Uncle Lawrence from Kopi More. Source

As a writer, coffee is one of my life’s sweet sinful pleasures.

The black brew jumpstarts my mind awake — except I take mine not black, I take mine white instead. White and iced, sweet flowery notes on the tip of my tongue, cool chocolatey motes in the back of my throat. Ah, coffee! The tired workman’s delight and the clogged-up writer’s respite.

I love my coffee, yes. One might even say that I am addicted to it.

But one particular morning, I had a problem.

I didn’t know where to get my coffee. I had just moved out to a new apartment, you see, and I was unfamiliar with the surroundings. Being unfamiliar with my surroundings I made my way to the nearest coffee shop. I had to buy my first cup of Joe…

Now, dear reader, a coffee shop in Singapore isn’t the same as a coffee shop in the West. A coffee shop here is more akin to a food court, a humid, crowded sprawl serving all kinds of foodstuff for cheap: chicken rice, stir-fried noodles, all manners of roast meat — and yes, cups upon cups of coffee.

That day, however, when I arrived at the coffee shop, I was greeted by an astounding sight.

There was a massive queue snaking out from one of the shops.

I stood there gaping and counted.

There must’ve been over two dozen people, queueing patiently in the sweltering heat, in front of a little shop called Kopi More. The shop’s signboard promised “Local blend coffee!”

I took this for a sign.

Like the good little Singaporean boy I am, I joined the rest of the stragglers in the queue. I surmised (quite correctly, as I would later find out) that if so many people were willing to wait for something as simple as coffee, it had to be good.

The wait took me over thirty minutes, but it was more enjoyable than I thought.

This was because Kopi More was playing classical music.

There was a large speaker mounted on the shop’s front counter, right beside the coffee machine, and over the sounds of fresh beans being grounded, I could hear the trills of what sounded like a masterful cello concerto.

I was unfamiliar with the song, but I enjoyed it nonetheless. Whoever was sawing at the cello had to be a virtuoso. He or she played the supporting instrument so masterfully that it sounded, for all the world, not like a cello but a violin.

I was lost in the dreams of that moment, lost in the tragic world the notes of the cello took me — then suddenly, it was my turn at the front of the queue.

I gathered up my courage. I ordered two cups of iced coffee, strong. Then I asked the proprietor, “Say…what is that song you’re playing, anyway?”

My question seemed to surprise him. He turned to look at me. Dark eyes, kind but intelligent. A head of wispy white hair. A white T-shirt, clean and unstained despite the hundreds of cups of coffee he undoubtedly brewed every day. In a voice brimming with sharp, slightly-accented colonial English, he said, “It’s Hauser’s Cello Adagio. You listen to classical music, kid?”

“Sometimes,” I admitted. “I listen to it mostly when I write.”

There, amidst the intermingled sounds of brewing coffee and Hauser, the coffee uncle and I made small talk. He gave me his name. It was Lawrence. I asked him how long he had been making coffee. He said six years. He asked me how long I had been writing. I replied two. I told him that I had just completed my first book, and he said that he would love to read it.

At the end of it all, Lawrence handed me my coffee and told me to come again.

I promised him that I would.

After that, I returned to patronize Kopi More every day.

The coffee was always fantastic, and the queues were always long.

I had to wait in line, day after day, for a cup or two of coffee. I didn’t mind though. Yes, I didn’t mind because the coffee was good, and I didn’t mind because Uncle Lawrence was friendly…but most of all, I didn’t mind because the Kopi More always had a piece of classical music playing.

There was Chopin. Lang Lang. Mozart. More Hauser. The heartrending notes they played rang in my ear while the aromatic coffee Lawrence brewed sang in my throat.

When I arrived home after buying my coffee, I would be ready and roaring to write.

Then one day, I asked Lawrence a question that would change everything.

That day, I arrived at the coffee shop as usual to find the usual long queue waiting for me. In the background, Mozart’s Lacrimosa was playing, and by the time I arrived at the front of the shop, I had become very curious.

“Say, Lawrence,” I asked as he was preparing my usual order. “You’ve got a right roaring crowd buying your coffee every day. What would you say is the secret to your success?”

I have to confess: I was expecting a flippant, somewhat artistic answer. I expected him to say something about how boiling water at just the right temperature was key, or about how he would slave and slather over each and every individual bean with careful cheer and love. After all, this was a man who listened to classical music as he worked.

Instead, Lawrence stiffened over the machine. He straightened his back, turned to look at me. His eyes were a ruthless shade of cold. With a solemn tone in his voice, he said, “Young man, the secret to my success is this: I think about crushing it every day.”

“You mean the coffee beans?” I asked. I was somewhat intimidated.

“No!” He barked, laughing. Then he jerked a thumb at the waiting crowd. “Them! I think about crushing them, about bowling them over, about blowing their friggin’ minds. I want every cup of coffee I make to be so goddamn good they can’t help but come back.”

Without another word, Lawrence handed me my coffee.

I took it from him, and with pensive thoughts in my head, I left.

I later found out that Lawrence, prior to his new career as coffee-maker, had been a high-flying petroleum trader.

He had lost his job during a financial downturn, and because he loved drinking coffee, had turned to making it as a result.

This was no hippie-dippie old man barista, I realized. Lawrence was an Artist, yes, that no one can deny (not after drinking a cup of his ridiculously good coffee with Chopin playing in your ear, that is) — but he was also a serious artist. He was concerned about crushing the competition, about elevating himself and his craft, about Making It in the world. In other words, he was a true-blue Singaporean, through and through.

I had allowed myself to be fooled by his amiable demeanor and his classical music and his plain white T-shirt with no stains.

And therein lies the lesson of this article:

Never judge a person by his or her appearance, no matter what they look like or what you presume them to be.

“The vulgar crowd always is taken by appearances, and the world consists chiefly of the vulgar…Everyone sees what you appear to be, few experience what you really are.”

— Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince

Every man or woman you meet has a wealth of treasure, buried within them, if only you would only care enough to see. Not to look, but to truly and utterly See.

This is an important lesson for all writers. It allows us to write stories and create characters with real depth. But most of all, this is an important lesson for us all. It makes even the coffee we drink taste better. It allows us to wander through life with a sense of child-like curiosity. It allows us to feel empathy and connection with even the most unassuming of men.

And in our increasingly connected world, this is a lesson better digested sooner rather than later.