【正文】 deep voice to keep quiet at afternoon tea time. Generally speaking, the great afternoon tea are Darjeeling tea, earl grey tea, Gunpowder green tea and Ceylon tea of the traditional pure taste flavor tea, and if someone want to drink milky tea and he or she should put in milk first then put in tea. The tea consumption of British is the largest in the world with each person consuming on average kg per year. (Zhang and Sun 9) They usually drink black tea served with milk or sugar. Strong tea which they drinking is served with lots of milk and often two teaspoons of sugar, usually in a mug, is monly referred to as builder39。s natural philosophy height. 11 IV. Similarities, Differences and Fusion between Chinese and Western Tea Culture A. Similarities Time goes by as the light, with the evolution of tea drinking history, we can see that although the difference of tea drinking history exist in both china and the west, but the tea culture also present some similarities: and western people are both the first to realize and use the therapeutic value of tea, started drinking, and gradually developed tea into a mon drink. Tea may help promote digestion with the aromatics. We therefore can say tea has great effect on many of the ethnic minorities in China who live mainly on meat . A popular old saying says, Rather go without salt for three days than without tea for a single day. Tea with various vitamins in it can help smokers discharge nicotine out o f the body. Moreover, strong tea may prove to be a sobering pickmeup when people are over drinked. 2. Tea has relationship with many aspects of social life. Generally speaking, the use of something and the formation of a custom started from the mon people, while a group of scholars surprisingly take tea as a drink at first. Zhu GeLiang, prime minister of the state of Shu during the three kingdoms period (), is known to almost every household. His wisdom and civil and military abilities are still respected by later generations. Tradition says that Zhu GeLiang popularized tea cultivation in Yunnan province and other places. The great literature works about tea is also fruitful. In Britain, Victorian, the queen of Britain specially love tea drinking and make tea popular all around country in that time. 3. People are both in China and western countries take tea as an enjoyment and relax. 12 4. In many Western countries dri。s home, a good hostess always has a picture of unsweetened on hand just in case if you expect unsweet tea with your meal. In the North tea is served hot and not with ice unless requested. In the winter, Southerners and Northerners enjoy hot tea as it is called here in the South. If loose leaf tea is needed, a teaspoon of tea leaves steeped in six ounces of boiling water for three to six minutes will yield a pleasant tea. This openness of tea drinking in the west, the good news is many active and original tea drinking patterns will be presented。 when they died, they should strive to control their own lives instead of being ordered about ghosts and gods at will. People used tea in funerals and sacrificial rites because tea could help them keep a clear head. 3. Tea and religion In china, tea is full of great spiritual significance and has had close connection with religion in China. In the history of China tea is usually regarded as a kind of drink that would refresh oneself and make the mind calm. Refraining from daily pressures, and sitting and amusing themselves with Buddha’s teachings are the Buddhists aim. Tea is their ideal drink to cultivate their moral character. In Buddhism tea is praised as a sacred thing given by god. The Taoist thought stressed the relationship between man and the nature and believed that it was the mon law of the universe that kept nature and society operating. Therefore, material and spirit, and human and nature could not be separated. Chinese tea culture, integrated with tea’s natural and material functions and human spirit, absorbed the Taoist spirit. Despite Buddhism and Taoism have played greatly important roles in the development of tea culture, Confucian thought is regarded as the core of the spirit of Chinese tea ceremony, which is demonstrated in the following two aspects: tea’s gentle and 6 peaceful characters embody the golden mean of the Confucian school and the spirit of tea cultivate one’s honesty, elegant taste and active attitude towards life. (Wang 152) 4. Tea and literature Literature is a mirror of life. As tea has been closely woven into the life of the Chinese people, so has it been into literature. There are several thousands of classic poems about tea left to us. The great poet of Tang Dynasty (618907)Bai Juyi（白居易） was particularly fond of tea. He wrote more than fifty poems about tea. In his famous poem of a Pipa player(《琵琶行》 )there are these lines: The merchant cared for money much more than for me. One month ago he went away to purchase tea. (Zhou 158) The great patriotic poet of Southern Song Dynasty(11271279)Lu You(陸游 ) wrote more than three hundred poems in which tea is mentioned. Tea has entered almost every other form of literature and artnovels, paintings, plays, songs, and dances, couplets. In the great novel of Qing Dynasty (16441911), a dream of the red mansions, there are about three hundred mentions of tea. So people say the novel is permeated with the fragrance of tea(一部《紅樓夢》 ,滿紙茶葉香 ). There are a variety of paintings describing teadrinking affairs and the scenery in tea fields and there are a variety of teapicking dances among the minority nationalities in China. So we can find these lines frequently quoted: Tea can add virginity to heroes While tea can stir up men of letters to create.