The origin of tea drinking is steeped in antiquity. According to legends, a Chinese monk decided to sit before a wall in meditation for nine years. During one of his meditations he fell asleep. Upon awakening he was so chagrined that he cut off his eye lids to assure no recurrence of his sin and cast them to the ground. On the spot where they fell the eye lids grew roots and sprouted a shrub, the leaves of which when boiled in water had the power to banish sleep. A Chinese legend has it that in around 2737 BC, a mythical Chinese emperor named Shen Nung accidentally discovered tea drinking.
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