I am actually relatively new to drinking coffee (I'm a tea man). With that said, I quite enjoyed Austin's coffee culture. I like the energy from having other people around you who are focused. I enjoy the pleasure of listening (ok, evesdropping) when two friends catch up. I appreciate the education of watching two businessman negotiate a preliminary deal.
It has been more than a decade since I regularly worked at coffee shops, and I had forgotten how much I enjoyed it.
My only real regret was that in Austin I had to drive myself to each coffee place. It was also not uncommon to drive somewhere and find that I could not find any reasonable parking. Someday self driving will fix this, but it is still a thorn in what is otherwise an almost completely enjoyable outing.
This got me thinking that I should travel somewhere with the intent of partaking in "cafe culture" on the daily. I want to be able to travel (ideally walk) to nearby cafes, roughly 2 a day, and work for several hours at each of them. I am thinking go to the first cafe in the morning for a few, then break for an extended lunch, and then do another extended cafe session in the evening. There are lots of options (Vienna, Melbourne, NYC), but many of those are more money than I am willing to spend at this time. I decided that I will do a sort of limited tour of East Asia, starting in Tokyo, and then moving on to Seoul and then Kuala Lampur. I am planning on spending roughly a month at each of these 3 locations. At this time, I only have Tokyo booked in terms of hotels. I will play the future by ear.
