Cafe Culture

I sometimes study with my eldest at Starbucks over an Ice Late. I always thought cafes were conducive to studying. The hum of conversations and the going and coming of pedestrians is surprisingly never distracting.

I used to study with my boyfriend, turned husband, in cafes also. In fact, my maternal cousin found that habit a proof of our love and presented it to my parents as persuasive evidence. In Boston, we went with our classmates to Coffee Connection, on Newbery Street or in Harvard Square. We invested a table or two, took out our readings and actually studied. Better than we would have in any library cubicle. We frequently stopped for a coffee break, an ice cream splurge or any junk food attack. But we stayed on, really early in the morning, before class or very late into the night, studying away in the selected coffee shop.

We also invaded student centers, otherwise designed for socializing. My husband and I parked our Turkish books almost daily for a whole year at the Tufts undergraduate student center. We needed the brouhaha of the students to keep us focused but not stressed. Most of my classmates and friends and cousin were male so I got them to study at the Boston University student center, because the BU women were reputed to be the hottest in town. Ask my siblings, they even tagged along on their visits to Boston, carrying their college or school work.

Cafe culture translated into study groups and cramming sessions. I miss those days. My children now have taken the burden of my nostalgia because I drag them to Starbucks and Caribou for study sessions.