I've always had issues with equality.
I mean, 'I have a dream' was just ground-breaking. Really inspirational stuff.
Segregation in the 50's and 60's was awful by today's standards and it really makes you wonder how one group of people can completely cut off another from the things that both groups should be freely entitled to. Regardless of skin colour or sex.
Now with this in mind, the other day I found myself (as always) pondering upon the quirky way in which the English language is construed as the following question dawned upon me; rather like the stone tablet thing in 2001: A Space Odyssey:
Why is it 'tea-room' but 'coffee-house'?
Shouldn't we, as the equality loving, "freedom for all" people of the 21st century that we are, be providing equal space for our hot beverages?
I mean I like coffee don't get me wrong but tea is much nicer. Come on admit it...
I work in one of these coffee houses (but to be honest it's more of a restaurant / bar / coffee house, not just a coffee house so I don't feel too bad) and the amount of cappuccinos I make could perk Keith Richards up from a drunken stupor faster than a middle aged woman with a complex who's just heard that Tesco have started giving away free botox and chihuahuas.
However, the sale of tea is still common. Whether chai, fruit, herbal or just good old normal English tea, (that's another thing...English? Really? In colonial times we enslaved an entire continent to ensure our supply of tea leaves and the last time I checked, we couldn't grow tea in England...but I digress) you can't deny, if push came to shove and the great English people had to rid this small isle of either tea OR coffee, coffee would, without a doubt, bite the proverbial dust.
So, why aren't we allowing our most beloved beverage an equal space with this south American usurper?
Let's start to see the emergence of the first of many tea houses and maybe even one or two coffee rooms.
Drink up guys. Raise the mug to the proper English brew.
Cheers!
Rob out.
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