Saturday, November 11, 2006

Coffee Melbourne-style

The Internet connection in my hotel is bad, to the point of being unusable. So, I've been searching this week for suitable coffee establishments where I might be able to catch up on things after work hours. While there are plenty of coffee shops here in Melbourne (they fancy themselves the most european of Australian cities), most of them do not adhere to /k's rules of coffeehouse greatness:
  • The internet shall be free and it shall be fast.
  • The chairs will be comfortable and oversized.
  • The music will be playing, but quietly in case one wants to listen to their iPods. And if you do play music, it must not be elevator music or techno.
  • They should bring your coffee to you, if the wait will be more than three minutes. And it should be better than I can make at home.
  • Power plugs. Everywhere.
After much searching, I have found a place that actually fits all of these requirements (except the music): Mag Nation (as in Magazine Nation). Not a coffee shop, per se, but a shop that sells about 600 different magazines (mostly from the UK). The photo above shows the magazine selection on 1/4 of one wall on the second floor. And it happens to have free Internet, comfy couches, power plugs and a decent flat white. Unfortunately, its in Melbourne CBD which is a short tram ride from my hotel. Still, worth it. Now if they would just turn down the crappy techno music . . .

2 comments:

MagMan said...

Glad you like the store. We actually have 3000 mag titles - not 600. They come from all over the world, although a lot of the best titles do come from the UK. There are heaps of Aus, NZ and US titles as well as a bunch of hard to find European titles as well.

Sorry you didn't like the music. We only have a very few techno(ish) songs on the playlist so you must have caught it at the wrong time. More counting crows, scissor sisters, U2, Pearl Jam, David Grey etc...

But you have to admit that it is a kick arse store.

/k said...

It is a kick ass store.

Just kidding about the techno.