Geda tea (疙瘩茶) or tea heads (茶头)

After killing the greenery, during the rolling of the leaf, some of the raw material falls (sticks together) into lumps and such tea was once called Geda. And after Shu Pu'er began to be made in Yunnan in 1973, it was discovered that during the production of tea, the lower part of the wet heap (渥堆) had a higher temperature and humidity, which glued the tea leaves into lumps. Such tea also began to be called Geda, which means a lump. In general, this word denotes something of poor quality. Tea merchants began to call such tea tea heads! And experts called it semi-finished Shu Pu'er. Usually, a lump forms around a tea shoot (bud), which is rich in sticky substances. The tea shoot is sealed, and the fermentation process in it occurs to a much lesser extent than in the rest of the loose leaf. That is why it is called semi-finished!!! Yes, it is worth saying that Shu Puer can only be made in a factory, since in order to get high-quality Shu, you need to put a large amount of tea in a pile at once (from 5 to 10 tons). So from about 10 tons of raw materials for Shu Puer, only about 100 kilograms of Tea heads are obtained.
At one time this tea was considered of poor quality and therefore it was crushed and made into tea bags!!! Later this tea was recognized as normal, and it began to gain popularity.
There is also an amazing story about the origin of the name Tea Head - once upon a time in Buddhist temples there was a monk responsible for brewing tea for guests, as well as for offering tea to Buddha - he was called "Tea Head".