You may not care to hear from me but I feel we have known each other too long for me to leave without saying goodbye. I am a self-confessed non-apologetic coffee drinker and when I met you five years ago, I fell in love with you helplessly and we had a blissful honeymoon. I have many friends and I brought all my friends to you. We were so in love I visited you at least three times a week.

I drank your coffee by the gallon, I missed that you did not have a bottomless offer! I ate your cakes and your fries, brought my children and their friends to eat some more.

Over time, you started taking short cuts, the cappuccino was no longer great, it tasted like watery latté and honestly I do not like the smell of milk in my coffee. I gave you many chances but finally I had to give it up. The Black Forest dropped off my list early, I did not know what to call it but it certainly did not taste like Black Forest any more, but that’s OK, I could still try the apple pie. Gradually, the tramazine changed too and was dry and made me think left over chicken had been put together on a dry bun. I had to drop the Tango Mango which I loved, the mango seemed to be diluted with something that tasted like packed juice and would separate into two layers in my glass.

But I stayed and kept coming, you don’t just drop old friends like that, you keep hoping they will return to the good old one you knew! However, I had to ad- just to your declining standards every time I came. I started to see fewer of the familiar faces and the tables were often empty when I came but I would still have to wait a long time to get service.

Still I stayed, I got tired of filling in your service forms and decided to speak to the waiters every time I was unhappy. They didn’t seem to care.

My family started preferring a homemade sandwich after church on Sunday to a visit to Bourbon Nyarutarama. I reduced my visits slowly and unwillingly and started to ‘visit’ some other places. A few months ago, I realized the only thing I could order confidently was ice cream! A few Sundays ago, the divorce was signed.

Dear Bourbon after getting my family to relent to another visit for Sunday lunch, I wondered why I kept coming – we waited a full hour to be served – with hungry children, there were very few customers who all seemed to be waiting endlessly. The nuggets looked like stringed chicken and were as hard as crust, the sandwiches were served on burnt bread with hardly any meat and the beef stroganoff was hard and tasted like reboiled meat, basically every plate we ordered was messed up. I pointed it all to the waitress and asked her to let the chef know. It seems like it was ‘burnt offerings at Bourbon’ that day, the couple at the next table ate the meat off their sandwiches and left the burnt bread alone. I don’t know if they complained.

Dear Bourbon, I may love you still but my patience has run out and I have to say goodbye. I will not be coming back except to drink some bottled water or a Coke – when I am not in a hurry! >/div>

Your loyal Customer [email protected]

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