Community

Josh and I are addicted to espresso. It started innocently enough - I realized a couple years ago that drip coffee was giving me the shakes, and I read online that espresso has less caffeine. Plus it tastes better, especially with a little milk. So we bought a cheap espresso maker, which broke instantly, then bought a fancy one which works great. Josh has six shots every morning (!) and I have two.

On our first day in the house here, we were in a pickle. No coffee maker, no stove, no nothing. We went hunting for a coffee shop nearby but came up empty, and had to settle for convenience store canned lattes. Ick.

We rectified that situation today! Oh my gosh, what fun. Josh worked on schoolwork all morning while I cleaned and organized our junky room a bit and planned for some travel. Around 1pm we were both ready for a break, so we went on a walk around our neighborhood. We passed a cafe called Bibi that we've seen, but never open, and we decided to give it a shot. Then we met Bibi!
It turns out the place is a dog-friendly cafe, with menu items for people and their pooches. (We were careful to order from the correct side of the menu.) Bibi sat near our table and accepted lots of patting and scratches behind the ears while Josh and I enjoyed espresso, cheese toast, and minestrone soup.

The proprietors were really great, friendly and attentive without hovering. The shop has an island feel, which Josh, who has been to Hawaii, thinks is Caribbean and I, who lived in the Keys, think is Hawaiian. We'll definitely be spending more time there, sad that we don't have our own puppy to bring. (And Mom, I checked - they didn't have sweet potato dog treats.)

Community is hard to come by in this culture of the very polite and very reserved, especially since we don't speak the language. Finding a warm, friendly place nearby which has COFFEE and PUPPIES? What a milestone.