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Sunday, 6 January 2019
Tea
There are people who absolutely love drinking tea, and I'm one. There are so many kinds of teas to chose from and not all of them are my favourites, but a few are. I happen to love spicy chai.
Herbal tea is one such type. Also called Tisanes, herbal tea is made from plants with no caffeine.
There are four actual teas in groups belonging to Green, White, Black and Oolong. All of those teas come from one evergreen plant called the Camellia Sinensis.
Some like to make fruit tea by brewing leaves from raspberries, strawberries, ect.
In ancient times, tea was only drunk as a form of medicine. It became a popular beverage drink in quite recent history.
A strange nickname for the process of making a cup of tea is "the agony of the leaves" when tea leaves unfold when hot water is poured.
Although I've said all of this, herbal tea isn't regarded as a normal tea because it doesn't come from the tea plant Camellia Sinensis. Herbal teas come from other sources like roots, fruit, flowers, rice, seeds and other leaves. In Tibet there is tea made from butter. In Italy there is tea from olive trees. The hibiscus flower produces a tea called karkade.
In the 17th and 18th centuries European tea lovers found it so expensive that tea was locked away in caddies.
Links:
The Magic of Tea
Tuesday, 1 January 2019
Welcome to the New Year
It's been a very long time since I posted on this blog. Storm Valkyrie will continue from where I last posted, and also shall be my new home from now on.
My first blog She Wolf Night is now run by a friend. You can still find my older posts over there. I've added links to my fiction on here. I will add future posts on Storm Valkyrie with essays and fiction again, if that is what others want.
So let us drink to 2019 and Happy New Year.
Tuesday, 13 September 2016
Dark Cinderella
I'm going to discuss fairytales, an exciting favourite subject of mine. It borders on myth and legend. Fairytales are said to be older than the myths of the gods themselves. We don't know enough about their origins except where the modern versions came from, and as you search further before Brothers Grimm, Hans Christian Anderson and others, you'll find older roots.
Cinderella is one of the most popular princess stories for girls.
Did you know there was a darker side? You will never find that in any fairytale book about Cinderella. In one old version, before the Brothers Grimm, the step mother was actually cruel to her own daughters who were the so called "ugly sisters". She tortured them and mutilated their feet so that they could wear the small glass slipper. The prince noticed in horror at seeing so much blood.
And in another older version of Cinderella, (not sure if there was a step mother) the sisters are tortured at the wedding of Cinderella and the prince. The magic pet birds belonging to Cinderella pecks out the sisters eyes.
Then in another old version of Cinderella it's even more freaky. Cinderella kills her step mother by breaking her neck! She wanted her father to marry the old house maid but after that, unknown to Cinderella, six new stepsisters arrive. They all bully Cinderella.
Another version doesn't have a fairy godmother in it. Instead, Cinderella often talks to her mother's grave and speaks to her ghost, learning how to create magical ingrediants.
How different she is to the gentle Disney princess in a tiara!
Thursday, 18 August 2016
Spirits of plants
Plants have souls and auras. Each plant, tree, flower, grass, root and vegetable have spirits attached to them. One of the most beautiful creations in science is Kirlian photography. Not only does it capture a variety of colours of living objects such as leaves, but also reveals the energy of those individual leaves. There is an inner aura and an external aura. Often no one can see the inner aura as it's the birth aura that remains throughout its life and doesn't change. The external aura is a reflection of moods, health and temperature.
Apart from auras, which I plan to discuss again one day in the future of this blog, plants have spirits attached to them. They attract different energies, as well as produce energy. Trees breathe in carbon dioxide and they then breathe out fresh oxygen. Carbon dioxide is a natural invisible "gas" that we all exhale. We don't see it but it's hot and appears only during cold temperatures as white plumes.
Ghost activity often makes a drop in temperatures and a drainage of electricity, especially with batteries. It's possible that ghosts are made of neutrinos as these are able to pass through walls and are invisible. The more extreme ghosts with poltergeists and evil entities have had to "eat" from living beings own vital aura and kinetic energies. While spirits attempt to communicate with the living through batteries or electrical objects, sometimes drinking some of this energy down, it can also be frightening. When spirits drain the energy from a living person or animal, it results in pain, nausea, depression, panic attacks, illness and paralysis.
Plants are also used as eating batteries by ghosts. Woods and forests attract ghosts like a magnet. Sadly it's possible why trees die, or become diseased. Some forest fires could be blamed on the negative energies accumilated in the trees by dark spirits.
But not all spirits of the deceased. Some spirits can be living beings, that are invisible, and don't need the energy field to eat. These living spirits include nature spirits or deva. Some spirits of the living or astrals protect the trees, including animals. Humans have always respected the nature spirits for protecting the land from evil. They made offerings to them and honoured them with respect. Some left food outside in the woods to the nature spirits as thanks. In return, the nature spirits kept the plants healthy and pure.
These nature tree spirits have many names, from wights, fairies, dryads, elves, kodama, lauma, gnomes, leshy, Of the many nature spirits there are those that are protectors of the trees and forests who prevent vampiric ghosts from destroying the plants. On another issue, animals and bugs have always been an issue with feeding off plants. It started to upset humans when harvests were ruined because of it. People needed the help of nature spirits to protect crops and vegetables from pests, flooding and drought. There might've been a deal in Neolithic times because nature spirits guarded the wild forests and not farmland. Powerful deities helped to protect agriculture if humans would honour them in return. Some would argue that the gods ARE nature spirits. According to Norse mythology, there are two races of gods, the Vanir and the Aesir. The Vanir were the earliest gods who were "nature gods" or wild gods of the forests and mountains. These coincide with the primitive cultures that worshipped the land and sky. The Aesir came much later as gods of civilisation, including farming.
It seems that the spread of agriculture happened at a time when ancient mythology introduced newer gods. Perhaps the migration of agriculture took with it various kings, warlords and conquerers who were revered as gods that they became deified. It's possible that the gods and goddesses of myths and all real people who were in charge and had the ultimate power to move everyone here and there. So much human prehistory is lost.
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