Hyderabad

Don’t look too closely: The little cup is almost always very old, has at least one crack, and might even be a little dirty. It always stands in its saucer in a little puddle of chai. The cup and saucer never match. Yet drinking chai in Hyderabad is a great experience, especially if you’ve pounded your fist in your open hand three times, calling loudly “Strong! Strong! Strong!” to signal to the waiter that you want some tea in that milk.

Drinking chai has become one of my favourite leisure activities in Hyderabad. I almost never drink tea at home, but chai is different. Every single cup of chai is essentially different. That’s because of how it is made.

All of the ingredients are brought to a boil together: tea leaves, milk, sugar, and spices. There is neither a fixed recipe nor a special method for preparation, but every family and every chai shop protects their recipe like a treasure. Usually, the tea is seasoned with cardamom, but I have also had chai with a distinct note of ginger. In chai shops the brew often cooks for hours. At home, the tea is brewed and then poured from one cup to another a number of times using sweeping motions. This froths up the milk in the tea a bit.

Then, the actual chai ritual begins. Although there are big “No Smoking” signs in almost every chai shop, the first thing to do is light a cig. It is quite practical that there is a little cigarette stand in front of every single chai shop (I haven’t found any exceptions in Hyderabad). They sell cigarettes, in packs or individually. A smouldering length of rope is usually hung on the outer wall of the cigarette stand – a perpetual lighter.

The cigarette is lit, now you shout “Strong! Strong! Strong!” loudly at the waiter and take your seat. More often than not a thin film of chai has already formed and is slowly drying on the little table. That’s because of the puddle in the saucer. Part of the ritual is to lift the cup from the saucer, then to carefully graze the chai dripping from the bottom of the cup onto the saucer, then put the cup on the table and remove the remaining chai from the bottom of the cup using a slow, circular movement. Then it will not drip when, in the next step, you slowly bring the cup to your lips and take the first sip with as loud a slurp as possible. It’s actually more like a mixture of blowing and drinking. That makes the noise. Once the first sip is taken, conservation can begin, for example, about politics. Well, actually only about politics, but not too intense. After all, this is a chai shop and here chai is the most important thing and nothing else.