Monday, October 12, 2015

Sweeten Your C̶o̶f̶f̶e̶e̶ Life



Lately, I’ve been so hyped about coffee, of how the latte here is better than there, how to brew it using V60, Cold Drip, Syphon, and any way possible. At first, it was very interesting to hear from my friends that this origin tastes less bittery and more fruity than the other, and how the other tastes more chocolaty than the first one. I really couldn’t wait to get a chance to taste them.

Until one day, my friend came to office with a grin on his face, carrying a flask, and said, “Here! Taste this Wamenans, perfectly extracted! I am using V60.” And his grin was transferred to my face, enthusiastically grabbed the flask and sniffed to the aroma. “Hmm, it’s very good.” I started to drink it, and tried to identify the flavor, based on what he has explained. Suddenly, the grin faded, replaced by a confusing smile, “Hmmm, it’s really good. It’s bitter.” Then my friend’s smile went away too. The next day, he brought another coffee, that time was a home blend from a namely coffee roastery. Then again, his smile went further away.

It’s really hard to see, or taste, the fruity, chocolaty, acidity, papery, woody, nutty, or other taste ended with –ty. I really just noticed the bitterness, and nothing more. Sometimes I tasted them better than the other, but when I told my friend, it’s just the overextraction. Not really helping.

Then I thought about the coffee again. Why it’s so hard to differ the taste of one to another, and why I only noticed the bitterness. Yeah, maybe some said that has to do with my experience with coffee, which I don’t have. I tried to relate with my ability to taste sweets, which I am really good at. Then why?

With respect to all coffee-freaks out there, who are graced enough to embrace the coffee taste, I’d like to refer the sweetness to a goodness, and bitterness to a failure. What I’m gonna say now, it is easier to taste the sweetness of things, rather than the layer of bitterness of things. Let’s dig deeper into this thought.

It’s really easy to taste the sweetness, most likely you’ll ask more of it. Most of the time, the sweetness doesn’t last long, and you need to have more and more, and don’t ever forget about the aftertaste. What first taste sweet, maybe will end bitter, and we never know, right? We are keep going for that until we are overwhelmed, and start looking for anything sweeter than what we identified as sweet before.

Otherwise, we will reject all the bitterness in our life, since we wonder how bitterness always lasts out longer? Even if before it happens, we will say no at first. It is really humane to accept what’s good, and reject what’s bad, works the same with sweetness and bitterness. But, have you ever thought about bitterness to have a sweet aftertaste?

Romans 5:3-5 (ESV)
Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

And what we learn from this scriptures, is that the works of God are somehow out of our thoughts, and sometimes wear us off, dry us off of our faith. The sufferings work that way, but if God can produce sufferings, He is also able to produce sweet aftertaste, of hope, which will take us one step higher. And always in the end, all we can say is, “Thank God for leading me this way, I never thought it will come out this good.”

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