Bow, January 7th 2017

I’m hoping to move to the East End soon which requires finding a new cafe. Perhaps yet another one with staff who will insist they know my order and steadfastly get it wrong.

I discover a handsome one snoozing on a back-street corner. A place with time to let a cooling circle of coffee drift through the afternoon, where the fading chalk menu doesn’t reflect anything available, where you don’t need to crack a code to access the toilets.

A cheerful middle-aged woman with a trilby takes my order of a tuna panini and coffee. The chap behind me then orders the same panini but with added cheese. From my seat I call for cheese too. Not to be out-ordered, I add sweetcorn. When infiltrating a new pack it’s vital to establish sandwich dominance.

A frazzled man emerges from the kitchen with plate in hand. I come to presume he’s married to the trilby lady. ‘Come, COME HERE!’ he beckons to a seated tourist. He thrusts a plate into her hand and directs her to fill it from the salad bar herself. He has no time. The meek American girl spoons some bits onto her own plate. Treading and spooning lightly, she asks him if she’s taken too much. “Huh? What do I care?!”.

His wife stares at the back wall. Jaw clenched.

As the customer shuffles off with her cautiously stacked salad, the wife unleashes a stream of what I think is Middle-Eastern hushed fury. Like a row in the kitchen mid-dinner-party the volume is quiet, the words are violent. The man dabs his sweaty forehead and waves off her threats as he returns to the kitchen.

After folding and refolding a towel, the woman takes off her apron and leaves.

A stocky bald bloke, as vital an ingredient to any East End cafe as a bacon butty, comes in to order. The frazzled man recognises an ally, leans across the counter and with pleading eyes says “She doesn’t want me to serve, THEN she doesn’t want them to serve themselves. Please, what can I do. WHAT CAN I DO!?’

I may have found my new cafe.