Unfortunately, she died – too early.
But she sure left some solid impressions. She both told me what I had to expect from my own the near and distant future, and then gradually she took me on as an apprentice in coffee cup fortune telling.
The first is easiest to remember. She firmly proclaimed that her grandson would be handsome, healthy, rich, famous and live a long and happy family life. I was trilled and excited, but it did not take long before I realised that this was quite a standard fortune forecast for grandchildren. Even later in time I came to think of the fact that she must have had a hidden talent. She could have been an excellent copywriter making ads for industrial coffee blends. She could well have written the following: “Before I drank brand xxx I was lost and lonely. Now my life is rich and beautiful”. Another standard promise to those who are easily fooled.
Then the ritual.
Keep in mind that I grew up some decades before the filter machines, espresso was just invented and instant coffee was in its infant beginning and pods still had to wait almost half a century to be invented. We relied on the coffee kettle and what is known as the steep method for brewing and, to be dead honest, more boiling than brewing. You may have seen it in old films. But with new technology, we must admit that fortune telling in coffee grounds suffered a substantial setback for some decades.
But, it is now bouncing back. The idea of making traditional Arab, Turkish, Greek quality coffee including its rituals and leftover coffee particles in the cups are recovering. To press the button “on” on a coffee machine saves time, but it sure loses our opportunity of human interaction.
Read more: Download Coffee Break Nr. 22
