Anyone on here read Chinese/Taiwanese?

Taiwan and HK use traditional characters, while Mainland China generally has used “simplified” characters since the 50s / 60s. While China has a lot of spoken languages, the written language is more or less the same, aside from cases where specialized vocabulary or different grammar from spoken languages are written down. Most folks in Taiwan speak Mandarin also, but Taiwanese (Hokkien) is a spoken language which is part of the Min language family (these languages originally come from across the strait across Fujian province; Taiwanese is a variant of the Southern Min dialect).

The first picture link doesn’t seem to work; the second picture (gold tin) should be a Lóng Jǐng (龍井茶; “Dragon Well”), which is a green tea from Hangzhou, in Zhejiang, China (and, as the text on the back says, is one of China’s “10 famous teas”).

Whoa. That’s bizarre. The tea that’s contained in that tin is almost definitely an oolong. I made it yesterday, and the leaves looked and behaved exactly like oolong leaves, and the color of the liquor was the right color. Furthermore, it definitely didn’t look like a Dragonwell variety, which, to me, has always been very easy to identify. So confused…

Here’s a couple of pictures of what the leaves look like. Maybe everything I know about tea is wrong?
http://tinypic.com/r/2llhmon/5
http://tinypic.com/r/333l6kw/5

And here are some pictures of it as it is steeping:
After one minute – http://tinypic.com/r/2zojlgp/5
After two minutes – http://tinypic.com/r/2gxg3eg/5
Taking the leaves out – http://tinypic.com/r/n4dyiw/5

You’re talking about the tea in this tin, right? http://tinypic.com/view.php?pic=2i93z1k&s=5

I couldn’t see the other image. You’re sure that the tea inside is the same one that was originally in the tin?

This is strange, Will is right, the words on the tin say Longjing aka Dragon well. On the rear end it says ‘The foremost of China’s Ten Most Famous Tea’ plus storage instructions and 12 months shelf life.
The tea leaves however, is definitely oolong. Can’t tell which variety it is but the dark green curled leaves and the light brown tea liquid are oolong. I am guessing when you brewed it the aroma should be a clear indicator as well.
I am not an expert but it looks like a variety of Shuixian to me.
Maybe your aunt swapped the box?
In any case green tea will not last beyond 12 months- 18 if you store in a fridge?

@Will: No, I’m not entirely positive that the tea inside the tin is the original tea, but I don’t know why my aunt would have swapped it out (or anyone else, for that matter). It’s possible that her son got it second hand from someone who had put a different tea in it before they sold it.

Thank you to both of you for helping me translate the writing on the tin! I knew I could count on the people on Steepster to lend a hand. :)

I’m not at home right now, but I will post the pictures of the second tin, which I think has some sort of green tea in it (or perhaps white—sometimes it’s hard for me to tell the difference) later.