I recently was at a coffee shop called Mecca, which is considered one of the best coffee shops in Sydney, and had a conversation. Or, more of a confrontation.

You see, there is a startup around here called Beat the Queue which is awesome. You can order coffee ahead on its app and it is waiting for you by the time you arrive. However, apparently Mecca does not let patrons who order via this service sit down. It seemed like an undue act of hostility, and I, the person who always is curious enough to unnecessarily scope things out even if it creates awkwardness, had decided to investigate.

I came towards a man named Kevin*. He looked at me with an air of friendliness. He had a long beard and eyeglasses. I hovered around the massive coffee machine, and he finally looked at me.

“Do you need something?”

“I am wondering if it is true that you don’t let people who order via Beat the Queue sit down?”

His expression darkened. He gave a curt answer and I decided I probably wouldn’t really ever find out.

I ordered a coffee and sat down. Kevin eventually came back to me. He sat down. He then explained to me more.

“It’s just this culture of rudeness. People come by and get their coffee and don’t linger. It becomes transactional and unpleasant.”

So as a compromise they decided to participants in the service but not let those customers sit down.

It still seems a little silly, but I am closer to understanding. In Sydney, coffee is not a commodity. It’s a community.

I am about to make a very bold claim: coffee tastes better in Sydney than San Francisco. If you walk into any coffee shop, there is a higher likelihood that your coffee would taste better here than in San Francisco. In my experience, the best tasting coffees (the artisan ones) vastly overtake the “best” tasting coffee in San Francisco.

People in Sydney take coffee very seriously here.

In fact, a friend who lives in San Francisco told me this story — once, some clients from Sydney visited San Francisco for a meeting. As a courtesy, the company provided some coffee. But the clients were so horrified at the taste that a few spat it out by accident, and they politely excused themselves to go to a coffee shop down the street. The meeting reconvened after the temporary hiccup.

This is just one story, but I think it’s an apt representation — Sydney people seem less tolerant of bad tasting coffee.

My office in Sydney does not provide coffee. The official stance as given forth by the Workplace team is that they “want to give business to the local coffee shops,” but it’s most likely driven by the fear of their coffee being rejected by hostile employees.

Indeed, Starbucks coffee, which I subjectively classify into the “mediocre” category of coffees, has not found much success in Sydney. There are only seven Starbucks in Sydney (which is very few for a city of 4MM people), and it seems to have shrunk to six with one in the financial district seems to have just quietly shut down. The horrors of baristas screaming your name and aggressive lines are not known here.

In contrast, Haven Tailoring Coffee Joyously, is f#%king fantastic. They are doing very well. What I love the most about them is that they let you tailor your coffee. Yes, you read that right. Sydney people are so serious about coffee that enough care about their temperature, acidity, sweetness, and body as to customize it.

However, my favorite of all time nearby my coffee is this tiny kiosk called Brooklands. Passing by it, it would be hard to imagine it’s one of the best coffee shops in all of Sydney, but it’s delicious. Their name is a reference to the motor racing circuit, as well as the Australian manufacturer of Aston Martins. I particularly am fond of it because they dump a fair amount of powered chocolate on top of my “skinny” (explanation to follow) cappuccino. It’s almost as if they just knew that was what I was secretly asking for. But it’s not just their chocolatey taste of their coffee that I love, but also that it’s always drinking temperature.

But coffee in Sydney is not without its imperfections. For one, their versions of coffee are very different. Here is their standard menu:

• Flat white (A latte — steamed milk plus espresso)
• Piccolo (Tiny cappuccino)
• Long black (Basically an Americano — espresso with water)
• Macchiato (espresso with milk foam)
• Anything can be called “skinny” (skim milk)

One glaring omission from this list is that there is no iced coffee. In fact, Australians don’t like ice. It’s apparently an American thing.

So when I order coffee, I need to explain and translate to them the concept of iced coffee. I usually say: “Please take a long black and add ice.”

They usually get confused. They say: “Are you sure you want ice? What about milk?”

Me: “No thanks on the milk. Yes, ice.”

They: “Not even ice cream?”

Yes, they love milk so much that they assume when you forgo milk, you are really asking for ice cream. I say no to the ice cream.

The other minor annoyance is that they are rarely open past 2 P.M. This upsets me greatly, and severely gets into the way of my reading and writing time that I did in San Francisco during the afternoon.

However, one exception on closing early is another favorite coffee shop, Suzie Q’s Coffee and Records, which has a great space, and very friendly baristas. They are open until ten P.M. I thank god that they exist.

One day the barista even invited me to the “dark side” and I was given a cursory lesson in brewing coffee.

For the first time, I looked around the coffee shop in his eyes. In way, it was like his kingdom, and the subjects were quietly sitting, waiting for their next brew.