By ABBY GROFF
Staff Writer
While Japan isn’t conveniently located next to El Diamante High School, the concept of this foreign cafe is genius. Tokyo’s Manuscript Writing Cafe has gone viral on social media recently displaying its strict yet encouraging rules behind the motivation that gets writers moving.
For 300 yen or $2.34 an hour following the first thirty minutes of visitation, customers can help themselves to unlimited and self-serve coffee and tea while making use of high-speed Internet and docking ports. Those struggling to work on meeting their deadlines have been visiting the Manuscript Writing Cafe and are also met with staff giving them three options of “difficulty” – mild, normal, and hard. With the “mild” choice, employees will only ask if they have finished their work as they pay to leave. “Normal” gives the visitors an hourly check-in, and “hard” leaves the writer sitting in their seat with staff standing directly behind them watching as they work. An intimidating idea, yet it is something that gets the job done. Those coming in are also paying with the understanding that they are not allowed to leave until they have completed the goals they had set for themselves previously. This spot isn’t exclusive to writers as well. It is open to editors, artists, or simply anybody battling procrastination and having to complete their work before their due date. Cafes such as these aren’t normalized in western societies, I think, due to the fact that it seems a little extreme. However, customers sign off on how they plan to go about their check-ins. People will go through desperate measures to submit an assignment on time despite frequently facing writer’s block, and I believe a concept such as this Japanese cafe is pretty helpful in solving a stressed student’s workload and it would be interesting to see them integrated in the United States.