ERROL PARKER | Editor-at-large | Contact
Just as Gavin McCarthy was about to turn in for the night and turn the television off, he was greeted by the familiar warm smile of the Dilmah man.
As Merrill J. Fernando, Dilmah’s chief tea maker, finishes his short tour of the Sri Lanka farm where the tea is grown, he implored Gavin to try his tea, even having the common courtesy to say please.
“Ok,” the 38-year-old said softly to himself.
“You have deal Merrill, I will try your fancy tea. Next time I go to the shops, a box of Dilmah will be coming home with me,”
“I’m trusting you.”
Mr McCarthy then turned his television off and retired to his bedroom, thoughts of tea still racing through his head.
But just as he pulled back the covers, he thought to himself that he must try the tea he has now sitting atop the microwave in his kitchen – just to set a baseline by which to judge the Dilmah.
“I wondered, ‘How will I know if I like Merrill’s fancy tea if I can’t remember what this el cheapo tea I have now tasted like?’ So I moseyed on into the kitchen and made myself a cuppa,”
“But on the way back to my room, I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror and suddenly realised that I’d been talking to myself about tea for 20 minutes and made a promise to a man on a television screen,”
“Perhaps I just needed to go to sleep.”
More to come.
