The bar is better
Sep 17, 2009
YOU do not need to have landed yesterday to realise that coffee is a statement of fashion in Kampala. Visiting the café is all the rage; it is deemed a popular pastime for the adventurous, openminded, young, affluent and urban.
By Alex Balimwikungu
YOU do not need to have landed yesterday to realise that coffee is a statement of fashion in Kampala. Visiting the café is all the rage; it is deemed a popular pastime for the adventurous, openminded, young, affluent and urban.
I possess all the aforementioned qualities, but why I have failed to fall for the typically western lifestyle fad has nothing to do with my Pan Africanism or the fact that I have never been to Starbucks.
It has everything to do with the whole café concept and those who make the whole coffee business look bad. Is it only me, or the ‘pretty’ ladies who work at these coffee shops? For all their beauty, they have this snobbish thing about them; they do not smile.
Move over to the bar and it seems all barmaids attended the same school. Before you settle down, she is already rolling her eyes, shaking her imaginary behind and literally cooing in a seductive voice, “Kulika yo Ssebo. Ononywa kaki? (Welcome back sir, what beer will you drink?)â€.
The beer will be served at your preferred temperature! But what is the point in sitting for hours in a café sipping a glass of coffee? A lawyer friend, preoccupied with his job every day, says he goes to Café Pap because he needs to be alone, undisturbed by either his job or the presence of a companion. In his theory, the lonelier the café the
better!
Move to Café Pap on Parliamentary Avenue, which is an Internet hotspot and you will learn that it is patronised by these so called ‘right thinking’ people who believe that if you do not have a laptop or an I-phone, you have no business there.
If they pick a call from a buddy in Kawempe, they will pretend the biggest inconvenience has befallen them and they go on to ‘whisper’: “I’m at Café Pap, call me later!†Those who remember the days Nandos had just opened its doors know what I am talking about.
For me, most people who hang at coffee
houses are screaming out for attention, they suffer from the “arrivist syndrome†typical of kyeyo returnees. They struggle to make a statement. The ladies, especially those on dates, act like they were weaned on Espresso and
Cappuccino.
Compare that to a bar. The average man who wants to impress a girl will have three to five chilled beers plus the good old dust-coated muchomo and they are sorted. Bump into a buddy in the bar and it is the same old slang. At these cafés, silence is the commonest form of communication!
Then again, since when did men start having cakes and salami on outings? Pass me a cold beer please!
YOU do not need to have landed yesterday to realise that coffee is a statement of fashion in Kampala. Visiting the café is all the rage; it is deemed a popular pastime for the adventurous, openminded, young, affluent and urban.
I possess all the aforementioned qualities, but why I have failed to fall for the typically western lifestyle fad has nothing to do with my Pan Africanism or the fact that I have never been to Starbucks.
It has everything to do with the whole café concept and those who make the whole coffee business look bad. Is it only me, or the ‘pretty’ ladies who work at these coffee shops? For all their beauty, they have this snobbish thing about them; they do not smile.
Move over to the bar and it seems all barmaids attended the same school. Before you settle down, she is already rolling her eyes, shaking her imaginary behind and literally cooing in a seductive voice, “Kulika yo Ssebo. Ononywa kaki? (Welcome back sir, what beer will you drink?)â€.
The beer will be served at your preferred temperature! But what is the point in sitting for hours in a café sipping a glass of coffee? A lawyer friend, preoccupied with his job every day, says he goes to Café Pap because he needs to be alone, undisturbed by either his job or the presence of a companion. In his theory, the lonelier the café the
better!
Move to Café Pap on Parliamentary Avenue, which is an Internet hotspot and you will learn that it is patronised by these so called ‘right thinking’ people who believe that if you do not have a laptop or an I-phone, you have no business there.
If they pick a call from a buddy in Kawempe, they will pretend the biggest inconvenience has befallen them and they go on to ‘whisper’: “I’m at Café Pap, call me later!†Those who remember the days Nandos had just opened its doors know what I am talking about.
For me, most people who hang at coffee
houses are screaming out for attention, they suffer from the “arrivist syndrome†typical of kyeyo returnees. They struggle to make a statement. The ladies, especially those on dates, act like they were weaned on Espresso and
Cappuccino.
Compare that to a bar. The average man who wants to impress a girl will have three to five chilled beers plus the good old dust-coated muchomo and they are sorted. Bump into a buddy in the bar and it is the same old slang. At these cafés, silence is the commonest form of communication!
Then again, since when did men start having cakes and salami on outings? Pass me a cold beer please!