I don’t remember the exact day I fell in love with tea, but I do remember the moment I realized that tea was more than just a drink for me. It was a pause button. A comfort blanket. A travel companion. A reality check. And sometimes, even a compass. On most days, tea is just tea. But on some days, it's the kind when you’re standing on a railway platform with a bag heavier than your future and an itinerary that’s barely an idea, tea becomes your best friend. That one hot sip which tells you, “Yes, this trip is going to be mad and magical, just like you.
So, on this International Tea Day, let me spill some tea (literally and metaphorically) from the corners I’ve walked through with nothing, but a backpack filled with stories.
So come, pour yourself a cup and sip along.
Chapter 1: Dadar, Mumbai | Departure Doubts
Dadar, Mumbai. That name alone feels like movement. Like something is always just about to happen.
I was standing on the edge of what would be my first solo trip and Dadar Station was the chaotic runway. The plan? Board the Express. The reality? Mild panic. I had my rucksack. A scarf and a mind buzzing with a hundred questions I wasn’t trying to answer yet. It’s funny how everyone romanticizes solo travel until you’re the one actually doing it. I watched people run past, chai vendors shout, "Chai chai chai," and my own feet shuffle nervously. I didn’t grow up traveling alone. Every trip was a family affair. The idea of figuring out bus routes, food, people, safety, language all by myself suddenly seemed too much.
So, I did what every confused Indian does I turned to chai. There was this guy, probably same age as my father, serving tea, handed me a cup and said, "ghumne ja rahe ho madam?"
I nodded. He said, "Happy Journey, khudka dhyan rakhna" while smiling.
The chai came in a glass that was a little chipped on the rim, but I didn’t mind. First sip lukewarm, slightly sweet, slightly too milky. But there was something about it. Maybe it was the familiarity. Maybe it was the fact that it felt like a goodbye.
As I stood near the tea cart, trains passed. So did thoughts. Would I be okay alone? What if I missed the comfort of people, of plans? What if I hated the stillness? But then a second sip went down. And a strange calm followed. That’s what tea does. It doesn’t change the world. It just pauses it. Just long enough for you to catch your breath. And maybe it was the chai or the smile of the uncle. Or the fact that nobody else cared what I was doing. But something clicked. I boarded the train with shaky legs and a warm chest. I didn’t know then that I was also boarding a lifelong worth of stories.
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Here’s how it went: Mumbai to Haridwar, then a detour to Joshimath and further up to Mana. Cold winds, higher altitudes, long bus rides. Beautiful? Absolutely. But my body started giving signs, dry throat and that weird dizzy feeling you get when you’re pretending, you’re okay. From Mana, travelled down to Goa then to Solapur. Took a bus to Chitradurga and from there took a train to Pondicherry. That’s how I landed in Pondicherry. It wasn’t graceful. I got off the train with a tear streaked face (don’t ask, I was overwhelmed), my backpack digging into my shoulders and My stomach was growling. My head was splitting. My voice had turned into a frog’s croak. I dragged myself down to my Airbnb but ah! It was not ready. Thought of taking a small walk in the town till it gets ready. Stumbled upon a small shop somewhere near the Mission Street, the shop was not meant for tourists. No fancy signage. Just the clink of metal and some Tamil film music playing somewhere.
He nodded and shouted something in Tamil behind the curtain.
The ginger was not subtle. It was bold. Like it knew I needed fixing and didn’t have time to ask.
I coughed.
She laughed. “Thoda strong banaya, sukku podi daala. You look tired.” She spoke in Tamil accented Hindi.
We laughed. That soft kind of laugh when two strangers don’t know what else to say but want to say something kind. She told me how she once wanted to visit Kedarnath but never got the chance. How her husband used to make the best filter coffee before he passed. How this canteen had been her escape, her anchor and her way of surviving all in one. By the time I finished the second glass, I had forgotten my sore throat. I had forgotten I hadn’t slept well in days. I had forgotten all the overwhelming travel past few days. All I remembered was this moment. Me. Her. This roadside seat in Pondicherry. And this tea that felt like home in that split second. Before I left, she handed me a tiny paper packet. “Sukku podi,” she said. “Dry ginger powder. For your journey.”
Chapter 3: Udaipur, Rajasthan | Kulhad Wali Chai
I hadn’t planned on Udaipur being this cold.
The fog was thick enough to hide the corners of buildings. The streets near Jagdish Mandir were hushed in a way only winter mornings can manage. The air bit at my skin and my fingers were numb even inside my pockets. I had layered up like any good traveler would, but Udaipur’s cold didn’t care about my planning.
What I needed, desperately, was chai.
And I found it. A small tea stall tucked into a corner of a cobbled alley near the temple gate. The sign above said, “Kulhad Chai – Special Masala.” That’s all I needed to see. The man behind the stall had a long grey beard and wore a thick shawl. His hands moved fast grabbing clay cups, ladling hot tea, pouring with a practiced flair.
“Ek kulhad chai dena,” I said, rubbing my hands.
“Udaipur main abhi thandi padna shuru huva hai” he replied, nodding toward the temple where early devotees were climbing steps wrapped in shawls.
He handed me the kulhad. The steam hit my face. I took a deep breath before the first sip. And there it was instant warmth. Clove, cardamom, cinnamon. No one overpowered the other. It was harmony in a cup.
I stood there, sipping slowly, letting the clay smell mix with the chai. Around me, the city woke up slowly. Bells from the mandir. Birds shaking dew off leaves. A cow ambling by like it owned the road.
A boy joined me at the stall. Backpack. Tired eyes. Probably just arrived in Udaipur.
“Good chai?” he asked.
“The best,” I said. “Especially in this fog.”
He laughed. “I’m coming from Pune. Couldn’t feel my toes when I woke up.”
We talked. About Udaipur's winter, about must try street food, about how tea always tastes better when your bones are cold.
“Funny,” he said. “I don’t even like chai that much back home.”
“Travel changes your taste,” I replied. “Or maybe it just resets it.”
He agreed. We clinked kulhads like they were glasses.
That’s the thing about chai in Udaipur. It isn’t just a drink. It’s a warm reminder in the middle of a foggy morning. It’s a small fire lit inside your chest. It’s a stranger sharing their story while your fingers thaw around baked clay. When I left the stall, I left with a kulhad in my hand and a feeling of pure aahaa!.
Chapter 4: Akkalkot, Maharashtra | Destined Chai
There are some places that don’t appear on your itinerary, but they quietly occupy a corner of your heart. Akkalkot was that for me. I had heard about it from my Aai since I was maybe nine or ten. She’d tell stories about Shri Swami Samarth and how people found peace, solutions and healing in this town.
I never really understood her devotion back then, but there was something in the way her voice softened whenever she said, “Swami sagla thik kartil." (“Swami will fix things.”)
I never made time for it. Life moved on, travel piled upon travel, but Akkalkot quietly followed me like a shadow, just behind all the noise. And then, one day, it happened. Just a train delay and a random cancellation from Solapur that rerouted me on a local bus heading towards Akkalkot. It was almost laughable.
“Madam, Akkalkot?” the conductor asked, half dozing on his seat as the afternoon sun glazed over everything. I just nodded. I didn’t even think. Something inside me said, let it happen. I reached Akkalkot around 4pm. The heat was dry, not punishing but definitely draining. The temple bells could be heard from two lanes away. Outside the Swami Samarth temple complex, my feet slowed. The streets were simple, rusted shop shutters, faded posters, a small medical store, a coconut vendor, and… her.
An old woman, possibly in her seventies, hunched over a kettle set atop a blackened stove. She had no signboard, no name for her stall, just four glasses, one kettle, a plastic container of sugar and some torn newspaper pages that doubled as plates. Her sari was sun-faded, her hands were swift, and her presence… familiar. She wasn’t calling out for customers. She didn’t need to. There was something about the smell of her chai that made people walk toward her.
But that chai? That aroma? That chai called me.
I walked up slowly. She looked up from behind thick glasses, squinted a little and smiled.
“Chay hava ka?” (Do you want tea?) I nodded, dropping my bag near the base of the tree.
“Ekdam garam hay, biscoot bi hava?” (Tea is hot, do you want biscuits as well) she offered, pointing at some Parle-Gs tucked in a tin box.
I smiled. “Nako, chahach dya.” (“Only tea will do.”) She poured the tea into a scratched glass, held it out with both hands like it was something sacred. The first sip hit me like a home I didn’t know I’d missed. The taste? Oh, it wasn’t fancy. No cardamom, no masala mix, no ginger.
Just thick milk, extra sugar, and some love maybe. It tasted like "home", the kind that was left behind as I grew up. Something about that tea melted me.
I looked up at her and said, “Aaji, hyat kahi ghatlay ka? Vegla lagtoy.” (“Aaji, this tea tastes different.”) She said "Akkalkotat paanich veglya hay. Swamichi kirti aahe bagh.” (“Akkalkot’s water is different. It carries Swami’s blessing.”) We both laughed. But I believed her.
She told me she’d been selling tea here for 25 years. No name. No fame. Just faith. People came and went. Some thanked her, some never looked back. But she stayed, brewing chai and watching life pass. When I told her I never intended to come here, she smiled knowingly and said:
“Kahi goshti aplya tharlela nasatat, pan hotat. Tula Swamini bolavla.” (“Some things aren’t planned, but they happen. Swami called you.”)
I had another glass. I didn’t click a photo. Didn’t even ask her name. Some stories aren’t made to be captured. They’re made to stay in the quiet folds of your memory.
Chai was never just a drink. It was a compass.
A gentle reminder from the universe that said, “You’re here. Now be here.” In a world where everything moves faster than our own thoughts, tea taught me to pause. To sit. To listen. To belong, even if just for a minute.
Each glass wasn’t just tea. It was a moment. A feeling.
A hand extended from a stranger, a conversation started with a smile or a home I didn’t know I missed.
Sometimes it came steaming in steel tumblers. Sometimes in chipped ceramic. Sometimes in kulhads that warmed both hands and heart. Sometimes with Tulsi, sometimes with elaichi, sometimes with nothing but warmth.
But it always arrived with a story. And sometimes, it was the story. They say solo travel is about discovering yourself. But maybe… maybe it’s just about remembering how to be human again. How to talk. How to taste. How to slow down. How to see things as they are simple, imperfect, beautiful.
Because somewhere along the way, tea stopped being a beverage and became a mirror. And in that mirror, I saw myself again & again lost, found, tired, hopeful, laughing, aching, changing.
Tea didn’t give me answers. It gave me time.
To ask the right questions. To hold silence without discomfort. To look at the sky and not scroll. To be nobody for a while and yet feel like everything.
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