Fall Colors Canadian Style - Boom or Bust in Coffee World · Saturday September 27, 2008 by colin newell
The local TV station, CHEK News arrived on campus on Thursday to have a chat with me… about coffee culture in Victoria.
I am not that much of a TV person. I mean, who is? But I did my best.
On Friday past, there were 25 or 30 local cafes that gave away mugs of coffee to downtown employees between the hours of opening and 10 AM. It was kind of an appreciation day.
The downtown Victoria business associations point was two-fold – express appreciation to Victoria residents that work down town, suburban residents that work downtown – and to make an eco point about people toting their mugs with them everywhere. The free coffee, after all, was for people with their own travel mugs. Good thing.
And CHEK TV’s questions? What is it about Victoria B.C. Canada that makes it such a hot-bed for coffee consumption?
Several things. Victoria is a government town. Victoria is a University town. Victoria is a college town. And it rains in Victoria – not a lot compared to Tofino, Ucluelet or Vancouver – but it rains. And rain makes great coffee.
We love our coffee. But why so many good and really good cafes? It cannot be just the weather – because the weather is not that bad. Seattle, to our South is arguably the coffee hot-bed of North America. Heck, they invented the latte.
Apparently we invented the London Fog – a beverage of steamed milk and Earl Grey Tea. Invented in Victoria no less. Now that is ironic.
Part of it, I think, is because Victoria B.C. Canada is one of the most desirable places to live in this country. You could say the same for Seattle… or Vancouver. We are a happy lot – perhaps happier… and coffee, generally the better coffee, makes people happier. And more alive. Even sexier perhaps… if I can be so bold.
I sat in Bubby Roses Bakery cafe this morning as the weather turned from gray to sunny and mild. I was chowing down on the best Challah French Toast and I noticed that everyone was ebullient, smiles on all the faces, everyone flirting with everyone else… couples smooching coyly in the line up for coffee, bakery and breakfast. It was contagious. Why today? Why here?
Currently, we are on the eve of a potential financial melt-down in international markets… And yet on Vancouver Island, there are more jobs than people, more hope than sadness, more optimism than pessimism. It is really an Island.
And what I was trying to introduce… before I was distracted by my own effervescence – was the fact that we are in the middle of our own caffeinated gold rush. If you have any interest in working in a cafe… or owning or building a cafe… now could be the time.
If anything… to our far flung readers that have always wondered about here, here being Vancouver Island… well, come on out for a visit. If you come to Victoria as a result of reading this blog, coffee is on me!
Oh yea. And the TV News interview? When they asked me why I live in Victoria?
“It’s the coffee, stupid!”
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Fall Colors Canadian Style - With glowing hearts we blog to thee · Thursday September 25, 2008 by colin newell
Does the contempt VANOC feels towards the citizens of Canada know no bounds? Two phrases borrowed from Canada’s national anthem have been scooped as the motto for the 2010 Olympics. VANOC has already taken steps to protect the commercial rights to the lines.
The lines “With glowing hearts” from the English version and “Des plus brillants exploits” from the French version will soon be slapped on the disposable Olympic merchandise that will soon start arriving from China.
Hopefully the cheap Oly togs will not contain too much melamine.
John Furlong, VANOC chief apologist mused… ““It embodies the emotions every athlete will feel — no matter where they are from or what flag they stand under — when they have the honor to represent their own country on the world’s grandest international stage in 2010…”
Let me tell you something about athletic emotions:
When they arrive in the Olympic village in 2010, they will be thinking about two things – getting fed and getting laid. That is what athletes think about. Nothing more and hardly anything less.
VANOC have already taken small businesses in the Vancouver area to court for using the word Olympic in their names — even ones in existence long before the Games were awarded to Vancouver — and they have largely failed – because there is little merit and because few people buy into their pathetic rhetoric.
Here is the thing about the IOC. They leave a staggering slag heap of smoking debt where ever they lay their princely heads – and Whistler/Vancouver will be no different. And where we are not buried in fiscal chaos, we will be inundated with worthless polyester threads from Mainland China.
What a pile of crap. Oh Canada.
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Fall Colors Canadian Style - It is a Stephen Harper World - scary · Tuesday September 23, 2008 by colin newell
Part of Stephen Harpers platform is… Tough on crime…
Let’s get tough on crime. Tough on young offenders. Tough tough tough.
Crime. Crime. Crime. Tough. Crime.
Uhm. Violent and petty crime is in decline in Canada.
And yet Harper goes on and on about how we are currently soft on crime…
What crime? Canada is as safe as it has been in decades.
I am, however, prepared to declare what Stephen Harper is up to.
Stephen Harper is having policy dictated to him by purveyors of private prisons. Private prisons are all the rage in America. With one in one hundred U.S. residents in detention in America, in largely privatized prisons (and ostensibly state sanctioned slave labor…), these prison contractors are eying Canada with a sparkle in their eye.
Something else to think about when conceptualizing Canada versus the U.S.:
In the U.S., drug use is a crime. In Canada it is an illness.
In the U.S., if you are mentally ill and you commit a crime, you do the time… behind bars… and there are thousands of mentally ill folks on death row in the U.S. In the U.S. prison system, they do not heal you, they kill you.
Simple drug possession in the U.S. can put you behind bars and to work for pennies a day in the prison system. In Canada, at least, there is hope of some rehab.
Stephen Harper, with his ear and eye to the U.S. system is eager beaver to build prisons, private prisons to fill up with new criminals – young offenders, drunk drivers, petty criminals, whomever he can get his hands on.
Is this the Canada you want under a Conservative majority? Think about it.
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Fall Colors Canadian Style - Chris and Steven let us down · Monday September 22, 2008 by colin newell
About a month ago we got a call from the CBC asking us to come to Toronto to appear on the Steven and Chris show – and like every other media outlet, newspaper and radio station, we bend over backwards to get the message out about specialty coffee. After all, it is our thing. The more we talk about the World of Coffee, the better it is for the people that actually work in the fields, on the farms, the coops and the processing factories – to bring you that cup of Joe that you love so dearly.
It is about the 12 million family members that grow coffee. Not us. Them.
That said, you had better make it worth while to travel several thousand miles to appear on a TV show for three minutes… which is why I deferred the task to the lovely Sara Lee Spector of Every Day Gourmet Coffee – because the CBC does not have a penny for guests who travel from places like Victoria B.C.
Anyway. Sara was somewhat apprehensive about this task because it would mean taking 4 to 6 hours out of her busy day – Along with her hard working staff, Sara is the production back-bone of Every Day Gourmet Coffee.
But that is OK. The CBC and the producers of the Steven and Chris show (like virtually every TV show I have ever dealt with…) promise the moon in exchange for some of our precious time. In Chris and Stevens case, their producer and videographer, Barbara, guaranteed a mention of Every Day Gourmet Coffee and the CoffeeCrew website for our trouble. Hey, I even blogged the event further back in my archive giving Chris and Steven a good dollop of free publicity.
Me being the perpetual cynic, I figured… “Sure, whatever…” TV shows on the CBC with their paper thin budgets will make any number of promises to get the volunteers they need – and we cannot fault them for that – especially when we expect this kind of cheesy treatment.
Anyway – it still burns me up a bit. I contacted the producer today and she said… “Well, this season we are not keying in credits during the show…”
Uhm. Hello. I watched the episode. You were keying in the name and credentials of the guests. What was so difficult about giving credit where it was due?
Oh wait. I know. At the end of the Steven and Chris show, they were giving away Tim Horton’s coffee to everyone on the show.
Tim Horton’s. After a wonderful lecture from Sara on what coffee is all about… We get an ad for Tim Horton’s.
Something smells here, and it isn’t good coffee.
Steven and Chris. You guys can do better than this.
Colin Newell lives and dreams in Victoria B.C. Canada on the West Coast of Canada. He believes in good food, good coffee and great friends. And this is the first in the Fall series of blogs on Food, Drink and Fun for the Fall.
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