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#9. Meet Wendelien van Bunnik 🇳🇱 2019 World Aeropress Champion and 2019 Dutch Barista Champion
124 Plays4 years ago
Snobby baristas make Wendelien van Bunnik nervous. That might be because she’s just about as welcoming, enthusiastic, and encouraging as they come.
Despite winning one world and two Dutch national championships in a single year, Wendelien continues to expand her coffee journey with an unwavering appetite to learn more. Not even COVID-19 can stop her from sharing her passion with her like-minded followers on social media.
When we recorded this episode, Wendelien was in a covid recovery, that is why she sounds a bit down, but don't worry, she is fine now.
Wendelien is also a recipe contributor of The Brewing Guide project.
There are only 4 days left to bring this project to life, click the link below and support on Kickstarter now.
http://kck.st/3d09x6Y
We also have an article about Wendelien, written by our volunteer Tigger Chaturabul, you can click the link below to read the full story now.
https://notabarista.org/wendelien-van-bunnik/
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Transcript
Introduction to Podcast & Kickstarter
00:00:06
Speaker
Hello and welcome to the I'm Not a barista podcast where you can get inspired by real life stories from the people behind the cup. Join us as we talk about everything to do with coffee from having a career in this industry to brewing tips and how you can support this global community. Humanity runs on coffee and together we can empower the people behind the cup.
00:00:29
Speaker
Hello everyone, my name is Miki, the host of Amna Barista podcast. As you may know, lately we are super busy with our first Kickstarter project, The Boring Guide. The Boring Guide began with the humble idea that to share tips for making delicious coffee at home, and today the project has grown into a worldwide representation of people behind every club.
00:00:53
Speaker
We know that it's very easy to find cookbooks with a variety of recipes from chefs and experts so they can learn about how to cook at home. But there isn't such a thing in the coffee industry. That is why we started this project and we collect recipes from coffee champions, experts and a really good home boroughs around the world.
00:01:15
Speaker
This is not just about the boring recipes, it's about bridging you with the talented individuals around the world who share the knowledge and technique for better brews. Our goal is to spread the love for drinking coffee around the world and to empower baristas, those we know by name and those we want to shine a light on.
00:01:36
Speaker
Most importantly, this is a charity project. We want to make small donations to help our users with financial needs, especially in nowadays the pandemic. There are only four days left until we finish the project on Kickstarter. So now, if you want to support us, if you want to support the project, please go to Kickstarter and back the project.
00:01:59
Speaker
You can find the link directly to the Kickstarter project through the link in our Instagram bio, or you can check the link in the description below.
Meet Vandalin Van Boonig
00:02:08
Speaker
And today's guest, you probably know her by her name, she's the 2019 WordPress world champion, Vandalin Van Boonig. When we recorded this episode, unfortunately Vandalin was sick at that time, and she was in COVID recovery, so if you hear her voice a little bit down, don't worry, she's very fine now.
00:02:30
Speaker
So first, welcome to the Amnaud Barca podcast. And we have No Yoo for the Arab Press Championship. And you've been famous for that. And let's talk about how did you start your coffee career? Yeah, that's way back. I think I started in coffee when I was in college about like
00:02:53
Speaker
12, 13 years ago. I'm 32 now. So yeah, that must've been like 12, 12 years ago. And I was in college. I just spent a year abroad and I came back and I needed a job. I was studying English and there was this coffee bar that I went to every morning before class. And I remember that I used to pick classes that were
00:03:15
Speaker
uh, preferably not at nine. Um, but if I did have a class at nine, I went to a coffee place close to the university and there was this barista there and he was really, really early in the morning. Like this was really early in the morning for me back then. Um, and he was so excited about his job. Like he was so enthusiastic and I would feel very cool and order double espressos. And then every morning he was like, do you want this da da da da da coffee? I don't even remember what he was saying. Or do you want to try la di da di da? Like, uh,
00:03:43
Speaker
strong and blend or do you want like the soft mild whatever blend and it always struck me that he was so enthusiastic about what he was doing so early in the morning. I was at a certain point I was like dude how what is it about this job
00:03:59
Speaker
that gets you so excited at this hour because I need to get me some of that and then luckily for me they were hiring and then pretty soon after I started doing that working as a barista I was like oh I get it this is fun this this part that you're playing in people's lives especially those early hours
Journey & Mentorship
00:04:19
Speaker
It's amazing and I've been working as a barista in about three other coffee places in the same city where I'm still studying and after I graduated I got an amazing opportunity to work for a coffee roastery.
00:04:35
Speaker
They were looking for a full-time trainer. I just graduated as a teacher, but I was really, really liking that whole coffee thing. So I decided to, you know, jump in the deep end, join that company. And I've been working there for almost nine years now. I've been as a barista trainer. I've been doing account management and sales. I've been head of full education of that company about two years ago.
00:05:01
Speaker
since they've opened their own flagship store in The Hague, their own coffee bar. I started managing that about a year ago. It was my first try in, you know, a management place as well. How you end up in the coffee industry because you see someone else was so enthusiastic about coffee, right? Wake up early with the full energy and you're curious, what's wrong with this guy? Yeah. I know. That's exactly it.
00:05:31
Speaker
There must be something about either in his coffee or in his personality that, you know, could get someone that excited about, you know, a way to make a living. That first barista job was when I actually started for the first time noticing the reward of, that you get as a barista of like having, having that satisfaction in your, in your profession. It's good to hear.
00:05:56
Speaker
And you started around 20 years, I guess. How was life back then as a student? Oh, it was simple. That makes me feel very old if you ask that question. But it was a much simpler time because the money that I made as a barista was extra. That was like on top of that.
00:06:16
Speaker
great funding that we get here in Holland when you're studying. It was especially now when you think about the pandemic that we've been in for the past year, life was just really straightforward. And I was really happy, even though sometimes I don't think I necessarily appreciate it then, because I have a tendency to make things complicated. Which I think a lot of people recognize, or at least I hope.
00:06:43
Speaker
Yeah, it was just, uh, you know, I was, I was in my early twenties and I was, I had no idea what life was about, but I was still in that super confident phase when thought that I knew, you know, what things were like. And, um, I, I lost some of that confidence, I think over the years. Um, but I think that's a good thing because I was a really, I'm generally a pretty loud person. Um,
00:07:09
Speaker
And especially if you combine that with like that overconfidence that new baristas tend to have after they learned like three things and they think to know how the world works, I was stuck in that phase and really verbal in that phase for at least a year. So when I look back at that, it did get me to a lot of places because of my big mouth. But looking back at it, it kind of makes me cringe a little bit because I was like, oh, I
00:07:39
Speaker
didn't know anything back then. And I was lucky enough to meet the mentor, the guy that hired me eventually at the company that I've been working now because he like, you know, went through that whole loud attitude and kind of like put me back on my feet like, okay, let's just go back to the basics and let's start building something really good. And yeah, he's been, he's been, you know, mentoring me ever since he's always always also been my coach through
00:08:08
Speaker
birthday championships that I've been doing. And yeah, he became one of my best friends as well. You're lucky to have a mentor in early age, I guess metaverse today, they just work. If you're confused about what's going to happen, what's the career is like in the future, then it's hard to find a mentor like close to you can give you some real guidance, opinions and tips.
Winning the AeroPress Championship
00:08:31
Speaker
Yeah, for sure. I think that was one of the biggest
00:08:37
Speaker
biggest things in my life that I'm so grateful for that I've been so lucky to have. Yeah, I think having a mentor doesn't necessarily have to be a coffee mentor, although that can help, but someone to just support you professionally and someone that makes you feel safe enough to every now and then like put your back on your feet or like put a mirror in front of you to make yourself aware of like what attitude you're having. I think can be can be super helpful. And yeah, I'm
00:09:06
Speaker
I'm really lucky in that, but I also think that it's not something that magically happens to you. Finding a mentor is something that you can attract, I think. It's not something that someone's walking around with a sign on their head saying, hey, I'm available for mentoring people. Just ask me. I think there needs to be an organic connection between two people. And for us, that was based on friendship.
00:09:35
Speaker
Uh, first, because we know when we start hanging out at, at, we start meeting at barista parties, even though initially I was really intimidated because this guy was, you know, judging barista championships in Holland, he's been a head judge for years. I was like, I only knew him from like a distance. We struck up a conversation a couple of times and he saw something in me that up to this day, I still don't really see myself, but it's really nice to have someone who's like constantly supporting you.
00:10:03
Speaker
I know I'd like to think I did something myself as well to, to, to find something like that or to deserve someone like that, because I struggled a lot with like how I'm going to make up for all that time and effort that a mentor puts and the patience that someone has to put up to like coach and teach and mentor someone. But I think over the years I've started to learn, especially now that I've learned a lot more myself and kind of progressed professionally.
00:10:32
Speaker
that the way to pay back to kind of balance out that mentor relationship is to just do the best you can and preferably stay humble about it as well, if possible, depending on how far you get. I remember when I just won the World AeroPress Championships in November 2019 and I called my husband first because he was at home and
00:11:01
Speaker
I called him like, I'm not sure what just happened, but I became world champion. And he told me two things that I will never forget. And that, you know, I will always carry with me. He said, first things first, thank the people that you need to thank. And secondly, just enjoy the freaking ride. So I think those two things are so important for me and to kind of
00:11:26
Speaker
what I've been trying to do and going to keep doing the rest of my career, wherever that's going to take me. Thank the people that you need to thank and just enjoy the rest. Pretty good, simple tips, I believe. Yeah. Let's talk about the championship. How did you prepare everything and how was that experience like? The AeroPress Championship. Well, Championship wise, 2019 was a pretty crazy year for me because I did like the Dutch Brista and the World Brista and
00:11:56
Speaker
Dutch AeroPress and World AeroPress all in one year. Actually, the AeroPress Championship, especially if you compare it to the British Championship, was just fun. It was very relaxed. Actually, after the whole WBC experience in the spring, I wasn't really planning on doing anything else the rest of the year, but because the guys here in the Netherlands who organized the AeroPress Championships
00:12:21
Speaker
Our former colleagues of mine used to work with them way back when they were organizing the Dutch Airpress Championships for the first time in a couple of years. And they were doing it in my hometown so I could go by bike, have a beer. So I was like, okay, you know what, might as well enroll, go for a beer. And it was pretty tricky to get one of the spots, but I got lucky. So I was like, you know what, I'm just going to go over there, support the guys, you know, being already the British championship champion that might like help their boost their event a little bit. So I never.
00:12:50
Speaker
meant to win that championship, but the coffee that they provided was really tasty. It kind of
00:12:58
Speaker
Um, it was a washed Kenyan and it really worked well with that, uh, bypass. So I was like, Oh, this might be a good opportunity to like, try this bypass thing, uh, with this really nice Kenyan coffee on this really fun championship where there's lots of beer and friends. And I adapted that recipe to that coffee at the evening while having some beers. And at the end of the evening, I was holding the trophy and I wasn't really sure what was going on. They were like, well, you know, if you want a ticket to London, you go into the world. I was like, wow.
00:13:29
Speaker
Okay, it's going to be next month." I'm like, oh, okay. And then I got into a fight with my husband when I got home because I asked him, like, do you know, I get to go to London next month for the World Air Friendship for a weekend. And he was like, but wait, wait a minute. Like,
00:13:48
Speaker
You know, I asked him like, do you want to come along? We can make it into a weekend or something. Because I was feeling quite guilty that I won because I was like, you know, we have a kid, we have, you know, stuff to do. And he got pissed with me because he was like, how can you join a competition, like enroll in a competition?
00:14:06
Speaker
and not expect or even take into consideration the fact that you might win. How does that work in your brain? How can you not think about the fact that you might, if you enroll, you might possibly win? Because now we have to figure stuff out because he has to work on weekends and we have a kid. I was like, I don't know. I was just going for the beers and we had a fun night and I'm sorry, do you want to come with?
00:14:31
Speaker
Funnily enough, pretty much the exact same happened in London. Like I went over there, I took a friend. She was a great competition buddy. We had so much fun. The hotel was like right next to the venue. It had a karaoke room. We decided, okay, we're out for the weekend. She's a pastry chef. So she dragged me through London the whole day before the competition just to eat pastries. I was so full. And then we went into this competition day.
00:15:01
Speaker
slightly hangover because we'd been doing karaoke the night before at the hotel, which was amazing. The thing I liked about that AeroPress Championship is because it was so, it's supposed to be really accessible and really inclusive.
00:15:17
Speaker
And you could really tell that from the way the whole competition is organized. I actually knew the guy who's organizing it, Tim Williams, also from way back when, because I was lucky enough that I met him before in 2013 when I went on an origin trip. So that was fun. Like we ran into each other. He was like running around like crazy because there was like 60 competitors and their buddies backstage like asking so many questions.
00:15:41
Speaker
And I was just like, hey, you know, I'm here too. Don't know how I ended up here, but I'm going to brew some coffee. And I started talking to the competitors of the other countries. I was standing in between, like we have like a tiny table per competitor backstage, really chaotic and so hilarious. I was standing in between a lovely lady, a competitor from Mexico, Monica, the guy from New Zealand, the competitor.
00:16:07
Speaker
And he was very serious. He was super focused. He was, you know, he and his buddy, they had a plan. So I was like, okay, I'm just gonna leave them alone. I don't want to like interfere with their, with their, their competition. I know how annoying that is. But again, I was just there to, you know, bring out the best in the coffee that we were given. I knew that that
00:16:27
Speaker
bypass thing worked for me before. So I adapted that to the coffee that we had that day. And luckily, I was also able to use a lot of the competition experience from beginning of that year from Barista Championships. Like preparing for that Barista Championship, that took me like a year and a half of my life, blood, sweat, tears, you know, that cost me a lot. You give up your social life for at least, you know, six months. And then
00:16:54
Speaker
You know, everything is super focused,
Managing Stress & Competitions
00:16:56
Speaker
super organized. So a lot of that how to approach a competition like in organizational wise was very easy for me to adapt to the airbrush championships. For instance, the first question when we got the competition coffee, like we got to cup it and we got to ask some questions. How much coffee do we have? How many rounds are there potentially?
00:17:17
Speaker
And how much coffee will we need? So how much coffee do we have to do the training with? So you kind of like make a system of like not, so you don't run out of coffee halfway the competition because you don't always need to prepare for the fact that you might make it through the last round. So there's, there's these, you know, little things of course I make checklists. Of course I make notes when I, when I taste and when I, it's not like I accidentally won the Airbus championship. It's just that the competition experience helped.
00:17:44
Speaker
in keeping it pretty relaxed for me. So I got a lot of people who got really nervous over the course of the competition. And I just was able to enjoy the process because I knew I was prepared and I could trust my own skills and then enjoy the process. And I think that's so important for every competition.
00:18:04
Speaker
that you make sure that you are as prepared as possible to be able to enjoy the competition itself. Actually, my other competition coach, he's really good at pushing me really hard before barista competitions, but then the week before, he gets into this pampering mode, which is amazing. He will make sure that you're in the right mindset. You do the hard work first during the training and the hours and hours of... And that can get really unpleasant.
00:18:31
Speaker
You know, the moment the competition day approaches, it's really important to remind yourself that you're supposed to have fun up there, that you're doing this because you like the process, because you like being up there. It means that you need to relax and you need to do, you know, stuff that you like doing and work out a lot to get those endorphins going. And if you would, although the Airbus Championship is a great way to start, if you're interested in competing,
00:19:00
Speaker
The amount of stress that you're going to have on stage is the exact same. So if you get stressed out on the air press stage, you're going to get the same amount of stress as the worst championship stage because stress is distressed. I mean, nerves are just that. They're going to be at 150% anyway, no matter what competition stage you're on. So in that sense, it doesn't matter which one you start with because they're going to be equally nerve wracking and scary.
00:19:29
Speaker
And I'm worried that if you start with AeroPress and you get thrown off because you get freaked out by your own nerves, then you will never make that step to doing Brista. So might as well start with the toughest one because both of them will show you how you deal with your nerves because ultimately that's what every competition is for. How well do you handle your nerves and how well can you perform despite your nerves?
00:19:57
Speaker
Yes, it's important to remember there's a book called Eat the Frog Every Day First. Yes. So choose the difficult one and then the rest will come easy. Exactly. So actually, it works in real life. I try to eat my biggest frog. You participated in three championships competitions within one year. How does it like? That's intense. My social life suffered.
00:20:25
Speaker
My marriage suffered, my daughter suffered, but I want to say it was worth it, but it was. It's really intense, especially the first half was all about the birthday championships. I noticed, for instance, when I was making a photo album for my daughter's birthday every year of the year before, and I had so little pictures of that first couple of months of 2019 from her.
00:20:54
Speaker
And they were only like competition setups, different coffee profiles. I know everything coffee related, tiny details, portafilters placed in certain positions on tables and, you know, grinder settings, whatever. Notes of pictures of notes that I shouldn't forget. Signature glasses, so many pictures of potential signature glasses and very little pictures of my daughter.
00:21:17
Speaker
except the one where she's sitting on my suitcase because I was going to Boston for 10 days and she wasn't able to come along. So that's kind of, you know, that's tough. And that is, I think the only way I was able to do that is because of the support of my husband. If he was not okay with that, then I would never have been able to do that. And then the second half of the year, which was defined by the airport championship, for me, it made me really humble because
00:21:44
Speaker
You know, all the attention that is giving you, I felt like all of a sudden everyone knew me, everyone wanted to ask me stuff. And all I was like, I'm just, I'm the same person as I was two days ago. But this platform that you've been given for me almost crazy way, like I didn't work necessarily like so hard. It wasn't my end game.
00:22:03
Speaker
to win that competition. I was just there to enjoy the competition, to meet up with other international baristas because that's something that always gets me really excited. So I wasn't necessarily prepared for what came after the Airpress Championships. I had the feeling that
00:22:21
Speaker
I gained 2,000 new followers on Instagram and they started congratulating me all at the same time, which was really crazy, really scary. I felt like I was in a stadium where there was like 2,000 people yelling at me at the same time. And I'm a friendly person. I like to respond when people talk to me. So I was like, I spend whole days on my phone.
00:22:43
Speaker
until I started noticing like, oh, this is, this is not okay. I need to like, okay, dial it back a bit, dial it back a bit. And, um, I actually got a great piece of advice from, uh, one of my role models who's, uh, it's Anya Shka, who won the 2009, uh, 2018 World War II championships. And she sent me a message saying like, Hey, congratulations, piece of advice. Just wait for a bit. Like let the big thing blow over. It'll blow over really soon, like two to three weeks.
00:23:12
Speaker
and then take your time to like respond to people or like.
00:23:15
Speaker
whatever offers are coming out of this, but just, you know, yeah, that was the best piece of advice I needed at that moment because I felt completely overwhelmed. I stopped replying straight away to all the people saying, uh, so I gave it like two to three weeks, everything like settled down. And then I also hadn't figured out by then how you can reply to Instagram messages on your laptop. So I was like, Oh my phone the whole fricking day. My thumbs were starting to hurt. It was, it was awful, but so fun. Finger works.
00:23:46
Speaker
How's life right now after such a long time since the last computation?
Life During COVID-19
00:23:51
Speaker
And then I was still very busy.
00:23:54
Speaker
Um, I'm not gonna lie, it's been quite a bummer. I'm a really outgoing person. I really thrive on socializing, on like spreading my enthusiasm, inspiring other people, talking to other people. So this whole lockdown pandemic thing has been really tough, increasingly. So like the first lockdown we had in the Netherlands was
00:24:17
Speaker
You know, we all had like, oh, it's, you know, it was spring and the weather was getting better and we'll get through this. And we had no idea that was going to take so long. So, um, the atmosphere was really like, okay, we're going to get through this. And now it's been a year. I'm still recovering from COVID myself, um, uh, six weeks now. And I do not like noticing the boundaries that my body is telling me. Um, I get really like that really, that can really like frustrate me. Like I want to do stuff.
00:24:44
Speaker
But then I'm also really fatigued. I want to hang out with people, but you can't because we're in lockdown. I enjoy hanging out on Instagram so much lately because first of all, I have some time now and it's costing me very little energy because I can like spend one hour on social media.
00:25:02
Speaker
hang out digitally with the people that I want to hang out with and then go back to being a fatigued zombie on the couch. Yeah, I'm glad spring is coming, but I have to know that it's going to be over soon because this is not good for me mentally.
00:25:19
Speaker
No, definitely not. It's a tough time for everyone. Yeah. Especially when you work in the hospitality industry, you meet people, you need to have this social communication and without this, to gain energy, I guess. I know that you spend your time wisely. You didn't just stop there. You have some new videos coming, sharing tips and everything. Tell us more about that.
00:25:44
Speaker
Well, the thing is, that was actually two ideas behind it, because first of all, I do get a lot of similar questions through my Instagram. And as I said, I do like answering them, because the one thing that I enjoy the most is sharing what I know, because I know a tiny bit, but I might as well put it out there.
00:26:10
Speaker
to anyone who's interested, if anyone is, because I got a lot of the same questions and I figured that if there's going to be one person who has that question, then there might be more. But I held off making videos for a long time, first of all, because cameras freak me out. And second of all, because I had this feeling of no one's going to be interested anyway. Who am I to start making videos and also
00:26:38
Speaker
I know nothing about making videos, like absolutely nothing. I am not a digital person at all. So a part of me wanted to, but there was also a lot of like reasons not to. But then when I got COVID and I was stuck indoors in quarantine, I needed some sort of creative expression, I guess, if that makes sense. And I decided, you know, might as well
00:27:05
Speaker
take the little energy that I have in a day because it's not like I was, you know, high fever in bed all day. I had like little bits of energy to spend. So I needed some sort of outlet and I decided, you know what, why not just give it a try. I know nothing about video making. I know nothing about editing, but I can give it a try and it's probably going to suck, but at least I'll learn something, which is what I did. So I recorded something and I watched a whole lot of YouTube videos on editing.
00:27:35
Speaker
I tried something and I just put it out there knowing that it sucked. I was comparing myself to James Hoffman's videos and I was like, no one's going to be interested. And maybe no one is, but I really realized really quickly that I enjoyed the process of making them. I enjoyed the process. So I enjoyed the process of editing a lot more than I had fear because that's the thing that's been holding me back. I don't know anything about editing or video making.
00:28:01
Speaker
I realized, oh, I kind of enjoyed the editing process a lot more than I thought. Um, so now it's kind of become just a little bit of a creative outlet whenever I have the, the energy or the, you know, the, oh, I should, you know, really, I should really make a video about that question that, you know, cause I feel like I could answer that well. And then it's a little fun little project that I can like really adapt to the moments that I feel up for it. So I don't want to like necessarily become a
00:28:26
Speaker
YouTube phenomenon or anything. It's more about the process of making the videos that I enjoy rather than making a really sophisticated fancy YouTube channel with a whole plan behind it. I just enjoy putting out that tiny bit of stuff that I know and enjoy making that. It's more of a creative thing than it is about me putting myself out there. Because the one thing that I enjoy the most
00:28:50
Speaker
in the whole world is sharing what I'm enthusiastic about with other people. I've been doing that my whole life. Whenever I start getting into something, I end up teaching about it. I'm a sailor, so one of my hobbies is sailing, and I used to be a sailing instructor when I was
00:29:07
Speaker
when I was a teenager and then one of my hobbies is salsa dancing and I met my husband on the dance floor and then we started teaching salsa as well. So I kind of I can't help myself but whenever I get really enthusiastic about that
00:29:24
Speaker
I need to share it to a lot of people who I can't otherwise reach because, you know, you're physically based somewhere. But time is, is a factor always. I mean, this is, these projects are time consuming and you know, I have a, I have a job and I have a family. So that's always going to be the limitation. I guess the short answer is I'm not sure. Um, I'm taking things I think pretty much like everyone is doing right now more one day at the time.
00:29:50
Speaker
The one thing I do know is I enjoy making the videos. Some people have responded that they like it. And that's, you know, that's enough for now. You enjoy the process. Enjoy the process. That's important. It's a difficult time. So we really don't know what will happen later. So we just follow the flow sometimes.
Love for Coffee Industry & Community
00:30:11
Speaker
After so many years in the coffee industry, what do you think the most fascinating thing happened in your life or
00:30:17
Speaker
Um, let me put this way. What keep your stay in coffee industry instead of looking for something else? Uh, that's actually a good question. I'm not sure. I think it's two things. The product itself is it for me, this is really fun because there's always new crazy coffees that you haven't tasted. Like every time you get a coffee from like a new roaster or a new farm or a new processing method, it's a little bit like Christmas because you get to taste something.
00:30:47
Speaker
And you're going to experience like, you know, why does this coffee taste this way, which is exactly what competitions are about. Like why is this coffee tasting the way it's tasting, which I think is really like that feeds my curiosity and knowing that that forever, you know, be, uh, be something that I can use because, you know, coffee is never done. Um, so you can always keep learning about it. And the second thing is, and this is going to be really cliche as well.
00:31:14
Speaker
But it's the community around it. Like through my work in coffee, I have met so many diverse people. It's the same thing with friends. Like you might not have the same friends as you did 10 years ago because you change as a person, but also professionally because you change as a professional that brings you into contact with different people as well. And for some reason, you always seem to meet the right people in your career at the right moment.
00:31:40
Speaker
what gets me so excited. Like you go to events and you run into the same people or sometimes you meet people that you only know through Instagram, but then you meet them in real life and they turn out to be just as fun. Um, except now you can have that beer together and it's, um, yeah, it's, it's, so it's both the product and the community around it that even though sometimes I considered it, like maybe I should go back into teaching and then I've always, you know, those are the things that have drawn me back.
00:32:08
Speaker
In addition to coffee, what other beverage do you enjoy the most? I would say tea. Yeah, I took actually a full year of tea sommelier training a while ago and yeah, I really enjoy the complexity and the same aspects about coffee that tea can like send you on this endless journey, like this rabbit hole that I'm afraid to dive into.
00:32:36
Speaker
Because I know that if I dive into that one, then I will be able to stop. And I strongly believe in focusing on one product, even though I'm like, I would love to know a lot more about beer, about wine, about cheese, about, you know, all those products, because all those things we talk about flavor, and that's, I think, super fascinating in general. Tea is even more complicated than coffee in a lot of ways. Yeah, I do enjoy like a really nice comforting, like nice oolong,
00:33:06
Speaker
Good welcome. Good job. Could you tell us more about what is life, Barista life in Netherlands? We know Netherlands is one of the most developed countries and the social welfare and everything there is just very nice. I guess it's nice to have a job as a Barista in Mexico or in Brazil there. So could you tell us more about the lifestyle of Barista?
00:33:34
Speaker
I'm not sure if it's necessarily being a barista in the Netherlands is like a super high esteem job. It's definitely not super prestigious or anything because you're still working in hospitality, which for a lot of people is still something that people do part-time on their way to their real job. There's a really small but close-knit community
00:34:01
Speaker
that I think is really pretty open and pretty supportive of one another. You can see that there's always, and I think that goes for a lot of countries, there's a lot of concentration of specialty coffee in the capital in Amsterdam. So it's a little bit like the Amsterdam coffee scene and then everything around it.
00:34:22
Speaker
But there's a lot of professional friendliness throughout the Netherlands and you know we have some really really impressive courses here that I'm lucky enough to know and I consider them friends I can you know ask them for help.
00:34:37
Speaker
We have, you know, Esther Mastam, who's like really great latte art barista. And then there's Lex, who's like one of the Amsterdam baristas, who has a really nice roastery and has been doing really great. And I think everyone does what they can in order to support one another while also maintaining their own values as a coffee professional, because there's always some sort of like competition as well, like you're sometimes professionally, you're each other's competition as well, if you want for like different roasteries or something. So I think
00:35:05
Speaker
There's generally a pretty good vibe of people being enthusiastic about each other's brands, which is, I think, something that goes for the whole specialty coffee scene. And there's a lot of mutual respect. One last question here for this podcast. And remember, you answered a question, what does coffee mean to you in Dutch? So, could you tell us in English today?
00:35:29
Speaker
Um, yeah, so coffee for me is, it's, it's a really challenging beverage. Like I can keep learning about it. It's one of my favorite reasons to get up in the morning. And, um, so it's a thing that brings this community together that I love so much. Great. Thank you. Um, is there anything that I didn't ask or you want to mention here?
00:35:49
Speaker
I'm really excited to be part of this podcast, to be part of this community that you're building. I think it's an honor to be part of such an initiative that kind of empowers baristas and other people in hospitality. I think that's something that we need and we need to stick together and help lift each other up.
00:36:09
Speaker
Thank you so much for tuning in to the I'm Not a Barista podcast where people get inspired and connected through coffee stories. If you want to join our community then please subscribe for future episodes and follow us on our Instagram to get connected. Until next time keep smiling and most importantly keep drinking coffee.