so tea!

It all begins with the Black drag scene in America in the 1990s where the expression spill the T meant ‘to open up about something’.  T stood for truth.  But some wit changed T to tea and this offered various ways of using the term. You could ask ‘What’s the tea?’ Or complain that the bit of gossip you heard was weak tea, whereas piping hot tea was a juicy bit of information.

This became Gen Z slang.  But now you can exclaim ‘So tea!’ meaning ‘that’s cool’ or ‘you really look good!’.  I am guessing that the progression is that whatever is being admired is worthy of tea (gossip).

On TikTok this morphed into your body is tea or even just body tea to convey the idea that you are pretty hot. To add to the joke, the phrase has expanded to your body is so tea the British are coming (because the British love tea and everyone knows Paul Revere’s warning).  Other well-known tea lovers are the Turkish people so it could be your body is so tea the Turkish (Turks) are coming).

And finally the phrase has progressed to ‘so Lipton!’