Coffee Culture: My Six Favorite Local Cafes

Cafes Ringo and Gagarin, Berlin, Germany

Sometimes, it’s the music that draws me back, like my Berlin local, Ringo, which I looked into wistfully as I walked by, broke, for weeks, until I finally ventured in and they captured my heart by playing Bob Dylan’s Highway 61’ on regular occasions. The menu is basic, coffee, cake, bagels, alcoholic drinks, and the tables aren’t quite the right height for laptop tapping, but nevertheless it is constantly filled with interesting looking people, who I am sure are all local artists and musicians, and may get to know eventually.

And this evening I have just arrived home from a regular meeting in Berlin’s Russian Gagarin Cafe with the raucous writers group I joined a few months ago. The corner table is booked for us and the waitress stops by to chat, and as we settle in to catch up on the latest gossip, critique each others work and write together, there is a new community being formed of people who find a home in this spot together for a few hours every week, that will always be there, wherever our travels take us next.

By Jodi Rose