Tea with strangers

http://www.teawithstrangers.com/

by j2kun • 11 years ago

181 91 11 years ago

brookside3• 11 years ago

A simple, and great idea. The post-social media world can be a lonely place and it's nice to see this effort to connect divergent people in a genuine way AFK, and outside of a capitalist or mystical/religious/occult context.

pidg• 11 years ago

Agreed, I've been attending mystical/religious/occult events for a while now and I just end up meeting weirdos.

brookside3• 11 years ago

More than a third of people in my country (US) do attend those events, and they are teh de-facto social outlets in many communities. Great to have alternatives.

ankitshah20• 11 years ago

Appreciate the good words, and I'm glad this resonates with you!

Although we avoid mystical, religious, or occult contexts, I do think it's important to understand the shared soil from which a lot of these things rise. It's helpful to have some common glue for a community to center around, especially when it involves some notion of what it means to be 'good' in the societies we live in. For lots of people, that comes in the form of some spirit or beyond-tangible belief.

With TWS, we assume that the people around us give us more than enough to believe in. (But if we were to get into it, I'd likely argue that's what most mystical or religious groups are about on some level. But let's not get into it :).

tomjen3• 11 years ago

An interesting idea, but why limiting it to select cities, rather than allowing whomever wants to host a tea session in their city?

nickbarnwell6• 11 years ago

Hey Tom. We have big plans to scale out, but we're still working on ensuring we have a plan for consistent quality of hosts and experiences before we open it up to all comers. If you want to get it up and running in your city sooner, drop me an email (in profile) or shoot Ankit, the founder, a message at ankit@teawithstrangers.com.

nickbarnwell6• 11 years ago

If you love the idea and want to contribute, we're totally open source and transparent with regard to roadmap. On GitHub as @teawithstrangers, and more background and info is at http://making.teawithstrangers.com

GabrielF00• 11 years ago

This is a terrific idea. Out of curiosity, are you a company, a non-profit, a group of people doing a project for fun, or what?

nickbarnwell6• 11 years ago

The latter :) We've considered becoming a 501 or something but for now we are just playing it by ear and doing what we can to bring tea time to as many people as possible.

krick3• 11 years ago

http://making.teawithstrangers.com/github

404 Not Found

hellbanner2• 11 years ago

I think you meant https://github.com/TeaWithStrangers . Their site shows 404 for any invalid URL

nickbarnwell6• 11 years ago

My bad. Forgot to fix that to 301 when moving stuff to S3/Cloudfront. The straight GH link someone linked down thread should work.

alain94040• 11 years ago

As an ex founder of similar ideas, good luck to you. This needs to happen. I'm just curious: doesn't tea give you a British angle?

zatkin• 11 years ago

Coming soon: Coffee with strangers.

justizin4• 11 years ago

Retro throwback: beer with strangers

mbrock2• 11 years ago

Tea is the most widely consumed beverage in the world after water, and it comes from China, not Britain! Obvious, perhaps, but the popular association of tea with Britishness is a tragedy that must be stopped. That's why I also firmly reject the ludicrous notion that the artificially scented "Earl Grey tea" is some kind of default option; why give such credence to the habits of 19th century British aristocrats?

keenerd• 11 years ago

Artificially scented? The bergamot orange is a real plant.

Every culture that has tea will have flavored teas. It gives you something to do with the low-grade leaves. Just last night I tried ginseng oolong for the first time. Is it as artificial as earl grey?

desas• 11 years ago

Earl Grey is not even the default option in Britain...

ankitshah20• 11 years ago

Perhaps for those who are a little more Anglophilic :)

But generally, no. Haven't had any trouble on this front, thankfully!

krick3• 11 years ago

Every time I find something like this and click on "Select Your City" dropdown it keeps reminding me all life happens somewhere else. Ah, so depressing.

Really great idea, I mean. Good luck with that.

justizin4• 11 years ago

It sounds like you might want to host:

  http://www.teawithstrangers.com/hosting

krick3• 11 years ago

I'm not sure if I would be good enough host. And even if someday I'm brave enough to assume I am, I'm afraid I would be hosting meetup with myself in Riga, Latvia.

hellbanner2• 11 years ago

Yeah, would be neat if it used location & just paired with "within 25 miles" or similar

ankitshah20• 11 years ago

Hey! Thanks to @nickbarnwell, we'll have a suggest city feature tonight.

Didn't realize this was going to be on HN today, and did NOT plan for such amazing traffic. Everything we do is spread via word of mouth, so we don't face these issues as much as we have been today!

reustle• 11 years ago

I went to tea with a group in NY maybe a year ago, had a fantastic time. Great work Ankit and co!

ankitshah20• 11 years ago

We're missing you Shane! Still remember seeing your facebook post. I think that was Alex's first tea time, and she had great things to say about your group! Bring some of your freshness back to the table brother.

(Also next time I'm in New York, come to one of my tea times. Would be cool to exchange high fives. Maybe a hug if I'm real lucky.)

robertnealan• 11 years ago

I haven't personally been to one of their events but met the founder (Ankit) by chance a few months back through a mutual friend who has been to a few. Definitely seems like a genuine guy who's passionate about the idea and being rightfully cautious about expanding at a pace that ensures all their events are of high enough quality with good hosts to guide good conversation.

If they're in your area definitely be sure to try an attend an event, I know I will be assuming I ever beat the waitlist in San Francisco.

austinjp• 11 years ago

Do it, then do it again. Riga is on my long list of places to visit. If you're making coffee too, I'm interested :)

corin_• 11 years ago

FYI you've replied to the wrong comment (presume aimed at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9400544)

ankitshah20• 11 years ago

Robert! So cool that we cross paths again on the internet. We're trying hard, but time will tell if we actually are hitting the nail on the head. Things have been good so far, but this is certainly a tough thing to grow effectively :).

icesoldier• 11 years ago

I am very much in love with this idea. There's a chicken-and-egg problem, though, where I live in a city that I doubt will get a host spontaneously (Amarillo, TX) but I'd want to attend one of these to get a feel for it before I'm willing to host one myself. I wonder if there's an opportunity there, to have a sort of "training materials" that can better bootstrap a host in this kind of situation.

eekelly2388• 11 years ago

Once you sign up to host there are some informal "training materials" available. I have never attended a TWS event but I will be hosting my first one next weekend (!!!). It's a little nerve-wracking to go in with no prior experience but I think that's okay since a big part of TWS is being open-minded and having no expectations about where the conversation will go.

ankitshah20• 11 years ago

Great point about the chicken and egg problem. We try really hard to ensure we have preexisting interest in a city before launching, and we make sure we have a core group of hosts to lead the charge in expanding, spreading the word, and, of course, hosting tea time. Most important, however, is that the hosts actually feel a sense of togetherness when this happens, so we place a huge emphasis on a host community before anything else.

steamy• 11 years ago

Is this something like Couchsurfing but mildly less creepy?

yrizk• 11 years ago

far from it. TWS occurs in neutral locations (coffee shops etc) . no one's personal space (in the literal sense) is in the picture. Which is good actually, it lets you be comfortable both as the host and as one of the attendees, which tends to lead to authenticity.Thinking about it, there would be way too much already on the line if these were placed in someone's home from the get go.

slvv• 11 years ago

Thanks for mentioning this! I definitely thought it was held in people's homes which was a big turnoff. Helpful clarification!

robobro• 11 years ago

Oh, I wonder where other Portlanders on HN go for tea!

ankitshah20• 11 years ago

Wow. Didn't realize this was on HN. Hi guys. Ankit here. I started TWS. Happy to answer any q's here or by email (Ankit at teawithstrangers.com). Actually in the middle of a gathering of the SF host community right now so will be a tiny bit delayed on responses but will get to everything!

Lots of gratitude for all the good words and valuable critiques.

lazyfunctor2• 11 years ago

any plan for bangalore? tea fanatic here :)

ankitshah20• 11 years ago

In time! Lots of social norms we gotta be more understanding of before we expand into South Asia in general.

I have a personal interest in expanding into India and nearby areas, given my family background and a lot of nonprofit work I've done in the past, but we definitely have more operational challenges to sort out before we can focus intently on international expansion with an appropriate amount of tact and attention. In time!

balladeer• 11 years ago

Do we already have anything like this in Bangalore? Another "occasional" tea connoisseur here :-)

green7ea• 11 years ago

I really like the idea but unfortunately you guys aren't in Montréal yet and I'm not comfortable hosting. I'm afraid that when you do get here that I won't remember to check it out. Would it be possible to sign up and get notified when your service expands?

njloof• 11 years ago

I second the motion for Montreal!

nickbarnwell6• 11 years ago

Building this this evening! Will reply back once the feature exists

Khao• 11 years ago

Your username is so appropriate for this :)

achille2• 11 years ago

Why do you think grubwithus failed?

calvins• 11 years ago

This sounded interesting to me when I first loaded the page and imagined it was talking about virtual tea: me sipping tea at home while typing/conversing live with a random person halfway around the world.

Is there such a thing? Turns out there are quite a few, as I just discovered with a quick search. Any HN readers have good experiences with any of them?

I just tried one briefly, and had a string of disconnects after just 'hello', and then one that didn't want to reveal the country they currently live in, after which I gave up.

S4M• 11 years ago

You could try that on IRC.

ankitshah20• 11 years ago

We're all about high fives, hugs, eye contact, and being in person. Attention and trust are really important variable in our f(human connection).

edward• 11 years ago

Feedback: "Cambridge" is ambiguous.

Paul_S2• 11 years ago

I was thinking the same but there's a photo. I suspect the author isn't American.

martin-adams• 11 years ago

Yep, came here to mention that also. The country is really needed as well.

ankitshah20• 11 years ago

Great point. Fixing that!

wiml• 11 years ago

Interesting to read this right after this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9399307

apandhi• 11 years ago

Last weekend, I went to an event hosted by Tea With Strangers called "Sunshine with Strangers"

One of my favorite experiences ever. I've lived in NY my whole life, and that was the first time it truly felt like a community. It was over 100 people, and everyone was just open to meeting new people.

10/10 would go again.

(P.S., The creator, Ankit, is awesome.)

ankitshah20• 11 years ago

Wow. This is amazing. Thanks so much for being so receptive to what we're trying to do. This is exactly what we're going for. Except for 8mn people in NYC, not just 100.

In time.

iheartramen• 11 years ago

I love tea with strangers! Highly recommend everyone to try a teatime out :)

ankitshah20• 11 years ago

I love tea with strangers too!

jdross• 11 years ago

A few weeks ago around 100 people spontaneously met in Alamo Square park in SF. Someone brought hundreds of roses to give out to everyone else in the park. Super cool.

TWS is a great crew of people, and Ankit's a great community leader. Both the normal small group events, and the rare big community ones have only been positive.

You should go to one and if it seems like your... cup of tea... consider becoming a host

ankitshah20• 11 years ago

It was pretty beautiful. Thanks for the love JD. And the pun. Because that wasn't at all predictable ;)

Oh, and if you want to see what he's talking about, here are some pictures https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.785821618171086.10...

TheSmoke• 11 years ago

alright, i don't see any city from the country with the most tea consumption [0]. add istanbul to the list please. i'm in.

[0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_tea_consum...

jqm2• 11 years ago

Meeting people is nice, but only if they are quality people. Otherwise, I'd rather not. There aren't many of these in the town I live in, but I know they are here, at least some of them. How to meet these people?

"Quality" might sound snobby or something so let me qualify... people who are intelligent, people who are motivated, people who have a sense of humor, people who aren't dishonest with intent to take unfair advantage of others, people who take basic care of their personal hygiene and fitness, people who are open minded (i.e. not racist etc), people who don't have chronic hard drug habits, people who are not religious fundamentalists or involved with some fringe political ideology, people who are interested and interesting....

All of these (or lack thereof) are deal breakers in my book. Call me uncharitable, but I'd rather be by myself than associate with them. I've met too many people in life who have simply wasted my time or taken from me without giving back. Where are the quality people? Make an app for that and I'm on board!

barry-cotter• 11 years ago

You are an elitist. You are snobby. Own it.

jqm2• 11 years ago

eh, you are probably right. does that make me a bad person?

ankitshah20• 11 years ago

Hey jqm,

I'm so sorry this is something you thought you had to outline.

I do think it's worth noting that everyone has a lot of quality when you actually believe them into it (also known as Pygmalion Effect [see http://psych.wisc.edu/braun/281/Intelligence/LabellingEffect..., http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pygmalion_effect])

One of the reasons we keep a curated community of hosts is because we think a lot of our belief in others is a function of situational notions of normalcy. Good hosts create a sense of norm by being the first to take that leap of faith on the people around them. What does taking that leap of faith look like? Welcoming strangers with double high fives, looking them in the eye when they talk, asking questions with a genuine interest in what the others have to say, and trusting them enough to share oneself with them, for starters.

These norms set the environment on fire. It's what makes the air at anything Tea With Strangers different from the air in most gatherings of strangers. Breathe it in for a little bit and everyone begins to find interest in each other because layers that make people 'strangers' begin to get peeled very quickly. That is, unless you're holding your breath.

Quality people believe in the quality of people in mind and in action. And that's one of the reasons we think TWS works. Because it attracts people who don't hold their breath. Upward spiral!

High fives, Ankit

P.S. Quality might sound snobby, so let me qualify:

Everyone is smarter about something than you are.

Everyone has been motivated to do something you haven't.

Everyone laughs at something. It's one of the two more fundamental human emotions (i.e. babies either laugh or cry when they express emotion. This isn't lost as we grow.).

Everyone has an interest in themselves because we want to be taken care of (see: Maslow's Hierarchy), but sometimes people have circumstances that make them distrustful of others. You have an opportunity to empathize and understand that there's a reason for that that are beyond your understanding unless you take interest in others without wanting to take unfair advantage of them yourself.

Everyone's mind is as open as their life's circumstances have conditioned them to be. If and when you interact with someone – even if by sharing physical space – you are a part of their life's circumstances.

Everyone is interesting.

daveola• 11 years ago

As someone who is also fairly anti-social, I'd like to point out that it can become dangerous to go too far down this judgement hole. I think ankitshah makes some excellent points.

youshaei• 11 years ago

The only thing more amazing that going to a TWS meetup is the thoughtfulness and care the founder, Ankit, puts into growing this community. Highly recommend checking out a tea time or letting a friend know who's in one of the host areas to join.

ankitshah20• 11 years ago

Making me blush. So unnecessary. But we're doing our best. Long road ahead if we want to create a real dent while staying mindful.

rza• 11 years ago

Great concept, my main grip with meeting people on say a site like Meetup is that every event has like 100 attendees and smaller ones are too niche when all I really want is to have a conversation with a few people.

ankitshah20• 11 years ago

I think 100 attendees isn't a horrible thing if they actually feel a sense of common ground. The real difficulty is eliminating the friction that exists between people in those large gatherings. Something we try really hard to accomplish, in between all the tea times we host, is create larger gatherings for the community and cities at large that welcome people in a way that gets rid of all notions that any attendee would need formalities to treat the others like the most amazing person in the room.

j2kun• 11 years ago

I hosted a tea this afternoon and it was really relaxed. We talked about everything from our dream jobs to improv shakespeare to what makes math beautiful. We swapped some stories, drank tea, and after two hours just said goodbye and left.

Can't wait to do it again!

ankitshah20• 11 years ago

Golden.

petercooper• 11 years ago

At the risk of a derail, I'm in SF for a few days (to host O'Reilly Fluent) and "doing" breakfasts at Mel's on Mission downtown - first one tomorrow 9amish :-)

DanielKehoe• 11 years ago

IMO, if you haven't met Peter Cooper, you've missed one of this life's joys.

bootload• 11 years ago

American site, Commonwealth concept of 'Tea?' Is that the hot beverage [0] or dinner?

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tea

nudpiedo• 11 years ago

Hey, I am missing European cities.

Any European city with more than 100k people could work! But for that there are one million facebook groups (which usually tend to make grill and barbecues with strangers; usually foreigners in the city).

tzhong• 11 years ago

Love the TWS community and the founder :)

ankitshah20• 11 years ago

IT LOVES YOU TOO T.ZHONG

Tea with strangers

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