Top 10 Differences; 4-5
4. My Kingdom for a Cup of Coffee
My first day in Australia, I arrived into the Sydney airport at 6 am after being on a 15-hour flight from Los Angeles. Kaptain picked me up, and on the drive home he told me that there was nothing on my agenda, as far as he was concerned, except for relaxing and recuperating. “We’ll get you a shower and have you sorted in no time”, he said. “Is there anything else you need?”
“A cup of coffee,” I rasped, eyes closed.
“Oh, I’m sorry, I’m afraid Betsy and I don’t drink coffee… but we’ll stop. There’s a coffee shop on the way home.”
“Thanks,” I said. “Anything will do. Just a gas station would be fine.”
“No, we’ll stop at the coffee shop. No worries.”
A few minutes later we pulled into a plaza and walked into Gloria Jean’s, the local coffee chain. It looked familiar; I think there might be some in the States too, somewhere.
“Just a large coffee, please,” I requested.
“What kind?”
“Just a coffee. Large.”
Kaptain helpfully interjected, smiling at the barista to apologize for my stupidity. “Pinky, do you want a cappuccino, or a latte, or a mocha or…”
“Oh, ohhh,” I said. “Umm… I’ll take a skim cappuccino, I guess.” I scanned the menu through the airplane-induced film covering my eyes, still confused. As she tapped and foamed, I noticed that the menu was filled with every type of espresso drink a girl could want, but no “normal” drip or brewed coffee. $4.80 into my budget later, I climbed back into Kaptain’s car, still not exactly understanding the full implications of my experience.
Coffee in Australia comes in two varieties: expensive and instant. Of course, within the expensive category there are numerous sub-types, including latte, cappuccino, macchiato, flat white, short black, long black, and then the mochas. It didn’t take me long to realize that outside the home you have only espresso drinks at your disposal. There is no such thing as a big-ass hot cuppa, no unremarkable but drinkable regular brew. There are only thimble-sized, three-dollar cappuccinos or four-dollar, slightly larger long blacks (essentially, a long black is an americano, one or two shots of espresso, made more voluminous with hot water).
Now, I like coffee, and I would be a pretty poor, typical-American specimen of a coffee-lover if I didn’t have a taste for good coffee. I am no sommelier of coffees, but I like a deep, woodsy french pressed or espresso coffee with a hit of citrus as much as the next person. My love of coffee began in Italy in 7th grade, when I woke up to a superlative full-fat cappuccino and a pastry every morning. Italy had good coffee, and so did Vienna. Australia has pretty good coffee too, and on several occasions I heard the locals bashing American coffee and praising their own; fair enough.
Sometimes, though (many times, in fact), a person just wants some caffeine in coffee-tasting form, splashed with low-fat milk to take the edge off, and a packet of splenda if one is to be found. I don’t always want to savor every fifty-cent sip. Over a leisurely breakfast or after a good meal, perhaps, but every morning to take with me and get me going? No. A few Sydney Starbucks offered, sequestered to a dark corner of their menu board, brewed coffee for a reasonable 2-3 dollars for a large (which at Starbucks is a heart-racingly, hand-shakingly true large). Everywhere else, however, it was espresso or nothing (or occasionally one of those automatic cocoa/latte machines at a 7/11 or some such store).
I turned to instant, and whoever might be judging me right now for usually drinking brewed coffee, you would think more highly of it if you drank instant coffee every day for two months. Amazingly, some people in Australia do. Some have espresso machines in their houses, but even they usually have instant on a normal morning. Has a society that is so advanced in so many ways failed to recognize the invention of the coffee machine? So it seems.
This particular contrast between the United States and Australia could not have been better driven home than by the diner where I ate breakfast for the past two mornings. I will talk elsewhere about my short time in LA in general, but while on the subject of coffee, I have to share my wonderful diner dining experience. When I woke up my first morning in LA, I went down to check out the restaurant in the hotel, but it looked awfully pricey for just a normal breakfast (about the same prices as I would have paid in Australia, but there’s a reason I almost never ate out there). I remembered that on the shuttle from the airport the day before I had noticed a diner just a few doors down, on the others side of the very conveniently located supermarket. I wandered over there and before even looking at a menu I could tell that this was more my kind of place – financially and atmospherically.
“Two eggs over easy, dry wheat toast, sliced tomato instead of home fries, coffee.” As my order was passed through the window to the kitchen staff I heard one person say “Que tipo de carne?” and my waiter turned to ask me. “No carne,” I replied, before he could translate.
This brings me to the first thing I liked about the place: Spanish. I hadn’t heard it at all in Australia except for a tourist or two speaking it in passing. Never has my foreign language training felt so useless. Los Angeles was the perfect antidote to that feeling. Granted, I could no longer exactly feel like a Latina (as my mom put it) – I could almost have passed by Australian standards, but I’m about as close to being Norwegian or Korean as I am to being Latina in this crowd, despite my solid ¼ hispanic heritage and halfway decent language skills. Anyway, it was nice to hear some chatter in Spanish, and all the staff at the place were incredibly nice. This brings me to the coffee, the other big selling point of the place, as far as I’m concerned. To be fair, the service was not particularly different than one would find in any decent American diner, but it stood in such stark contrast to my experience of Australian cafes and diners that it felt miraculous. Moments after I sat down, a steaming cup was plopped before me, and it never got more than half empty for the remainder of my time at the diner. I’m not sure exactly how many times it was filled, but at least 3 different employees came around to me at different times, gave me a knowing smile, and kept the piping hot goodness coming. For the money I would have spent in Australia for two small cups of coffee, I got a two egg breakfast and a bottomless mug. Life is good.
5. The Hours
Related to the observation that Australians approach work and compensation differently than we tend to do in the United States is the matter of business hours. In the US it is not uncommon for shops of various types – malls, clothing shops, book stores, food vendors, etc. – to be open from perhaps 8 am to 6 or 7 pm. Business hours depend on the store, of course, as well as where it’s located, but if you are looking for something in particular on a weekday evening you are likely to be able to find it in any small city.
In Australia, on the other hand, the stereotype of the “nine-to-five” job still has some meaning. Even in central Sydney, if you walk around after 5 or 5:30 you will find food courts shutting down and shops and pharmacies (“chemists”) closing, as if on a bank or post office schedule. Kaptain explained to me that more than anything this is a matter of economics. There are government-regulated policies on work and compensation that provide incentive to business owners to have relatively short and consistent hours.
Whereas in the U.S. jobs with hours that nobody wants pay more because of the pressures of supply and demand, in Australia it is mandated that people who work outside regular business hours must be compensated significantly more generously. As a result, there is a strong economic disincentive for businesses to remain open into the evening or to open early. There are exceptions to this rule of course, such as the early-morning coffee shop or the 24-hours Maccas or 7-11, but in general it is amazing how much commercial business shuts down, Australia-wide, at around 5 pm. Friday, Saturday, and to some extent Thursday nights are a bit different, with bars and clubs staying open of course and a slightly wider variety of other businesses extending their hours to accommodate increased night-time traffic. By and large, though, it is a different attitude and approach to store hours. How, I wonder, do stores make any money? Isn’t everybody working at exactly the same time? When do locals find the time to shop?
