Is there no café culture in the U.S?

[Deleted]

People with friends but I can understand this sounds alien to you

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2hrs in a bar normal
2hrs in a cafe weird

logic

Usually in a bar you drink more than a beer / hour, and when you're done you leave.

[Airlick]

Why would I literally sit somewhere surrounded by strangers with nothing to do? Obviously I would just get my coffee and go back home.

Well, you find something you can do. Read a book/newspaper, do some work on your laptop, whatever. The atmosphere of a quiet cafe is really enjoyable, it's just fun spending a few hours chilling out in a comfy chair with a cup of great coffee. This is something not everyone could recreate at home.

Of course, this isn't something you can get to feel in a noisy Starbucks in the center of LA.

[AcidicSyn]

It really depends on the locale. NYC is just too busy to accommodate.

NYC isn't really a great indicator of typical US culture, though. NYC is its own culture, and what you're looking for would exist more in other parts of the country. If you want to visit the US and get a better experience in this particular regard, I'd suggest leaving NY, much of Cali, and other tourist hotspots off your list. Maybe spend some time in Ohio.

This. In my experience, I have discovered that the majority of Americans that are not from NYC, hate NYC, or at least the culture.

If you want a coffee hang out type of vibe hit any of what is commonly referred to here as the hipster hubs. Places like Portland, Seattle, Boca Raton, Orlando, some places in the mid west, and I think some over in the Indiana area? (Hoosiers help me out here). I would suggest Northern California just because of the culture and atmosphere but....yeah, maybe wait on that.. =(

From the above though, you can safely ignore Boca, because its Boca. And generally speaking anything in Florida that isn't the keys can be sunk and few would care. Orlando you can skip too unless you want to hit the parks. But as a general rule avoid Florida, because it's Florida and you never know when Florida Man will strike next. (Seriously I live here and it's killing me inside. 2 more years.....)

All that said, to each their own and all but did you (OP) really only stay in NYC when you were here? I think I could see everything I want to see in NYC in a 20 minute helicopter ride. To visit the USA and really feel it, in my opinion, you simply must head west, Rocky Mountains, Yellowstone, Yosemite, Big Bear, Copper Canyon, Grand Canyon, Joshua Tree, etc.

Unless of course you live somewhere like freakin Norway in which case you can just tell me to stuff my gob because you've seen things that are so beautiful I wonder why anyone would ever give two tugs of a rats tail about ever leaving..... (I hate you Norwegians. It's a love/hate, a salty hate, and jealous hate, just....you suck; can I please crash on your couch? I cook really well; I'll make breakfast.) Seriously, If I got to live in some of the places I've seen there(pics); fuck internet and fuck video games I'm hiking forever....what were we talking about again?

[Arenis]

Does the US also has this thing called 'terrasje pakken'?

Like this:

[Elim Garak]

I don't think so. I could see myself sitting in a coffee shop with my laptop studying or doing some work.

That's even more rude. Inconsiderately so. There are special places for THAT, go there. Don't annex a table at a cafe, you have no right. It's a cafe not your personal office. People go to a cafe to drink and eat something. Not only you are screwing the cafe you are also screwing people who want to use cafe properly but can't because no tables left.

[Deleted]

Terraces are filled with American tourists here. They seem to like the idea. It's sad if they don't have it back home .

[rhoark]

There's a coffee shop in my town that has a gaggle of NEETs and lesbians at all hours.

[Wolfman31]

Millennial hipsters killed cafe culture in the US for me. Don't get me wrong, my friends and I were pretentious douches in our 20's too, but we were our brand of pretentious douche. This new generation of pretentious douche is just too much for me.

[Kaleredar]

LA has a cafe culture of out of work writers pretending to be busy on their laptops in public.

You know you've really hit pretentiousness central when they're on typewriters.

[Drungan]

Does the US also has this thing called 'terrasje pakken'?

Like this:

This is every town in Denmark in the summer ...yes it is lovely to be out around people and yes you can sit there for 2 hours drinking a coffee or 2 and NONE gets annoyed with you, not the workers there and not the owners.

Yes it is perfectly normal here to read the newspaper there, oddly enough there is a lot of people around the world that are able to sit and relax away from home and not feel like they would be better off doing it at home in front of the PC ....go figure.

[NoiseTank13]

The ebb and flow of American culture on work days is not really... compliant with some of the European countries. I can only speak for myself with my opinion, but usually you will get the feeling from other people that if you have 2 hours to spend sitting and drinking coffee, either alone or with company, then you aren't really leading a productive life especially during the workdays. There's obviously going to be exceptions and it's a generalization, but I can definitely see how those servers would get anxious and agitated, because the daily average of their tips are going down. It's bullshit honestly and the whole tipping system needs to just be rolled into their payroll so they don't lose out when customers are having a good time.

You don't get the same sense from the bar-culture because it's usually prevalent in the evening/nights when it's still considered to be "off-hours" by most employers.

[Strawberry]

That's even more rude. Inconsiderately so. There are special places for THAT, go there. Don't annex a table at a cafe, you have no right. It's a cafe not your personal office. People go to a cafe to drink and eat something. Not only you are screwing the cafe you are also screwing people who want to use cafe properly but can't because no tables left.

Yes there are special places like that and it's called a café where people sit and enjoy. It's not a place where you rush with things.
And I do have a right to be there as long as I buy something. No, I wouldn't drink one tea every 2 hours, but if I'm sitting there and enjoying my #5 coffee, I should be allowed to do so.
No customer owns the bar. No one has that privilege to remove someone else just because they want that place. They can always go somewhere else.
I would like to see a bar in a civilized country which would remove a paying customer by force, unless that customer is misbehaving.

[Elim Garak]

Yes there are special places like that and it's called a café where people sit and enjoy. It's not a place where you rush with things.
And I do have a right to be there as long as I buy something. No, I wouldn't drink one tea every 2 hours, but if I'm sitting there and enjoying my #5 coffee, I should be allowed to do so.
No customer owns the bar. No one has that privilege to remove someone else just because they want that place. They can always go to somewhere else.
I would like to see a bar in a civilized country which would remove a paying customer by force, unless that customer is misbehaving.

As I said, inconsiderately rude. Cafe is not your personal office. It's against cafe's nature even. It's not a place to sit and enjoy. It's a place for exchange of information while having a coffee, socializing - not working. You can rationalize it however you want, reality is unaffected by your rationalizations.

[Deleted]

That's even more rude. Inconsiderately so. There are special places for THAT, go there. Don't annex a table at a cafe, you have no right. It's a cafe not your personal office. People go to a cafe to drink and eat something. Not only you are screwing the cafe you are also screwing people who want to use cafe properly but can't because no tables left.

I thought you were pro annexation.

[Elim Garak]

I thought you were pro annexation.

Only if the population approves. Nothing wrong in annexation in and of itself. it's just a word that describes a process of a territory changing ownership.
No one in cafes likes laptop hobos. Not even laptop hobos themselves.

[unfilteredJW]

Turn and burn, baby.

[Strawberry]

As I said, inconsiderately rude. Cafe is not your personal office. It's against cafe's nature even. It's not a place to sit and enjoy. It's a place for exchange of information while having a coffee, socializing - not working. You can rationalize it however you want, reality is unaffected by your rationalizations.

Lets just agree to disagree. Pretty sure many here both agree and disagree with you. So it's a pointless discussion.
It seems however that you haven't really experienced café culture. I'm from the Balkans, cafés in Belgrade are often FULL of people just sitting there and doing nothing. Killing time.
You can go to a café and have your 15 minute coffees. I will stay there as long as I want.

[Amirila]

Yea in the US we don’t take 2 hour lunches like they do in Europe. However, we do have Saturday and Sunday off on the weekend. Where in Europe the typical work week includes Saturday. Just a different way of doing the work week. There are plenty of coffee houses in the US. The US is also less densely populated so maybe you are feeling that as well.

Sweden has a GIANT coffee culture (fika), we neither work weekends, and we're less densely populated than the US, so those are bad excuses. Not to ignore the 2 hour lunch that we don't have

[Poopymonster]

Welcome to the US, where in 'murrica...

The cafe server, probably makes under 3 bucks an hour. This is legal. You sat there for over 2 hours? Unless your tip was rather large, you may have cost that server money after taxes, since they want you to get your stuff, consume, bail, 30ish minutes. That's about 2 "orders" worth tips. An hour. So yes, the staff there was nervous. Their jobs may have been on the line.

If a server doesn't get enough tips to make minimum wage, their employer has to make up the difference. Do that too often, you get fired as a server since you are costing the boss money. Regardless of why they didn't get enough in tips. Dickholes "I dun tip on principil", low tippers, or someone camped at their table for hours. No real reason needs to be given. So the staff wanting people in/out quickly is to keep their tips up, which doesn't cost their employer money, so they can keep their jobs.

Stupid? Yes. Legal? Yes. Welcome to the US.

[Protean]

In USA we have jobs so we can't just sit around cafes all day

Like waiting tables and getting paid directly by the customer instead of your boss?

One small step away from having to pay the owner for the opportunity to earn a tip in his shop, wouldn't you say?

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Yea in the US we don’t take 2 hour lunches like they do in Europe. However, we do have Saturday and Sunday off on the weekend. Where in Europe the typical work week includes Saturday. Just a different way of doing the work week. There are plenty of coffee houses in the US. The US is also less densely populated so maybe you are feeling that as well.

Haha, what?

Please name the European countries in which this is normal. For every one you name I'll match you two that doesn't. This is so far from the norm I'd say it doesn't happen, but you never know about the weird ones like Greece.