I just finished another couple of pages in the book "Starbucked" and while I was reading I began to wonder why I had developed this pull towards Starbucks in the past few days. Okay, maaaaybe the past month...ahem...I didn't just say that. Believe me, it's against my will...but I have found myself going there on a regular basis to work on my thesis. I guess it started when I got bored with going to the library to work, which happened after a ridiculously short period of time. I just can't take the typcial library silence. Besides, it's kind of depressing to go to the library and always see the same people, who are already there when I get there and still there when I leave. Don't they have a life?
So I was thinking about what was making me go back to Starbucks. The most obvious reason is that I know I like the coffee there. So far I haven't found a single coffee place in Nürnberg that serves the kind of coffee that would make me come back for more. So I go to the one place I know I will like the coffee: Starbucks. Ugh, there, I said it. I admitted it again (my forehead is in furrows and the corners of my mouth are pulled down, that's how much it just hurt to admit that). I guess my preferences for coffee, I should say coffee drinks since I never actually drink coffee, were shaped by those coffee drinks to be found in California, and not just at Starbucks (like I said in my last blog post I hardly ever went to Starbucks while residing in the US). And it's difficult to find a place that serves iced coffee drinks (as far as I remember the Starbucks in Germany doesn't even serve iced drinks in the winter). That's reason one.
Reason two is also quite simple. Since there is no waitstaff at Starbucks there is nobody there to kick you out, so you can just go ahead and read a book for 3 hours (like I did today) and nobody will bother you. Isn't that great?
A third reason I would say that applies to me is one that is mentioned by Taylor Clark in his book "Starbucked". He quotes the Austrian writer Alfred Polgar who allegedly once said that a coffeehouse is "a place for people who want to be alone, but need the company for it' (p. 77). Yes, that is totally it! That is exactly what I need right now to get my work done: company that won't bother me and that isn't silent. Good thing the wireless internet at Starbucks costs an arm and a leg (and therefore I don't use it). Otherwise I would be tempted to go online and that would be the end of getting any work done.
I mentioned above that I know I like the coffee drinks at Starbucks. There is also something I know I don't like at Starbucks: their pastries! I think they taste bad, really bad. They taste of mass production and a gazillion ingredients. But hey, I shouldn't complain because I have the biggest sweet tooth (I actually think I have a mouth full of sweet teeth...) and I guess I'm a big enough food snob that I won't eat something if it doesn't seem worth it.
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Applies to reason 2: go sleep off your jet-lag :-)
ReplyDeleteTalk about bad food at Starbucks. I think they must add 100 preservatives and just as many flavors. You think you're eating a cinnamon bun but guess what: you aren't. It's just a bunch of goo which tastes like fake cinnamon.
Hey.....don't frown...if you like it...you like it! Millions of people do! It's not a "bad thing" to like Starbuck's. I think it's great you have a place to just hang out and who knows....maybe Mr. Wonderful will come in someday!!! So...don't worry....be happy!
ReplyDeleteOpps...sorry...that was me. I forgot to sign my name!!!
ReplyDeletei am not a starbucks customer, but it really seems like the place i would like as well to work for my thesis.
ReplyDeleteas you know there is nothing like that here, only thalia in kassel could be something like, but is still too far away :(
You're so right! That's why I like to study at Starbucks (in my case math)... because they don't kick you out (often I go without buying a drink) and it makes you feel like you're hanging out in some fashionable club when really you're just poring over a math textbook. I also don't use the wireless internet for that very reason you stated--the exorbitant cost. Maybe they'd attract more business by making it free, but, hey, when are they strapped for business?
ReplyDeleteI don't mind the omnipresence of Starbucks so much. It's convenient, though aesthetically annoying. What does annoy me is how, now that they've infested every nook and cranny with a store, they're trying to capitalize on different industries such as music and film. I must confess I enjoyed their Buddy Holly compilation, but their acquisition of Bob Dylan and others is wearing the whole thing a bit thin. It's a constant reminder of the power of unbelievable amounts of money in America and abroad, and I think this is something that irks people about the U.S.--the cult of money. But, hey, the products are pretty good quality, at least the coffee, and it's heads and shoulders above places like McDonalds. At the very least, it'll provide incentive for those ungodly places to improve their quality.