I’ve come to believe that in order to participate in our culture (or at least to be perceived as a participant by others), we must consume. I’ve seen people buy a coffee and sit for an hour, only to leave without having taken more than a sip. What I’ve taken away from this is that we all feel an obligation to participate, to “join in,” and in order to do that, we feel we must exchange money for goods.
These same people who think they are helping need-the-help-but-can’t-ask strangers in third-world countries (sometimes) look me in the eye, don’t say hello, don’t say please, try to pay for a $2 coffee while on their cellphone scheduling a session with their private trainer, and ask for “only a drop of skim” and a receipt. I am the person they see every day, who makes their latte with care and years of training, retraining, and practice. But often the consumer is more comfortable doing what is considered humanitarian work for citizens he will never meet in a different country that he will never visit than he is leaving some change in the tip jar.
At the shop where I work now, we charge $1.95 for a small coffee, so I often I give people a nickel as change. More than half the time, they keep that nickel. I have even seen people roll their eyes as though change is a nuisance, and then fish through their oversized purse for their oversized wallet, so that they can put away that nickel. I would appreciate that nickel.
Meanwhile, someone in Ethiopia gets paid about $2 for one kilogram (2.2 pounds) of green coffee beans, which, according to ethiomedia.com, is an outrageously optimistic estimate.
Additionally, outdated requirements for Fair Trade certification state that no children can work on the “farm.” In Ethiopia, coffee doesn’t grow on farms. Taking care of the coffee plants is like asking your child to water the plants in your backyard. This stipulation itself comes from a North American ideal rooted in privilege: the idea that if a child is “working,” he is being exploited and would otherwise be able to go to school.
It is easy to find Ethiopian coffees selling for over $18 for a 12 oz. bag and justify the cost because we “are making it at home” instead of paying $2 for a cup from a cafe. Plus, we feel like good humanitarians. That feeling is not only pleasurable because it supports our desire to believe that we are altruistic, but we also get to feel superior and exceptional. These feelings silently bind us to our unknown peers, and we get to partake in what it means to be a true American.
People who work in coffee shops rarely want to be lifetime baristas, especially in New York City. Everyone is funding their other project, their Life’s Project. Be it music, writing, acting, dancing, painting, or saving up for graduate school, the individuals I’ve met behind the counter tend to be the most interesting and thoughtful human beings I’ve encountered anywhere.
We bond over our laughable incidents in a coffee shop, we talk about politics and the latest live shows we’ve seen. We constantly realize that we know people in common from various avenues in our lives. We make each other food, we have Thanksgivings together, we understand each other’s dietary restrictions. Collectively, we often find ourselves both critical of and estranged from the goods we produce.
But as far as our customer goes, all we want is eye contact, a genuine hello, and your damn nickel. We can all do more good by participating fully in the face-to-face interactions we have than we can by handing off money in the hopes that it reaches the source.
More often than not, most of it doesn’t.
<About Our Guest Blogger>
Mia Schachter
Mia has been a barista in Los Angeles, Austin, and New York for almost six years. She currently works at Irving Farms of the Upper West Side.
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