Thank You

I wanted to take a moment and say thank you to everyone.

A lot of free tea and what not has found its way to me since I started this blog, friendly samples from my fellow TeaChat members to things sent to me from companies hoping to generate some word of mouth. The later doesn't always get mentioned here (If I don't like something, I choose not to write about it. Small tea shops have a hard enough time competing for business on the web without bad press from me, even if it is honest bad press).

I appreciate all of it.

I wanted to single out Toru Yoshikawa-san of Artistic Nippon. Again. A few weeks back there was a conversation on the Green Tea Forum in which the owner, Kevin, pointed out that the chasen I had just purchased from Toru-san looked like it was made in China. Within two days I received an email from Toru-san saying that he became aware of the conversation and checked with his supplier.

It turns out that the chasen was made in China. He apologized profusely and offered a refund and free shipping on a replacement as soon as he was able to procure a Japanese-made chasen. I thanked him and declined, because I felt, made in China or not, the price I paid was very fair.

So he sent me a new chasen anyway.

To Toru-san, and everyone else, thank you for being kind to me.