Coyi Café

My favorite hangout for coffee, a light meal, free WiFi, and friends.
It is closing after 1÷19÷14 — another victim of a greedy landlord. Come say hello to the fantastic Felix who runs the place. You’ll be missed!

I stopped in here for lunch recently. Ordered a banh mi and chai. The banh mi was decent so I wouldn’t mind going back for lunch. It’s a quiet little café during the week so that’s nice but other than that there isn’t anything else special about the place.

Ever been triple-​charged for a coffee at a wifi café because you you’re using wifi?
«What are you doing? Are you going online? Let me see. If you are, it costs more. Let me see your computer.»
Ever been accosted by a waitress who, when she discovers you’re in media, forces you to download her audition reels and asks you for a job?
Adieu, Coyi.
Coffee’s terrible, incidentally.
PS — How am I supposed to download the audition reels if I can’t use wifi?
PPS — I’m moving back to Paris.

Cute little café in Alphabet city.
Ordered the Pork Banh Mi sandwich. It was pretty standard.
Also ordered a Vanilla Latte which came out as an iced coffee with milk essentially. Not pleased but drank quite a bit before I realized it wasn’t what I wanted (It was a treat that I usually don’t indulge in.).
Great OJ.
Tight quarters.

I used to like going to Coyi Café to drink coffee and enjoy the wifi. The food wasn’t as good as in other local wifi spots — Gaia Café, Native Beans, Paradiso — but I happened to like the counter people, who tended to be chatty and incredibly nice.
I hadn’t thought about the fact they were all young women until the night when none of them were there and someone else had taken their place.
In the past, I’d seen a man with a black beard standing behind the kitchen window, but I hadn’t paid much attention. I did catch him glaring at me sometimes, but I figured that was only the cast of his face. On my last visit ever to Coyi, I found out he meant that glare.
This time, he was my counter person. He also seemed to be the manager. After I ordered something and paused to study the blackboard menu (since that’s the only menu they have), he scowled and repeated, «Sit down! I’ll bring your food!»
«I know,» I told him. «I’m just looking to see if I want something else for later.»
«Sit down!» he repeated.
When he went back to the kitchen, I watched him talk to the cook through the window. That’s when I saw him pointing at me. He then used the words *maricón* and *vaso de leche*, assuming I wouldn’t know that the first word is a derisive term for an effeminate gay male and the second is slang for people who either look too white or are purported to guzzle something that only looks like milk.
Apparently, he thought the other male patrons, who arrived later, were more masculine than I, because he served them in ceramic cups while I waited half an hour longer for my café au lait. Eventually, he served it in a tiny paper cup, saying the café was about to close. «You’re open for another hour and I’m still sitting here,» I told him. «I thought you were going,» he said. Then he poured the café au lait into a ceramic cup, which I noticed was half as full as everyone else’s.
I drank my coffee, paid my money and left. It was hard to stop thinking about the fact he’d essentially called me the F-​word twice. I decided never to go back there and haven’t for over a year.
The wifi signal’s reliable and there’s generally a power strip there to plug into. But if you’d rather not support a creepy homophobe who chooses to hire young women so that he can ogle them — as one of his former employees told me recently when I found her working at a better café — this isn’t the place for you.

The people here are the absolute nicest.
Had no wifi in my apt so I spent the whole day here one Sunday and it was great. Free wifi! Great coffee!
Got breakfast and lunch there and everything was pretty tasty.
Service was GREAT and everyone who works there is the best. I’ll definitely be back.

While in NYC and looking for an affordable but nice breakfast we came across this little café and were very happy.

Avocado omelet = amazing