Smoking???
I noticed this week a new section of a cafe has been built of glass so that it can operate throughout the winter. I also noticed a big no smoking symbol for the new section. It was so great to see... and then I remembered. On January 1, supposedly, new anti-smoking laws come into force which require non-smoking sections everywhere. I don't see other places making changes, and there isn't that much time left, so let's see how that all plays out. But just the thought of it has me excited!
posted by Raffi K. at 10:33 PM
11 Comments:
Non-smoking sections can't come soon enough for me! The nice thing in the regions is that most restaurants have individual rooms. Yerevan sucks especially when you go to a nice, small restaurant and a bunch of guys come in and start chain smoking.
In this new law, do they say there needs to be ways to move the air? Without air handling systems, why bother to have a law.
Yay! I hope this also applies to internet cafes.
Hi. Why are cafe's so often discussed? As I've been reading this blog it crosses my mind that there seems to be something special about cafe's in Armenia or Yerevan. People on the blog talk about them pretty often. I wonder what it is?
Yerevan has a big "cafe culture".
What is the cafe culture there like? I conjure up the French philosophers discussing world-class philosophy on the left bank in the 30s over strong coffee and stronger tobacco. I picture modern Starbucks and other coffee shops in Seattle with Fair Trade purchasing, slick merchandising, and world-class pricing per cup. Somehow I expect maybe Yerevan's coffee culture is neither of those. I've been to the left bank and seattle, but never Armenia.
Hi,can you guys tell me how much do they charge for internet at the cafe,or do they have WiFi?
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Anonymous, anywhere from 50 cents US to a dollar an hour for dial up. There are places that have "high speed", not sure how much they cost.
David, didn't you know ... an Armenian found the first cafe in France? ;-)
Yerevan, supposedly, has more than 400 cafes. Trying to find a table at one of the outdoor cafes in central Yerevan in the summer is very difficult.
First cafe in France? really? My cousin is French, ethnically Armenian, in Marseille. I'll ask him if that's known among French Armenians.
My image of Yerevan is that of bitterly cold winter afternoons in fuelless apartments with the afternoon light failing into night. Not animated crowds basking in leafy sunlight enjoying lunch. No doubt dated. No doubt parochial. Sounds nice.
David, Armenian cafes are really cool. Apparently Armenia was the first country in the USSR to be allowed to open pavement cafes. Although there are so many, everyone tends to have their favourite, and the summer nights are incredible when the air cools a little and people start to come out - generally very safe, cheap , some cheaper than others.
Theres also something distinctly "Armenian" about wasting a whole summer evening with close friends and family just sitting together and taking in the atmosphere. I have yet to find this atmosphere anywhere else, although I've tried it with friends here in Britain, it just doesn't work!
Also each summer the cafes get "remodeled" and try to outdo each other with their number of fountains and tvs..its quite funny.
Time stands still and you switch to Armenian time, where everything is late, and hours slip by without you even realising :)
ahhh....
although there is another side to do with the destruction of parks for these cafes - but I heard the land was only leased and so eventually we may see a restoration of green areas.
harmick,
You make Armenian cafes sound inviting. When I grew up in Chicago there were no sidewalk cafes at all, I first knew of them from the textbook in high school French class. Strictly and exotically European. Now, here in Los Angeles there are actually a lot of them but they are kind of "incidental" to everything else in the life of the city. Not a focus of attention or awareness. Pleasant to patronize to be sure. And though I'd prefer to look out over the Seine than the Traffic it's still a wonderful idea and great ambience. But if you met a stranger and asked what cafe(s) were his favorite, this would not be an area of common experience or understandning. It'd be a weird question.
Also we don't have the cultural time clock to enable the savoring, much less the deliciously wanton wasting, of an entire evening at the table. Which is of course the right way to do it. No, we have to move on to the evening's other activities and the restaurant has turnover to consider.
Are the cafes in Armenia affordable and so attended by the average man, or is the clientele economically or otherwise selective?
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