A Cup of Coffee

“Why, O, why did I ever leave my hobbit-hole?" said poor Mr. Baggins, bumping up and down on Bombur's back.” 

From The Hobbit By J.R.R. Tolkien

Today I decided to take my studies off campus and, as is traditional for students in America, into a coffee shop.


For those of you who are familiar with coffee shops in America, the scene I describe below will be familiar to you. The air is just slightly too cold for comfort and the aroma of coffee grounds permeates it. Mostly small tables fill the space. Mixed in with these are a few larger tables and a smattering of chairs that are so comfortable most people who sit in them contemplate the likelihood getting it out of the building and into their car without anyone seeing them (most conclude that it is not possible but that doesn’t stop the thought from occurring every time its soft leather embraces them). Every wall has at least one power outlet (if they are really awesome there are more!) There is a steady flow of every possible person you can imagine flowing in and out; coffee is universal no matter who you are or what you do. If a caffeine I.V. could be successfully invented I’m sure there would be a line to fill those too. Sitting scattered throughout the space are individuals and small clusters of people. There are a few retired people either chatting or reading the paper, a few friends who haven’t seen each other in a while catching up, and a table or two of a business person giving a sales pitch to a mostly unwilling client (you all know you’ve seen it). But most of the people filling the shop are between sixteen and their mid-twenties. They are students. How do we know this? They are easy to identify – either they are working hard on their laptops or pouring over a book that is hideously large with a highlighter. This group buys their one obligatory drink (usually a small because that’s all they can afford) and nurse it for as long as possible and, even if it sits there empty for hours, they don’t throw it away until just before they leave. Unless the coffee shop is in a mall (in which case all bets are off), this is the slice of humanity you will find. American coffee shops do not make their money on the people who sit in their chairs; this is evident in the great success of the coffeehouse drive-thru (how did they only come up with this like, within the last five years?).

This is the world from which I come. I am comfortable with this.

This is the world which I find myself.

Coffee shops in the UK are also a little too cold and the air also smells of coffee. There are small tables. At this point the similarities end. If you are lucky you’ll find a coffee shop that has comfy couches and chairs, but don’t count on it. Mostly there are straight back chairs and those strange armed-chairs that you usually only find in old peoples’ houses (you know that ones, they look like they might be comfortable but really there isn’t enough padding and the arms feeling like they’re trying to keep you from escaping). You know something is up as soon as you order your beverage. They ask you, ‘eat in or take away?’ Huh? Why should they care? It becomes clear once you move down the counter; they give you real cups if you said ‘eat in.’ what’s with that? How can you hide that you finished your drink hours ago when they can see into your cup? There is a steady flow of people, but most of them stay and sit. Don’t you buy coffee so you can move faster, not to stop? The strangest part of the whole experience is the strollers. Yes. You read right. The strollers. Apparently people feel that it is not only socially acceptable to bring their tiny (usually crying) infants and their small (usually screaming or wiggling or running around) children into the coffee shop – they feel that they should sit and stay for a bit. In the ten plus years I’ve gone the coffee shops in the US I’ve seen maybe a half dozen strollers, and most of the time they are left outside, and the baby staying with a responsible adult/older child or the parent carries them inside. The number of running/wiggling/screaming small children is also so low that I can only recall seeing them with a parent, who was at a table, once. I have already seen six strollers in the few hours I’ve been in this single coffee shop. My favourite was in a London Starbucks that barely had space for people to squeeze past each other in front of the counter and three couples with strollers managed to force their way in (my first question is why they both had to come it, but I feel that they might not have taken kindly to my question). Then there are the rest of the costumers. They come, sit for a few minutes (maybe an average of fifteen) then leave. Even if they are by themselves! I am the only person sitting with a laptop and I have commandeered the only power outlet I could find. I feel like I’ve fallen into an alternate reality. Oh, and all those mugs that they give out? No one brings them back to the counter, they are just left out for one of the staff to collect. This situation also leads to that awkward moment when you know they see that your cup has been empty the last three times they’ve been past but they don’t take it because you’re still there – taking up space that should be used by real customers.

This is a strange world and I don’t know how I feel about it. Wait, scratch that. I do know how I feel about it. I don’t like it. But really, I think deep down I’m not missing American coffee shops. I think I’m going through Caribou Coffee withdrawal. As much as I like Joe at the University Library coffee shop, there is nothing like Caribou Coffee. Why, oh, why did they have to expand into Bahrain but not Britain? It is a crime against humanity.

Well, gotta love my first world problems.