Time Traveling Without Changing the Present – A Coffee Shop That Hurts, but Heals Us

There is a small, timeless coffee shop in a basement on a narrow side street: it has no windows, no AC, and none of the clocks on the walls show the correct time. It is not a particularly popular establishment, yet it is widely known that it is possible to travel through time at one of its tables. One might think that people would be queuing up for a chance to travel, but there are numerous rules and conditions one must meet to actually use this “service.”

This is the premise of the four stories found in this volume by Toshikazu Kawaguchi, a Japanese director and playwright. To be more precise, the stories were adapted into a novel from an original stage play. The events of Before the Coffee Gets Cold take place entirely within this café, called Funiculi Funicula—a family business with few visitors. The four stories each tell a tale of time travel in a slow, calm, and almost elegant, dialogue-centric manner.

The main characters are all women: a successful scientist who visited the café a week ago with her boyfriend, expecting an engagement while he wanted to break up before moving abroad; a nurse with a husband suffering from Alzheimer’s who travels back to a time before the disease took hold; a sister longing to see her deceased sibling one last time; and a mother-daughter pair.

While I could discuss the intricate rules at length, the most vital one is this: the traveler can only stay in the past (or future) as long as their coffee remains warm. I have encountered criticism regarding these rules, but I felt they made the fantasy more perceivable and grounded. After all, time travel is such a far-fetched concept that it can be hard to wrap one’s head around. However, if one can only travel within the confines of this specific café, it limits the possibilities: you can only meet someone who has been there, at the exact time they were present. Furthermore, anything the traveler does in the past will not affect the present. It is impossible to avoid tragedy, undo a decision, or alter the course of events.

The author’s approach is not typically “Western.” In Western fiction, time travel is often a tool to improve the present, frequently relying on the “butterfly effect” to drive the plot. Kawaguchi, however, operates with “immobile time travel.” Instead of hard sci-fi, the story leans toward magical realism, diverting attention from the mechanics of the act itself. If the past is unchangeable, the purpose of travel is not modification, but understanding and relief—a form of catharsis. It functions as a “narrative therapy”: characters return to say what was left unsaid, helping them process their trauma in the present.

The rules serve as metaphors for the human condition: the fleeting nature of the moment, the finitude of time (the cooling coffee), and the fact that answers are often found within rather than without (the rule that one cannot leave their seat).

Ultimately, time travel is secondary. The human destinies and the characters’ reactions are what truly matter. This focus helped me overlook certain flaws: the “exoticism” of the Japanese mentality that might feel foreign, occasional stumbles in the prose (likely due to the translation being based on the English version rather than the Japanese original), and the repetitive descriptions—such as the redundant details of how to enter the café from the street.

I recommend this book to those who prefer emotional depth over fast-paced action, or to anyone who has ever wished for ‘one last conversation’ with a loved one.

The book is the first in a six-part series, all available in English, with five already translated into Hungarian. I listened to the audiobook version narrated by Eszter Ónodi. Her minimalist, measured delivery did wonders for the story. In this case, the slow pace was an advantage, enhancing the experience—much like the slow ritual of drinking coffee.