Written: [Anna's Cafe] 9.45am 16th April

You don't really notice places like this unless you walk. I wonder what this calm Filipino lady thinks of me wandering in at this time with my old jeans, flip flops and several day old beard confessing that all I have in my pocket is 600 fils. As expected when I walked past earlier this morning, there is no one here. I wonder how she makes her money. I must come back. There's nothing particularly special about this place apart from the fact that it's not very Bahrain. It's tiny, quaint and hardly patronised yet it still feels more European than Bahraini. It's nto a chain, no wi-fi and no credit cards. No shisha either, it seems, but they do bake their own bread and pastries and things. This would be a paerfect little local to frequent.

It has a very odd style about it. Rounded little hotel lobby-style camel chairs with a mahogany trim. Round pink ashtrays on tiny round black tables, pictures of pasties and cheese on the wall, all the same size and all in a row along the top of the wall. They all look like they're from the mid 90s. Some random fake vines in the corner and square wooden tables with green tablecloths and wooden chairs along the middle. Oh and a ceiling high circular shelving unit adorned with magazines on the bottom and faux wedding cakes at the top. All to the smooth commercial sounds of Radio Bahrain. Yet somehow the quiet mishmash of this place somehow fits together and it feels homely like Costa never could. The Filipino lady also seems pleasant, like a young aunt. I do wonder why the menu refers to it as a Cypress coffee and not Turkish. Political statement or gimmick?

Well you wouldn't call the coffee good yet there's still something enticing about this place. Maybe I'm just craving something different like this after all the cafe chains and shisha joints or maybe I just want to fall in love with a place that's so cosy and so human. The massive windows are a bonus but you wouldn't call the view 'beautiful'. On the other hand, this is the real, typical Manama neighbourhood. Road 3614, faceless grey apartment blocks, vans and old cars frame the dirtyish narrow concrete streets with not footpath. Random corner DVD store with posters of Egyptian and Lebanese posters adorning its window wall. This is Bahrain, or Manama at least. Rusty satellite dishes sit atop roofs of buildings a few stories high, all grey with dirty walls, grate square balconies and AC units sticking out. It's all function. Light colour walls, block the heat, ACs cool and satellite dishes entertain.

There never was a gothic period here, no renaissance. Surviving in the Gulf means protecting your family (women) behind thick walls and cooling your home from the 50 degree summer heat. They don't need flourishes, detail and fancy buildings. They live functionally, always have, maybe always will. They build beautiful monuments to Allah and they aim for their hearts to reflect the same kind of beauty. You don't need European charm for that. Life is simple. You fear God, protect your family, provide food and stave off the heat. Nowadays American TV and Asian labour takes care of the rest. America, a country born of the same functionality and simplicty seems a perfect cultural model for development in that sense.