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| http://www.timeoutmumbai.net/mumbai-local/features/tea-leaf-reader |
One cup of tea holds the answer to one question
Tea leaf readers are the least convincing of soothsayers. Even in the wizarding school of Hogwarts, the scatty Professor Trelawney was never right – except that one time she spotted the ominous Grim in Harry Potter’s teacup. But tassologist Hetal Desai claims the practice isn’t just fodder for adolescent fantasy or ridicule but a legitimate method of divination.
Desai, who has a degree in clinical hypnotherapy from the Indian Board of Alternative Medicines, worked as a management and training consultant and even had a stint, presciently, as an Agony Aunt columnist before she discovered tea-leaf reading by accident. “One day a friend told me about a woman from New Zealand who had come to India to teach tassology, and I went along to see her for fun,” she said. Desai hasn’t heard from her since but she has been reading tea leaves for the past nine years.
At a reading for a client at a tea workshop at Nature’s Basket in Bandra, Desai swirled the tea cup clockwise deftly – she only uses Assam long leaf – before “peeping” into her customer’s subconscious. She looks for symbols like birds, animals and even vehicles in the remains in the cup. “It isn’t a dictionary where each symbol has a specific meaning,” she explained. “It is rather the combination of images and other messages besides what I find in the teacup. One cup of tea holds the answer to one question.”
The spiritualist explained that the teacup’s brim is the starting point of the client’s timeline, representing the present, while the far future lies at the very bottom of the cup. Desai mostly gets questions about careers, relationships and buying property, she said, but wouldn’t let on who her alleged celebrity clients were. Can the remains of a hot beverage really hold the answer to the future of your career? Desai got it a little wrong with a client whose teacup apparently showed that she was a swimmer (she wasn’t) and had a “gloomy room” (she didn’t). But on other occasions she’s been right, she said. “I did a reading for a woman who came with her friends and the teacup showed multiple relationships,” she said. “She denied having any, though I saw at least two, one of which was out of town. She called me up later on and admitted to seeing a guy in Bangalore too.”
If you don’t fancy tea, you can ask Desai to read coffee dregs, the drippings of candle wax, or opt for something else entirely. Tassology is only one of Desai’s talents – she is also a tarot card reader, a pendulum dowser and an aura and chakra healer. Be prepared to fork out, however: she charges R3,000 for a full consultation.
Contact Hetal Desai at 19, Evershine Mall, Mind Space, Link Road, Malad (W) (+91 22 98202 43055).
By Maya Sorabjee on September 01 2011 6.30pm
Photos by Parikshit Rao
Photos by Parikshit Rao
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