Tea is made to turn over a new leaf

The perfect sip is given the cafe touch, a l'americaine

A man from Colorado showing Chinese how to drink tea is akin to a man from Chongqing showing Americans how to eat apple pie, but that does not seem to be putting off Martin Papp. The 30-year-old from the Centennial State, who has lived in China for seven years, has given himself the mission of reinventing tea, and cultivating a new culture of tea drinking.

He runs Papp's Tea Lab and Papp's Tea Lounge in Beijing, which both eschew the genteel decor of most teahouses and instead emphasize the modern and the fashionable in venues whose target audience is young adults.