Romanticism of the Coffeehouse
Coffee in the 21st century is more than just coffee.
I am fully aware of just how enthralled our generation is with coffee, and I could easily list one or two obvious reasons why this is the case.
Whilst I completely appreciate the artisanal quality of the great drink that is coffee, I do not care so much for what roast or blend I drink. I am much more intrigued by the coffeehouse chains that continue to spring up on every corner in every city, and serve a myriad of customers of day.
Coffee and its widely abused benefits go hand in hand with today’s incessant demand for productivity — the rat-race would cease to continue running without it. Most people grab their daily dose of caffeine to power through whatever duty the un-caffeinated versions of themselves would resent, or at least struggle to get through if not for coffee. But the place in which this coffee is made in is undervalued.
A big part of my conscience detests the wave of corporate coffeehouse chains that maintain a guise of ethical practice and ethically sourced products. Another part is guilty of embracing the Western coffee culture by sitting in one of these coffeehouses and soaking in the ambience with Fleetwood Mac or something of the like playing in the background, whiling away my time over a mocha cortado.
The gag is: I am sensitive to caffeine (can sometimes trigger a migraine or make me ball of anxiety) and have been advised not to drink it, and I especially dislike Starbucks.
When I want to properly indulge in a very decent latte, safe enough to drink on a lined stomach, I will go to Costa. When I’m feeling extra bougie, I will find an independent coffeehouse that brew their coffee by hand by baristas trained in a small Italian village. Coffee in hand I proceed to plant myself into one of their Italian chairs and spend at least three hours in it.
But like I said, its not so much the drink I am interested in. It is the opportunity to lose myself in a piece of work in the midst of other coffee drinkers, hushed conversations and subdued energy of patrons coming and going from the shop. A phenomenon reflecting much like the course of my life.
For me, this is the perfect atmosphere to blend into the backdrop of the establishment and work at a very healthy pace. Coffee shops for some are a strange territory but for me are the perfect spot for creative productivity, to which effect I find myself seeking go to instead of a library.
Other times I’ll just sit and with my journal closed and my hands clasped around my hot drink to observe couples share intimacy through their eyes, watch groups of adolescents debate what next they’re getting into and, watch people just like me. Those who appear to be in sad solitude at a glance but are in a world of their own, blissfully experiencing internal tranquility, ruminating and allowing the ideas to generate.
This is something special about the coffeehouse I think not many appreciate. The coffeehouse has an extrinsic power which I believe deserves to be transformed into a space of its own. I, alongside my older brother Shaun, am exploring the possibility of establishing a sort of neo-library, where creativity and conversation can flow freely.
In the meantime, before I can dream to bringing it into reality after university, you can catch me in a 24 hour Starbucks in the centre of the city being my pensive self.
