While I love the ability to prepare food for people the way I love to eat it, and making a good cup of coffee for someone’s first sip of the day, by far the best part of my job is all the amazing people I am blessed enough to meet through my trade. Like I’ve said a thousand times before and will continue to say here again, I just love talking to people! And in my line of work, some of the people I have the pleasure of talking to are truly inspirational.

Take Rosa for example. Sitting at table 23 every morning at exactly 9 o’clock, Rosa has become a favourite of mine over the last several months. A travel blogger from Bolivia, she keeps me in the loop about her exploits around our country over her morning short macchiato. While I’ve managed to discover that she is, in fact, a Bolivian national, Rosa is always far happier talking about her work. Just this morning, for instance, we had a very relaxed conversation where she told me about the conference centres she’d inspected on behalf of the freelance writing agency she works for. All she wanted to talk about was the amazing places she’d been to, particularly Lorne, a small town on the Great Ocean Road. Rosa just simply couldn’t stop raving about Lorne, country Victoria, and the accommodation she stayed at. All my efforts to change the subject away from Victoria to her travels elsewhere in the world were, as usual, entirely in vain. She’s a very forceful woman, that Rosa. She steers the conversation where she wants to, with no thought of the will or interest of others. Regardless of what it is exactly she’s been through, I know that she’s suffered a lot. It’s truly wonderful to see her here, such a strong and confident young woman!