A step inside, off the bright, busy street and into a dark corridor. Before your eyes can adjust you are moving, down a spiral staircase into a small room brimming with cushions and low tables. On the tables, candles, flickering the shadows of teapots on the walls. You order tea. When the tea comes, you pour it over the rock sugar in the bottom of your cup. The tea is golden, a hypnotic blend of black and green tea and sunflower petals. No words can describe the flavour, and yet, you can never forget the taste. It is the lazy gold of a summer’s afternoon, distilled into a cup of tea.

Photo: 1001 Nights of Summer at Same Fusy in Warsaw, Poland.