gramstand http://www.gramstand.com/

214 Avenue A (btwn 13th & 14th st.)
New York, NY 10009
East Village

hours (their words not mine ;))
M-F: 7:30am until rather late
Weekends: 9:00am until rather late

Review after the cut!

Hopped onto an express M15 heading downtown to get to the first stop on my work-friendly New York coffee/tea house tour. 40 minutes of futilely wishing that the 2nd avenue subway would be finished earlier than 2099 and a couple avenues over later, I had arrived in front of gramstand. I was expecting more a sterile asian pseudo-space age type store, from the website and the way that the name of the store is pointedly not capitalized, but was pleasantly surprised by how welcoming and homey it was. It’s got just enough dirt/grit to deserve its Alphabet City address and make feel like a real neighbourhood tea house.

10AM, Tuesday morning, and the place is pleasantly empty. There’s a couch in the front with a nanny and sleeping toddler. A couple tables are occupied with freelancers pounding away at their excel worksheets, tea lattes and toasted bagels. The well-worn whiteboard next to their flasks of loose leaf teas list the available specialty teas and I heartily approve of the selection. It’s green tea-centric; a dragonwell mint, some kukicha (my least favorite of the Japanese teas but very glad they got a nod anyways), the requisite jasmine green tea, and others I can’t recall. I order the jasmine green tea, but they’re out of stock, so I settle on the chamomile kukicha — two teas I generally have not liked separately, but hey, I’m all for trying new things. At $4.38 (w/tax) for a large cup, it’s a bit on the expensive side. Then again, I’m planning on sitting down for the next couple hours and taking advantage of their free wifi, so who am I to complain. (Which makes me wonder, are their take-out fares lower?).

I choose one of the 4 empty small circular tables in the back of the room, perfectly sized for two to converse over a pot of tea, or for one to set down their laptop and still have room to lay out their scientific articles random papers. After 15 minutes or so, the kukicha is delivered to my table, in a lovely large glass mug, fresh from being brewed from tea leaves (none of the tea bag nonsense at gramstand). At first I was surprised that it was sweet (but only because I didn’t actually read the description of the tea), but its a good combination. The honey mixes with chamomile and kukicha in a strange “East meets West and tastes delicious” way.

The music is happy, upbeat (Neutral Milk Hotel, Jason Mraz, etc). The tea-tender(?) is damn cute. My tea tastes delicious. I am in my happy place.

I start chugging away at my work, leisurely sipping on my tea, when a strange individual sits down next to me (now I see how writers can garner so much inspiration from haunting coffee shops). He’s quite a character. From the 70s, by the looks of it. Shock of white hair, a studded black leather jacket, tight leather pants that shouldn’t belong on anyone even half his age, and muttering under his breath so much a schizophrenic would be proud.

“Have you ever been to a Christian Science Room?” he turns to me.
“Um. Uh. No,”
“They’ve got one downstairs,” he says, conspiratorially. “You’ve really never been to one?”
“Uh… no,” as I already start wondering how the hell I’m going to extricate myself from this conversation.

He talks a bit about what he’s here to do (check an email), what he does (write novels), shows me a picture of him as a baby (oh, how cute), asks what I’m doing (uh… school stuff). He starts going off about how undergraduate education is like a woman. Both give you a place to stay and things to occupy you with. By now, I’m convinced he’s not right in the head.

“Are you an artist?” he nonsequitors. “Do you draw?”
“Uh… actually, I do.”
“Great great! Here’s what I’m looking for,” he excitedly opens up Word. “My last cover designer suddenly quit. Are you interested? Here’s my story, oh wait, you’ve never read it! Here, I can send it to you, do you want to read it?”
“Uh… not really.” I smile, hoping that blunts my lack of tact a bit.
“Well,” he says, taken aback. “You can just say no, y’know.”
“Uh… I just… I just did.”
“No. You didn’t say no. Just say no!”
Awkward pause.
“Come on, just say no,” he says, hurt.
“…uh… ok… No.” I reply, and quickly avert my eyes, looking back at my neglected papers.

I think he gets the point. After about an hour of him fluttering around, trying to make conversation with the people next to him, playing music and talking on his cell phone, he finally packs up and leaves. I can’t decide how I feel about it. On one hand, I was trying to get work done and he was kinda crazy. On the other hand, isn’t working in coffee shops all about meeting interesting characters? Isn’t the Lower East Side all about gritty lunacy? Isn’t life about the interesting weird people you meet? Ah, the 21st century mental crisis; wanting spontaneity… but only when convenient.

After that exchange, I’m curious about the downstairs part. I thought it was just storage, or maybe where the store owners lived, or maybe the bathroom. After the crazy guy left, I snuck downstairs for a bit…and found a huge open practically empty lounge! A few large tables, some bookshelves, and couches galore. I can’t wait to come back and work from the quiet cozy seclusion of the downstairs lounge next time. I might even be able to avoid the crazies!

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 6th, 2008 at 2:12 am and is filed under New York, Review, Tea.