Shilpa had few vices and one of it was her morning chai. She had to have it at 6 AM and it had to be the Lasa-Lamsa Chocolate Tea. She had lived in Hyderabad all through her growing years and it was the tea that she swore by. She had a lot of “ought to” and “should,” but considering her age it is to be expected she become even more wedded to the routine than others do. So, she had to prepare it the way her mother did. She disliked the tea made by anyone else other than her own. Despite the advancing age, she religiously woke up early, meticulously measured water, added the tea leaves. She added some grated ginger. Just as it simmered, she added a dash of milk, just enough to have a golden hue, a tawny shade, a rich butter scotch. She didn’t prefer the dandelion shade to her tea neither did she like the darker medallion. Just before she filtered the tea into her blue cup, she added a generous pinch of cinnamon and inhaled the woody flavour and felt her mood rise despite the ageing muscles and bones. The blue mug carrying her tea was one of the pair she had purchased with her then new husband some fifty years before. She sat down in the porch and savoured the first sip, the zing of the chocolaty- peppery-citrusy mix of ginger and cinnamon as it hit her taste buds.

And then one fine day in 2021, Shilpa knew something was wrong when the tea tasted different or rather it tasted not at all…

She called her doctor and caught the infection at an early stage before the damned virus hit her lungs. It was cinnamon she said to one and all when they asked her how she managed to identify the problem. Her tryst with cinnamon tea continues and you can catch her sitting on her porch with her blue cup inhaling the Cinnamon from her Chocolate Lasa-Lamsa Chai from Hyderabad.

This post was created for the Blogaberry Creative (Monthly) Challenge.