Meet Liva Galina, a committed coffee lover, for whom coffee is more than a lifestyle or a hobby. Here on Filter Liva is pouring out her thoughts about her relationship with coffee.
Sometimes I go to bed just to wake up to have coffee in the morning. That warm soft hug of a smooth flat white. Coffee has always been the only constant in my life. I’ve moved around a lot, even lived in a hotel for two years, so a stable place to live has definitely not been my constant. Instead I had to find something else - and I found coffee. No matter where I go, I seek out a way to have my daily cuppa. It doesn’t always mean a cute wee coffee shop around the corner, not at all, as I can’t say I’ve been living in the hippest neighbourhoods. Not until now.
Finally, I live somewhere I don’t necessarily want to move away from but that’s exceptional. The local coffee shop is Isla in Berlin if you’re keen to know, and they have an amazing Tahini cake, but that's the details. Well, as the saying goes, the devil is in the details so it matters. Little things matter. There is just something about drinking coffee and instantly feeling grounded, fully taking in every flavour note, be it cherry or dark chocolate.
It connects me to the present and it reflects where I am, what I do and who I am striving to be.
When I travel, it’s the first thing I look up on the map and that’s how I orient myself around the city. It’s not south east, it’s always just three streets from Rocket Bean in Riga, and up the hill from Artisan Roast in Glasgow (that’s sadly shut down now).
It was my first constant. I studied at the University of Glasgow a whole 10 years ago, and one afternoon I went to Artisan Roast with two of my friends after a lecture on News International Phone Hacking scandal with Rupert Merdoch. Here is the article if you want the details. It is quite scary to acknowledge the fact that the banner shouts out to my face that the article is 10 years old. I feel old. But thanks to a fruitful discussion with my uni mates on that scandal, I discovered the first speciality coffee, and I knew that this ritual is going to be constant in my life and will take me everywhere.
How many beautiful moments but also sadness and frustrations I’ve had around coffee. It’s all part of life - same as there is not good coffee every time but you can always look forward to the next morning and have a better one.
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