The Story of the Hupao Spring

Story of the Hupao Spring

The water of the Hupao Spring is the best match of the Longjing tea in the Hangzhou city. Long time ago, there were two brothers called Da Hu ("big tiger") and Er Hu ("litter tiger"). They came to Hangzhou together and tried to live in a small temple in the suburb of the city. The monks in the temple told them that there was no water there and people had to climb over the hills to carry water there. The brothers promised that they would supply water to the temple if they could settle down there. Therefore they stayed in the temple and waged a long way to carry water everyday. A few years later, there was a big drought in the city and even the remote water resource was dry to the bottom. These two brothers remembered that they had passed by the Hengshan Mountain many years ago and used to enjoy the water of the "Kid Spring" there. If they can carry the Kid Spring to the Hangzhou city then the whole city would have plenty of sweet water. They decided to go to the Hengshan Mountain and transfer the spring to Hangzhou. After several months they arrived at the foot of the Hengshan Mountain. The brothers were both exausted and fainted. When they woke up they saw a young boy standing in front of them. The young boy listened the brothers story about transfering the "kid spring" to the Hangzhou city. He was actually the angel in charge of the "kid spring". With some spell the boy transformed the two brothers to a couple of big tigers, and the boy rid the tigers flying to the Hangzhou city. At that night the monks and villigers in Hangzhou had a strange dream: the two brothers became two tigers and really carried the spring to the city. The next morning there was many streams of sunshine coming out of the clouds to the ground, and two colorful tigers flying down from the sky to the city. The two tigers digged a deep pit by the side of the temple, suddenly clear water bubbling out of the pit and there was a spring at that place. The villigers named this spring "Hupao" (digged by tigers, our tigers running) in the memory of the tiger brothers. The spring offered clean water to the villigers and also was a perfect match to the Longjing tea.