I was on the other side of town when my roommate called and invited me to dinner. At first I was hesitant because I did not feel like making the short trek but after his persistence I agreed. The phone connection was weak and I didn’t fully understand why he was so adamant about inviting me to dinner but he gave me and address and at the end mentioned that someone wanted to meet me.
I showed up at the address he gave me note sure what to expect at all. It was quite dark when I first entered so I just went on through to the kitchen where my roommates (twin brothers) and a woman (most likely in her 50s or 60s) were standing around chatting and preparing dinner. The woman was quick to involve me in the conversation but I still did not know who she was, her relation to my roommates or why I was there.
From the get go conversation was great. We sat down for a homemade dinner of fish, rice, and some tomato based salad. Throughout dinner we touched upon just about every topic. Religion, politics, travel, love, life, culture, evolution, our pasts, futures, and & present. After a great dinner and even better conversation the woman left the room to get something to show me. She came back with her “Poisie”, a book filed with poems, advice and decorations from her grade school friends. Despite the fact that the various poems were dated back so the 1950’s the book seemed to be in perfect condition.
When the woman had left the room again, I quickly asked and found out the woman was the step mother of my roommates. Over dessert conversation continued… I learned of all the places she had experienced. Her time in France, South America, Asia and much more. What was the best was she didn’t just mention her travel destinations but rather share a personal story. Like he experience enduring an earthquake at a love hotel in Japan with her language teacher.
Before we left she showed me what she does for a living. Now with the lights on in the hall I could see how beautiful the apartment was. It had many rooms and the hallway and foyer were filled with interesting pieces of furniture of all styles. As she took me down a long hallway toward one room she saw me admiring 2 large flattened animal furs hanging from the wall. One was the skin of a leopard the other for a zebra. She stopped to tell me she was given the furs by a man she fell in love with while living in Africa.
We continued on to a small room with bouquets of fresh roses. She told me to smell one bundle then another. She worked as an organic botanist. She had a request to provide a company with the best smelling roses. We went on to the next room. The ceiling was filed with dry flowers hanging upside down, an amazing site in itself. Then we continued on to the backyard to see her outdoor garden. Just before we left she showed me one last thing. It was a type of plant sitting in a cup of water. She said “most people use this drug daily, do you know what it is?!” I thought for a minute and guessed coffee. She then showed me a jar of dried beans we cracked on open to see an actual coffee bean. After that we left and walked home.
The dinner reminded me of a couple important life lessons:
1) Never decline an invitation to meet someone new.
2) As much fortunate as I have been to see so much in my life, I still have much to see, learn, and experience.
Then I began to wonder what if I do see more and more, aside from understanding more cultures how would I apply this my life, my career my interests and goals. A couple of hours later I was thinking about dinner and I realized that understanding coffee at its simplest form is the only way to fully understand why it has become a phenomena and why places like star bucks come to be such hits. Of course there is much more to it. But something I took away was to understand something fully you need to be able to understand it in its simplest form and through travel and experience there is often the opportunity to appreciate, observe and understand things in their simplest, original and natural form.
