> the context of Europe is nonsensical to begin with as tea doesn't grow in Europe
It does grow just fine in India which was mostly controlled by Europeans at the time. As much as all of this seems bizarre to you it's still a historical fact. The Chinese government (wanting to maintain its global monopoly) banned the export of tea plants. In the 1840's a British botanist Robert Fortune (commissioned by the East India company) travelled to the tea growing provinces of China, disguised himself as Chinese and illegally smuggled several tea plants back to India. After replicating them in greenhouse he introduced them to the Darjeeling region in Northern India.
To be fair tea was already grown in India before 'the Great Tea Heist' it was just different kinds of tea (e.g. Assam) and Chinese teas were more popular and much more expensive (largely due to Chinese monopoly on trade, western ships were only allowed to trade at specifically designed trade ports).
It does grow just fine in India which was mostly controlled by Europeans at the time. As much as all of this seems bizarre to you it's still a historical fact. The Chinese government (wanting to maintain its global monopoly) banned the export of tea plants. In the 1840's a British botanist Robert Fortune (commissioned by the East India company) travelled to the tea growing provinces of China, disguised himself as Chinese and illegally smuggled several tea plants back to India. After replicating them in greenhouse he introduced them to the Darjeeling region in Northern India.
To be fair tea was already grown in India before 'the Great Tea Heist' it was just different kinds of tea (e.g. Assam) and Chinese teas were more popular and much more expensive (largely due to Chinese monopoly on trade, western ships were only allowed to trade at specifically designed trade ports).