The Art of Coffee

Another day, another coffee shop. This one is a mere stroll from home. A modern looking, welcoming front disguised an old fashioned, dark wood interior. Behind the counter wall mounted shelves displayed china cups, no single one being the same. The woman behind the counter was dressed in layers of floaty black clothes like a butterfly wearing the sky on a winters night. She presented us with iced water and hot towels before taking our order. Once back behind the counter she examined the selection of cups before choosing the correct ones for each of us. She weighed out the coffee beans, ground them and placed them in a filter onto which she poured hot water from a large, ornate silver pot. We marvelled at the precision and the flavour but just slightly lamented the lack of the usual small chocolate accompaniment. Moments later we were presented with a large plate each (matching our cups and saucers) on it were three small slices of cake and a leaf-shaped glass dish containing a home-made lemon ice-cream that tasted exactly like a perfect gin and tonic. There was no shortage of customers coming and going-it's clearly an institution.

It's worth remembering (and I'm really not lecturing) that while this glorious attention to the simplest pleasures goes on in our area of Japan it's a different story in the North East. There people are refusing to move into the free new (pre-fab) homes being built for them because at the rescue centres they get fed. If they move into their own home they'll have no money to buy food. Poverty is always shocking but when I contrast my day in this country with that fact it somehow means more. Today I miss working for Oxfam.