Six o’clock in the morning, the alarm clock is ringing. You have the temptation to throw it against the wall. Yesterday you read a book until two o’clock in the morning. After four hours’ sleep you think what an idiot you are. In the night you decided “only one more chapter” and then eleven times the same thing. Despite how warm the duvet is and how comfy your pillow is you have to wake up. Suddenly it hits you! The morning coffee. If only you can reach the coffeemaker without tripping over your own legs. The first sip of the flavoured drink and you are back to life. You realise the sun is up, on the TV (miraculously you have found the TV remote control) there is only good news and the Swiss Franc is back to the level it was at before the EUR/CHF unfreezing. And what if you could drink the same tasty coffee but in the “Eternal City” in a sunny square with an old fountain… The coffee is served by a smiling barista who knows your exact preferences. He knows you don’t like cold milk in your coffee, the foam should be stiff as a meringue and he always adds something special to the coffee. Impossible? Maybe, but you can always dream, can’t you?
Such a barista is described in the book “The first coffee in the morning” by Diego Galdino. Massimo knows the clients of the coffeehouse he inherited from his father in Trastevere. He knows what kind of coffee they like and what time they come in. He serves cups with amazing drinks before the client thinks to order them. Like a best friend, his old-fashioned coffeemaker accompanies him every day both while preparing daily coffee for friends and making new and amazing mixtures. Every weekday looks the same. The monotony is safe and calming. The only deviation is Sunday when the coffeehouse is closed and our hero must fill in his day differently. His city helps him with this. It invites him for a walk, reminds him about different places, soothes him and improves his mood. And so day by day Massimo’s life passes by. Is he happy? He thinks he is. Until the moment when a handsome green-eyed French girl appears in the coffeehouse. She doesn’t know anything about coffee, speaks Italian poorly and loses her temper easily. It is easy to surmise that she will change our hero’s life. The question is how and when?