Saigon is a city of coffee. Walk down any street or through any alleyway and you’ll find cafes of all kinds: artisanal stores, chain brands, all the way to the humble, ever-popular sidewalk vendor. Aromas of Robusta and Arabica beans fill the city, mixing with the choke of exhaust fumes, with the scent of fish sauce, lemongrass, and chilli that make this city as much a delight on the senses as a full-blown attack. In a city that loves and indulges in coffee as much as Saigon, you’re never going to run out of cafes serving up your favorite brew. Despite such a plethora of choices, I’ve only been to a handful. However, if I had to recommend one, it’d have to be A Priori.
I found A Priori by accident—on a walk to Le Van Tam park back when I lived in Đa Kao. Taking a shortcut through a sidestreet, it was impossible to ignore the cafe’s pastel yellow finish, playing off nicely with the greenery surrounding the building. Soft jazz sounded through the open-air rooms, and stopping for a moment, I watched a few Vietnamese businessmen chat at one of the outdoor tables, going back and forth between sips from glasses of oily-black cà phê đen đá and puffs from 555s. I continued on my way, promising I’d check it out someday.
Someday came not long after. I headed around noon, bringing my laptop, headphones, and a book along with the intention of completing some freelance work before lounging with my copy of The Things They Carried. Making the short walk over, I went inside, ordered an iced latte and was pleasantly surprised when the teenage boy behind the register took my order in English. He relayed it to the other making drinks behind him, while two other staff sat on stools, giggling at some video on their phone. They all looked like they’d only just graduated from middle school.
There are two levels to A Priori. A mix of closed off, air conditioned rooms and open-air spaces on the ground floor, as well as an outdoor seating area up a steep set of stairs. I found an empty chair in a darkened corridor, waited for my iced latte which came not long after, along with a free glass of trà đá. Settling into the wooden reading chair, I looked out the doorway onto the neighborhood. Sunlight splintered through the tree branches, a motorbike puttered by. One of the staff, a girl with deep red hair and glasses, walked by with a tray of coffee and trà đá, looking for a customer. Jazz played on the speakers but otherwise it was quiet, quiet enough I could hear the clack of my keyboard as I started typing. I was there to work, after all…
I’ve never been big on cafes. I’m by no means a coffee connoisseur, so a simple cup of hot black coffee from my coffee pot at home has always sufficed. More than that, it’s been one of the greatest pleasures of my mornings ever since I really started enjoying coffee back in university. From the drip of coffee through the filter, the smell filling the room, to the first sip which always makes me imagine a flower coming into bloom, drinking coffee, for better or worse, is an integral, cherished part of my day. Frequenting cafes, in some ways, always felt like the antithesis of this. Why would I want to pay for coffee, no matter how great, rare, or special the beans and the barista might be? Not to mention a lot of cafes play music way too loud for comfort or any type of work, as well as the fact that in Vietnam you’re more likely than not to see customers posing with their drinks, making heart signs, staring longingly away from the camera, or pretend-reading a book they’d picked up from a nearby shelf. That’s really not the type of people-watching I want to do, which is why, for the most part, I avoided going to cafes when I first arrived in Saigon.
But A Priori feels different. It’s simple, no frills, and I could lose a few hours there without feeling like any of it had been wasted. While living in Đa Kao I’d stop by every once in a while to get some work done, read, zone out to the jazz which made the walls and the patterns on the floor wiggle. Since moving, I haven’t been to A Priori as much. It still remains, despite the countless options, one of my favourite cafes in the city. More so than that, A Priori served as something of a catalyst for getting over my initial indifference towards cafes. Speaking to a friend and a third of District 0, Garrett, he mentioned an irony in this. He said A Priori is Latin for “from the earlier”, meaning knowledge or reasoning that comes before experience. Before visiting A Priori, I wasn’t a fan of cafes but afterwards I found that some could be nice. My prior reasoning and knowledge wasn’t rooted in any experience. I suppose now, to some extent, it is.
