So my greed for knowledge doesn’t really
end! That’s greed; and that’s the foundation and reason for the perpetuation of
a free market; and explains the improbable nemesis of capitalism! Does America
run on coffee or does capitalism run on coffee?
Finding that the library round the corner
would be closed for renovation till March, I headed to Starbucks. I wonder why
I headed there? I think I had seen it earlier close by and I knew that
Starbucks is one place you will find everywhere and its relatively cheaper than
sitting long in a restaurant. Its familiar (you see every other person with a Starbucks
coffee walking around). I also was guessing it would have wifi!
Guess what, Starbucks is less than five
minutes away from home. And its my fourth day here and I wish I had the ‘chai’
time so that I could verbally share this. But, I cant. Its addictive. Its not
the coffee that’s addictive, its the BRAND. Welcome to America. In India, I
kept trying to understand what it is about and that’s why I took up my research
(yes I came here to understand India better). And now I am drowning to
understand what is America. What makes it what it is. I sit in Starbucks
analyzing Indian data! Like a pendulum I sway between understanding both the
countries. I have many questions which I ponder over (and my research seems to
have taken a caffeine break!).
Starbucks is the largest coffee company in
the world; and is present in 68 countries (yes, its Wikipedia!). There are 54
outlets in India and around 13,000 in the US. I don’t know anything about
coffee, but I know many people have mixed opinions about its coffee. When I
came here, my first observation was that, people drink so much coffee here! But
I realized that we drink a lot of tea in India too! And no sooner did I realize
two things, that coffee drinking here and tea drinking in India are different
acts; and the reasons to why coffee is so important here.
We drink tea in a social way. The caffeine
is as important as the feeling of sitting together and having ‘chai’. Yes, chai
is in the Oxford dictionary and I didn’t know till I saw it being so popular
here. Here ‘tea’ means tea without milk and chai has milk. And I guess its not
just tea with milk but also with spices. But I need to try it before I say
anything. So chai here (according to Oxford) is masala chai. Okay, so chai for
us is mainly an activity we do together. Even at work, we have had our chai
together. There is a chai break. But coffee in the US is about being alone/an
individual. Its an activity which marks their society, a society which
celebrates individual endeavor, individual dreams ...and ethic closely linked
to capitalism. Chai represents our society, which promotes the community over
the individual. The sociologist, Parsons’ pattern variables help provide a
snapshot. Modern societies are marked by affective-neutrality (emotional
neutrality, discipline, rules), specificity, universalism, achievement and
individual oriented. Traditional societies are marked by the opposite of each
of these, i.e. affectivity (emotions), diffuseness, particularism, ascription
(importance of birth based identities) and community oriented. Obviously these occur in different degrees in
different societies.
I am not sure if capitalism has promoted
coffee/Starbucks or if coffee/Starbucks has promoted capitalism. But they go
together. I work because I have my coffee. It’s the same reason why Coke became
popular. Caffeine has closely become associated with work. The more coffee you
have, the more you can work (not sure if that is actually true). And of the two
important facets of capitalism, work is one of them (branding/marketing is the
other). Work has been important in this country which is perhaps the only
country born on the values of freedom and equality. A society where hard work
takes you far…at least the belief in it does! Americans work really hard….and
that’s really all they do. Not always as ‘career-oriented’ people, but as
people who have to run their lives on one hand and fulfill their dreams on the
other. This work ethic is incomplete without individualism. Till the
individual’s efforts and the individual per se is not important, the individual
cannot work hard. You promote the individual in order to promote the hard work,
hence promote the capitalist system. And coffee helps you do that.
But Starbucks isn’t really coffee. It’s a
quintessential example of America. Its close to all offices/universities…places
where people work. It has free wifi (which will help you work) and the new
wireless charging! It is a brand! They have their own coffees, their mugs, gift
cards, samples to smell and buy, they even have their brand of water! Self-service
(you can make your own coffee) also is aligned with the choice making
individual. The individual who wants to do what the individual likes; and to
buy and eat what the individual likes. The choices may be unlimited, but the
choice to have coffee or not isn’t really there! Similarly, the individual can
choose so many things to work as/for but does not have the choice of not
working!
Starbucks loves to tailor your coffee (even
with the season, the Christmas blend, pumpkin spice latte), hence aligned with
individualism/individual choices and with the capitalist branding mechanism.
The chai society also tailors their chai, but nothing can be more tailored than
a coffee here…uhm…whole milk, soy milk, half and half, skim milk….demera sugar,
artificial sweetners (and did someone forget the good old white sugar) ….vanilla,
cinnamon, peppermint, caramel, hazelnut, mocha, and the millions of kinds of
beans….its hot, its cold and its iced! Its black and its with milk. And the
choices will never stop (if these guys want to stay in business). They even have an online quiz to help you
find which kind of coffee you would like. Right now, I am having the one they
selected for me! Called Pike Place Roast. (I cannot differentiate between
coffees! I tried at least five different kinds in the last week and will keep
trying…and I go back to liking the one I have liked in the first place!). Why
Pike Place? Their blog also starts with Pike Place. Yes, because that market is
the place where their first coffee shop was started (and its there). So that is
America! They can brand everything with such emotions. They can make everything
feel important. Every street, every moment...and that’s how they brand
everything. Their global experience reminds me of Hershey. The town Hershey has
streets named after the places from where they get their cocoa beans. By the
way, I just learnt that cocoa beans are fermented before making chocolate! I
didn’t know! Well, Starbucks also takes you across the world…Java, Sumatra,
Colombia, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Vietnam, Ethiopia and there is always the
Italian blend! Or rather, they have sold
what the developing countries didn’t sell! Another success for capitalism to
sustain itself. They have their masala chai, which has been globalized (or made
popular by America) and not by India.
One thing I like here is that it is a ‘safe
space’. Funny word for some? Yesterday night, I watched a film on an adolescent
program (called AGEP) being implemented by the Population Council in Zambia.
One of the objectives of the program is to provide ‘safe spaces’ for adolescent
girls to learn and talk freely about health and sexuality; and just their
emotions. No matter how much we talk about freedom, people are not really free
to be themselves. Starbucks also provides that safe space for all people.
People sit with their laptops the whole day, they share tables and they do what
they enjoy. Some people are busy on their mobile phones, others are working,
some take interviews and meet clients; others watch movies, some connect with
their friends and family through calls, some sketch…some Skype, some Facebook
(more brands which can safely be used as verbs!)…some read…some write…some actually
write (like with a pen and paper)…some watch videos…but every individual is
united in a common space to have coffee or chai or not and do what they want to
or need to. That’s the safe space they get. There is music. There is a bathroom
with soap (and instructions on using soap effectively).
Starbucks here opens at 5am and closes at
11pm! Its crowded till at least 4pm, then the crowd thins out (and they have
opened an ‘evening’ brand of theirs which serves alcohol). It doesn’t make
business by those who come and sit. It makes business by those who come to get
their coffee and head out to do their work/thing. There are parents with
children who come, old men, old couples, young boys and girls, women of all
type…Well, Jersey City is a very mixed city ethnically, so you have everyone
here. Some people get their tables in the morning; other share. Some wait
around in chairs. Some wait for their coffee and head out. Everyone is busy.
Few people come and talk to each other, few friends come and gossip (unlike the
coffee house thing in India). We like our chai time to be reflected in our
coffee houses, we do our collective things in our coffee houses…we meet school
friends, we take out our kids to have cakes and muffins….we meet our boyfriends
and girlfriends (which coffee houses in India have become notoriously noted
for) and not to leave out, we meet prospective spouses and families.
I may not know anything about coffee, but after
a day at Starbucks, I really love the smell of my bag when I go to bed beside
it!
