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Today, big business retail coffee shops are expanding quickly all over the world. Starbucks alone has stores in over 60 countries and plans to add more. Despite its popularity, Starbucks has been criticized by many as a blood-sucking corporate machine, driving smaller coffee shops out of business through unfair practices. This has even produced an anti-corporate coffee counterculture. People who support this counterculture say they will not buy coffee from big business coffee shops. Increasingly popular coffee stores such as The Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf are also giving Starbucks some competition. In any case, it seems pretty clear that coffee has weaved itself into the fabric of our consumer-oriented culture.
如今，大型商业零售咖啡店在世界范围内迅速发展。仅星巴克就在60多个国家设有店面，并计划继续增加分店。尽管星巴克深受欢迎，但很多人指责它是“吸血企业机器”，用不正当的行为致使小型咖啡馆破产。这甚至产生了反企业的咖啡反主流文化。支持这种反主流文化的人表示，他们不会从大型咖啡店购买咖啡。“咖啡豆和茶叶”等越来越受欢迎的咖啡店也给星巴克带来了一些竞争。无论如何，可以肯定的是，咖啡已将自己融入了消费主义文化中。
Coffee, it would seem, is more than just a drink. Ever since its appearance, coffee has been tied closely with cultural trends and has been indicative of important periods in history. It was poured into the cups of the giants of the French Enlightenment as they changed the course of human thought, it was placed on the backs of slaves in the era of imperialism, its fragrance was in the air as the Beat poets wrote of their alienation, and it is here now as the world continues to change in this era of technology and globalization. So the next time you enjoy your latte or cappuccino, appreciate the fact that you are connected to countless people across many different cultures and eras through your love of that wonderful beverage: coffee.
咖啡似乎已经不仅仅是一种饮料。自始至终，它都和文化潮流紧密相联，并且是重要历史时期的象征。它被倒入法国启蒙运动伟人的杯子中，因为它们改变了人类的思维方式，它被置于帝国主义时代奴隶的背上，在垮掉的一代的诗人书写疏离之情时，它的香味弥漫在空气之中，在世界不断发生变化的技术和全球化时代，它就在这里。所以下次在你享受拿铁或卡布奇诺时，可以想象一下，你正在穿越文化和时空的界限与无数人交流和碰撞，而媒介正是你们热爱的这种美味饮料：咖啡。
