Coffee.

Coffee.

It’s the stuff of life, isn’t it? It brings people together. It enables conversation. It makes you smile. It makes any day just a bit brighter, better, happier.

So, why is it so difficult to get a good cup of coffee here?

Chris and I have encountered this dilemma in other countries, being served instant coffee frappes, overwhelmed with foams, creams, and everything else but coffee. So why are we experiencing this in the country that we’ve decided to temporarily call home?

Let me see … they have flat white,short black, long black, cappuccinos with cocoa powder sprinkled on top? It’s difficult enough that I can’t understand what they’re saying half the time, but now I have to interpret their coffee choices? We haven’t found a single place that sells a regular cup of Joe. Poor Chris has tried to order coffee and you should hear him: “Can I have a regular coffee? Just a plain coffee? With cream? I mean milk. Just a coffee, you know, like a filter coffee? “ Imagine an exasperated and non-caffeinated Chris. They seem to like the French press coffee here. Chris isn’t so taken with it. In fact, he’s decided that we shouldn’t buy coffee for the French press that we have at home because it makes him not look forward to coffee. What’s happening!!! When the first cup of coffee tastes like washing up, you know he’s losing it. We’re looking to buy a coffee maker online. It’s sad. We often dream about that endless cup of coffee that you could get at places like Sitwells (or most places in the US).

So, like we’ve done in the past, we decided to visit our local Starbucks. You know why? We’ve decided that Starbucks is the standard. No matter where you go in the world, you know what you’re getting. At least it’s a good place to start.

I’ve saved a warm place in my heart for Starbucks. Where I last worked, my co-workers/friends and I visited Starbucks daily, if not twice daily. Yes, I know I could have saved my daily coffee money and put it into an IRA or something useful like that. But why would want to I miss out on the daily coffee train? The coffee breaks that Susan and I would take just before we had to do weekly Culture Room checks? How about the free coffee that my bosses would buy? And maybe Jack would take us into the FCC for a half eaten donut or bagel? Or when you would go for coffee and know that Tim or Caryl had already gone for coffee because the brains were lit up? We knew we were daily Starbucks coffee drinkers because the Starbucks baristas knew us by name, or by nickname (Larry), or would know if we already came by that morning and were now re-caffeinating ourselves for the afternoon. We knew their names. We knew when they bought new cars. When you went to Starbucks and bought a coffee for a friend, those Starbucks baristas could even tell who ordered it! I can even remember everyone’s drink-of-choice: Tim, Katrina, and Jenny ordered Americanos, Susan ordered grande (often venti in the afternoon) decaf black, Caryl often ordered chai because she doesn’t prefer coffee, last I remembered Jack was on a non-fat mocha kick but in the summer he gets iced coffee light on ice please, Kathy ordered the most complicated coffees, Nate would drink anything that was free, Brian had his usual, and Michelle would always change it up. As of late, I ordered non-fat cappuccinos.

And that’s what I order at my Starbucks here. It makes me think of my friends and all of our fun times, but also because … I simply can’t figure out what kind of coffee to order here. (ETK)