple, intentional living. I also began to realise that its lack in the modern world has resulted in both conscious and unconscious degrees of pain, anxiety and imbalance that we experience in our daily lives.
I founded GPT so that the hidden benefits of tea drinking can become more accessible, relatable and practical to more people. Five thousand years ago in China, tea was first made as medicine. Beyond treating acute, physical symptoms, tea was applied to enrich us with the “big vision”: a holistic and preventative approach to life that cultivates our physical, mental, and spiritual well-being, with the critical recognition that we are part of nature and are all interconnected.
When the Chinese words for “grass” “people” and “tree” are put together, they transform into the word “tea” 茶 (Chá).
Tea is the art that cultivates the harmonious relationship between humans and nature; it is the container of ancient wisdom.
So whether it is a journey to enjoy the flavours or health benefits of our tea, to learn the ways to brew and styles of rituals, to look within and explore self-love and empowerment, or to become a facilitator for what the world desperately needs… What we’ll have received in the cup is entirely based on the clarity of our intention and the quality of our open-mindedness.
Welcome to the forests, the mountains and their inexhaustible ways of making you smile. Wherever the journey takes you, may each cup be the vessel for your soft landing.
With love and gratitude,
劉蕊 Rui Liu
