Preparation for tea time

The Douglas Adams piece below is poached from the BBC's Hitch Hiker's Gude to the Galaxy website, following some online discussion about tea: most of those involved seemed to know how to make tea, but it is a nice wee pasage with useful other sociological observations.

I would add that if you are in Oxford, Rome, Washington D.C. or anywehre else where the water is so hard that you take a foot-high cone of sediment out of the water boiler every year (Rome) or your hands after a shower smell as though you have been in a public pool (D.C.) or both (Oxford), you should filter the water first or nip out to one of those handy Roman fountains or all the effort will go to waste. Chalk and chlorine kill all the flavour, you might as well drink instant coffee. Or go to Edinburgh for nice water.

FInding good tea outside Britain is not so easy (by which I mean you cannot just nip out to the nearest shop with any tea). Twinings seem to put factory-floor sweepings into the bags they sell on the continent. Dilma teabags seem to be quite respectable, and the Tetley I found in Poland was also good, though expensive.