On Sunday, Atlanta was supposed to be hit by a big storm system.  My parents decided to start their drive back to the Coffee Bean Corral in Mississippi that morning.  I had to pack my bag and take to the GWCC to be checked while I attended the SCAA's final day of events. On of the things that the SCAA offers at the expo is lectures.  They educate members about various topics like roasting, running a coffee shop, training staff, producing coffee and various industry related topics.  I had not attended the lectures on Friday and Saturday, but was excited to attended two on Sunday.  The two lectures I attended were "Technical Assistance for Farmers: The Role of NGO's in the Specialty Coffee Value Chain" and "Penning the Perfect Cup: Writing About Coffee". The "Technical Assistance for Farmers: The Role of NGO's in the Specialty Coffee Value Chain" lecture was done by a panel made of Carolina Aguilar from Luther World Relief, Dr. Christopher Bacon from UC Berkeley and Ben Corey-Moran.  The topic discussed the need for organizations to work with coffee farmers to provide training.  Dr. Bacon covered some of the research he has been studying showing how academic research can help coffee farmers and NGOs develop effective programs for helping coffee farmers.  Carolina Aguilar discussed the Luther World Relief's work in Nicaragua.  Ben Corey-Moran is a roaster in California who worked with several farmers in Uganda to help provide them training.  Ben discussed the difficulty of providing training to farmers with no help.  He enlisted the help of the Luther World Relief who had experience working with famers to develop business plans, farmer strategies and environmental impact plans. When picking this lecture, I wasn't sure how interesting the topic would be.  On a very surface level, I know that as consumers and retailers of coffee we need to be concerned about the substantiality of coffee famers.  This lecture helped to expand my understanding of the importance of education of both the coffee farmers to develop quality and training end users (coffee drinkers) to help them connect to the coffee they are consuming.  Due to my work with Hope 4 Kids International, I particularly enjoyed Ben's work in Uganda.  H4KI works in Uganda with similar efforts of helping local people provide a sustainable income for themselves with education, job training, farmer development, sponsoring orphans and building medical facilities. My second lecture of the day was called, "Penning the Perfect Cup: Writing About Coffee".  The lecture was a panel discussion with three coffee authors.  They discussed the reasons why they decided to write a book, plus a discussion of how to get a book published.  They offered a number of suggestion for inspiring writers.  The authors were Susan Zimmer, Mark Pendergrast and Tim Castle.  Each had a fascinating and very personal story about their coffee books.  As a reader, I forget how personal books are to the authors.  Below are some of the thoughts from my notes from the lecture. Susan Zimmer - I Love Coffee Quote from book: "When a cup of coffee becomes masterful art, thirst is perfectly optional." Lot of experience in coffee and food industry. Susan took a year and a half to writer her book.  She self published and in four years sold forty thousand copies. Enjoys the recipes and art of coffee. Plugged the WBC and the baristas.  Sammy Piccolo from Canada helped her with the book Mark Pendergast - Uncommon Grounds Quote from book: "A good cup of coffee can turn the worst day tolerable, provide an all important moment of contemplation, rekindle a romance." Not a coffee lover - set out to write a history - became an accidental coffee snob. Met a lot of the influential people in coffee.  Traveled to producing countries. Spent a lot of time at the Library of Congress researching back issues of magazines. Tim Castle - The Perfect Cup Quote from book: "A coffee remembers where it came from and how it was raised, the soil, the weather, the processing and the roasting are all recorded in the bean." Took 5 years to write.  Didn't like title or cover art.  Publisher chose and he had little say. Tim loves words.  Poetry, fiction, coffee. There is no perfect cup.  Coffee is a process of imperfections. Compared coffee to wine. We should look at coffee like wine.  There are many varieties, nuisances, processes, roasters. Quality is the true link between the farmers and coffee drinkers. Coffee is packed with information like a cd rom.  The "reader" is our tongues. Words help us catalog our drinking experiences. This lecture was great.  The authors all showed personality and humility.  They truly enjoy coffee, the coffee industry and writing.  I was inspired by the stories of the authors to write my own "coffee history".  You can look for it soon on my blog.

Day two was much slower than Day 1. My parents and I decided to skip the morning lectures and have breakfast at the hotel. After breakfast, Dad and I took the shuttle bus to the Georgia World Congress Center. We got the Expo and visited the area for the Roasters Guild. They were in the process of cupping the coffees of the year and the sound of slurping was everywhere. For those of you not versed in the art of cupping coffee, it is a noisy affair. Cupping coffee is done by taking a small amount of coffee in a bullion or cupping cup and slurping it into your mouth. The slurp is to make sure the coffee coats the entire tongue. On Day 1, Dad and I took a beginning cupping course from the SCAA and enjoyed see more experienced cuppers at work. The World Barista Championship was to start at 11 am. I went down at 11 because Colin from Ireland was to start first. Colin's coffee was roasted by my online friend, Stephen Leighton from HasBean coffee. Before the competition started I visited the WBC barista bar. The bar was manned by volunteer barista's from around the world and showcased various coffee roasters. In two days, I had around 10 espressos and cappuccinos from the WBC bar. I got to my seat in time to Colin start his performance and earlier enough to talk with Steve for a few minutes. Colin has a great story. One year ago he was a banker in Ireland. He was tired of his job and decided to become a barista. Before starting as a barista, he had never turned on an espresso machine! Colin did a great job advancing to the finals on Sunday.

My parents joined me to watch several of the barista's compete. We got to see Michael Phillips of the US and Gwilym Davies of the UK. Gwilym had a fascinating specialty drink because he allowed the judges to pick the ingredients for the drink. Both Mike and Gwilym advanced to the finals. The other finalist were from Hungary, Korea, and Canada. There was a total of 48 contestants in the WBC. I can say that I believe the baristas are artist. Their specialty drinks have to be prepared in 15 minutes and have all the ingredients work together perfectly. The drinks they make, put the special in specialty coffee. My parents went back to the hotel room earlier in the afternoon. I had planned on taking the shuttle bus back to the hotel to join them for an early dinner. Unfortunately, the shuttle buses stopped running at 5:30 pm. This was a problem because the WBC did not conclude for the day until 5:30 pm. I had to make a brisk walk back to the hotel. Dinner ended up being an experience because the meal and our transportation. At the hotel, we asked on the the valets to recommend a steakhouse close to the hotel. He said he knew of one in Atlanta that got good reviews, but was "a little too far to walk". It took up 30 minutes by taxi to get to the restaurant! The restaurant was called Bone's. We did not have reservations so we waited an hour of a table. Fortunately, the wait was worth it. The food at Bone's was excellent. I don't eat steak often and am glad to been able to enjoy a great piece of beef. Bone's is highly recommended for the food, but be warned the experience comes with a price tag. Our ride back to the hotel was exciting. The valet called us a cab. He was a GISDASU kind of driver. GISDASU means "Get In, Sit Down and Shut UP!" The taxi drove 80 most of the way back to the hotel and repeatedly crossed two or three lanes of traffic to make turns. It reminded me of the times when I rode taxis in Russia, Thailand and Guatemala. I ended the day with a call home to check up on the family and then crashing in bed.

Our first day of the Specialty Coffee Association of America Expo was busy.  Dad and I started the day with an Introduction to Coffee Cupping class.  The class was great!  It was taught by Amanda Eastwood of Cafe Imports.   Cafe Imports cups coffee every day and their employees have a great knowledge of coffee. Amanda presented an overview of the SCAA cupping protocols and quickly got us into cupping coffees. For cupping, we sat at two tables of 3 people and had a volunteer helper.  Our helper was Anna also from Cafe Imports.  She was very knowledgeable and helpful with the cupping process.  For the class, we cupped 5 different flights of coffee.  It was good opportunity to practice cupping and develop more of my palate.  By the end of the class, I felt like I had a good knowledge of cupping protocols and had gained more knowledge of coffee and growing regions. Our afternoon and evening was spent talking to Importers and Roaster manufacturers for CoffeeBeanCorral.com.  The exhibit hall is HUGE.  We have more to see tomorrow. Tonight, we attended a delicious reception hosted by Hacienda La Minita.  La Minita is a Coffee Bean Corral importer.  The reception was fun because of the great food and having the chance to rub shoulders with some of the national coffee roasters that La Minita imports coffee for.  FYI, the Hacienda La Minita Tarrazu Coffee is the best selling coffee for Coffee Bean Corral. One highlight of today was meeting an online friend, Steve Leighton.  Steve is a roaster and video podcaster from England.  His business is called Hasbean Coffee.  I have interacted with Steve a number of times online in coffee related discussions.  His video blog, In My Mug, is entertaining and instructional.  Steve is here to support the Irish Barista champion, Colin Harmon, who is competed in the World Barista Championships.  Steve roasted the coffee Colin is using for his espresso tomorrow.  He graciously gave me a sample of the coffee. I plan to go by and support Colin at the WBC tomorrow morning.  (Here is Steve’s blog about his first day at the WBC.) Time for sleep.  My legs are killing me from walking the Expo floor.  Tomorrow will be a fun day of coffee, WBC and connecting with a friend from Tennessee.