Ever want to close your eyes and take a deep breathe when you walk into a cafe where the aroma of coffee is in the air?
Ever felt like a cup of hot coffee warms more than you hands, but also your heart?
If you hear yourself saying 'Yes, yes and yes!', you share an identity with millions of others around the global: Coffee lover.
Today is International Coffee Day.
A day for your beloved (and maybe favorite) beverage.
It boosts your productivity, inspires you with new ideas, helps you to relax, accompanies you for overtime work and leisure reading time...
A cup of coffee might as well be a staple in your life.
So basic that you've never given it a good thought.
Maybe today, you should start thinking about it.
Ever thought about the people who plant and produce the rich-flavoured coffee?
Do you know that coffee production is nicknamed the 'sweatshops in the field' because coffee producers are poorly paid as mega-sized multinational coffee chains swallow up the majority of profits?
Do you know less than 5 coffee companies have the power to control the operation of the whole coffee industry worldwide?
With all that sweat, coffee farmers produce one of the best tasting agricultural goods ever but still end up in deep poverty.
On the other side of the planet, going to cafes symbolizes a quality lifestyle which people sit back, relax and savor the finer things of life.
If this is not 'unfairness', I don't know what it is.
I'm not a coffee drinkers but I have to admit that I'm in love with this alluring beverage, amazingly not with its rich taste.
These little beans have enriched my life in a truly unique way.
For almost a year, I lived with it, read about it, write about it and think about it.
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| Ripe coffee beans |
Coffee has given me wonderful memories and experiences.
I could easily make a list of reasons why my life is related to coffee:
1) When I was a student, I go to the cafe on campus for lunch almost every day.
The cafe is filled with the aroma of coffee. You can smell that before you even walk into the place.
I smile almost every time as I walk in the cafe, partly because of that.
I smile almost every time as I walk in the cafe, partly because of that.
2) I have some of the most enjoyable conversations I've had in my life with my awesome professor.
In that same cafe, over coffee and sometimes lunch.
In that same cafe, over coffee and sometimes lunch.
3) I'm amazed after my first time having Vietnamese coffee which has the richest of dark chocolate.
4) My baby.
I read and researched on the bitter truth behind the popular drink.
I shed tears on some of the long quiet nights when I stayed up to work on it.
Not because of stress, but because of what I read and found out. And because I didn't know what to do to help.
I wrote the longest thing I've ever written in my life, on coffee.
It made me proud. At the same time, it is humbling.
5) I met new people while working on my baby.
6) It gave me the opportunity to work in an NGO advocating for fair trade.
7) The fact that I studied about coffee but don't drink it, was the 'fun fact' about me when I was in Stanford. People remember this fact about me up till now.
8) Some of the best summer memories was me spending evenings at Stanford's CoHo listening to jazz.
The last night I spent at CoHo, the jazz performance was one of the best I've ever seen.
Dozens of musicians took turns to play an improvised verse with an instrument or just vocal to the same song.
Young talents like that amaze me, I wish I am a fraction that talented.
With modern technology, I shared the it with someone back at my home city.
9) In general, all those good times I spent in cozy cafes scattered all over the city, with books and/or people I love, for a nice chat or quiet reading time.
The smell of coffee is in the air, it surrounds me and made me feel warm and loved.
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| How do you like your coffee? |
Dear coffee lovers,
Did coffee bring you any special memories?
Does the scent and the taste of it reminds you of some special moments, persons or places?
I don't know how you like your coffee, but I certainly don't like it to be produced inhumanly.
While you enjoy this delicious beverage, I dare you to take your appreciation to a whole new level:
1) Show your appreciation and gratitude by being concerned about the well-being of coffee farmers.
2) Buy fair trade coffee.
3) Turning fair trade part of your habit and lifestyle. Not just coffee. And not just FLO labelled but also those by other certification systems.
4) Spread words to change the world.
Sugar can sweeten the coffee, but it can't remove the bitterness in the lives of impoverished and marginalized coffee farmers.
Good news is: you can!
Next time when you have a choice, go for fair trade. :)
Love,
N
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