Espresso Bar Stories Augustus 2010

Every week brings another story. Some more interesting, some a bit boring. This week I took a couple of photo's to write about it.

Saturday :
Sylvie (or was it Sylvia?) is a very loyal and friendly woman. Sometimes she's passing by on her own, sometimes with her son, I don't know the name off.
Last Saturday morning she's enjoying her tea in one of those 'leather' seats opposite of the bar. While her son is reading a comic at the bar she goes to the bathroom and comes back with a book. "Look what I found!" she yells at me very excited."Where did you find this book?" I asked.
"It's a 'free book' meant to be found and read. It was stuck in the bathroom behind the pipes. I'm very happy with it, I think it's a good one.

The Road, written by Cormac Mc Carthny, Pulitzer price winner.
And on the first page we see a handwritten message.
It's a bookcrossing book.
This intrigues me and I go to the website and after a couple of clicks I find this.
Thanks Elena you picked our bar for this initiative and good luck Sylvie with your book.

Monday :
Laurent is a 5 year Caffenation Veteran. He came in sight the days he was dating blond Charlie. That didn't last long, but meanwhile he kept on coming for his favourite 'Muscat' cappuccino's.

This time he came along for a take away mocha.
While waiting at the bar he was babbling on and on about this upcoming Motor bicycle exam and how nervous he was.

Probably a bit too nervous. He puts the mocha cup on the roof on his car, then gets in, but .... forgets his drink.
He seems to be a careful driver Laurent; it was only 25 meters further up the road the mocha decided to take a dive. Hopefully Laurent was more lucky on the bike....

Saturday, again :
Thomas from Balen studied at the Plantijn Hogeschool around the corner 3, 4 years ago. In those days he liked sitting at our bar more than going to school and so it happened one day he came in touch with Little Patrick.
Patrick and his brother had the luminous idea of opening an Antique furniture shop annex Espresso Bar in Hudson, a city in between New York and Albany. And Thomas would be their man behind the bar.
The idea lasted long, but the store never opened.
So Patrick had to find a new profession. And he found one : I Phone sales man.

In those days he was getting his hands on hundreds of IPhones and his office was ..... in our bar. The business was prosperous and Patrick ambitious, but bit by bit the Americans were blocking their IPhone sales to foreigners and Patrick had to shop somewhere else.
After a couple weeks of negociating he found himself a new dealer .... in China.

The day his big box full of IPhones arrived he was all tensed and curiously he opens the box.
What a dissapointment to discover the only thing inside was a pair of sneakers.
Because Thomas never had his promised job, Patrick offered him the shoes.
Up to now Thomas is the only guy I know wearing 16000 dollar sneakers. What a way to walk the streets. :-)