The "Coffee Prince" barista practicing Muay Thai

In a coffee garden in Costa Rica.

Go out to sea on a yacht.

New Express reporter Chen Bin / Wen Gong Jilin / photo

He was born as an accountant, but he was fascinated by coffee, so he switched to making coffee full-time and was known as the "Prince of Coffee".

He likes sports, this is his way to vent pressure, favorite is football and Muay Thai, one let him know how to work as a team, and the other let him learn to be restrained and patient.

He prefers to travel around the world and see the different lives of different people.

This is Thomas Mak, the trainer and business manager of Pacific Coffee in Hong Kong.

The accountant turned around to the barista.

Thomas Mak is a very serious person. During our appointment, he specially came from Hong Kong for an interview and brought an extra suit to take pictures with us.

When he appeared in the Pearl River Metro 428 Coffee and Wine Bar in a T-shirt and casual pants, the sunshine and vitality also passed on. No wonder Thomas, who is participating in the selection of "Modern Gentlemen" held by the Hong Kong edition of a fashion magazine, is in the top three.

Thomas is known as the "Prince of Coffee". On the one hand, he plays several roles in the coffee industry. On the one hand, he is a coffee trainer at Pacific Coffee. He spends about two hours every Wednesday night giving coffee appreciation courses to students at the University of Hong Kong. On the other hand, he is also responsible for buying coffee beans for the company, often exchanging views with roasters in the United States, and visiting various coffee producing areas. At the beginning of this year, he just went to Costa Rica to inspect. At the same time, he is also responsible for the company's external business development work, so intertwined different work content is basically easy in Thomas, using "workaholic" to describe Thomas is not an exaggeration.

He told reporters that he works more than 12 hours a day, which is the most regular working time from 9: 00 a.m. to 9: 00 p.m., and this time is cut into very clear pieces. In the morning, he usually has a meeting with colleagues in the company to solve problems. In the afternoon, I have to communicate with local equipment suppliers in Europe, and then discuss with bakers in the United States.

Despite the fact that Thomas is a workaholic, you can feel that he has a clear plan for his career, and his own experience is interesting. He told reporters that he majored in accounting in college, which seemed to have nothing to do with coffee. After graduating from college, he once worked for a period of time in the famous "big four" accounting firm. By coincidence, an upperclassman he knew in the university led him into the world of coffee, so the man fell in love with coffee. At the same time, he made a "gorgeous turn" in his career, and he left the accounting firm to make coffee full-time.

Making coffee is a lifelong career.

From accountant to barista, Thomas has made a drastic change, completely unrelated to two professions, but he has no problem with his mastery. He told the reporter that in fact, his previous experience as an accountant was also very helpful in making coffee, because his sensitivity to numbers made it easy for him to grasp the vertical and horizontal curve in the coffee market. Relatively speaking, he felt that it gave him an advantage over others.

In Thomas's view, making coffee can be a lifelong career, and he is infatuated with coffee because of its variety. Not to mention that coffee beans from different places will bring different tastes, even coffee beans from the same place, when you use your own hands to make them into a cup of coffee, will also have a magical change because of the different mood of each day.

Making a good cup of coffee is a happy and comfortable thing for Thomas, and he asks for perfection in every step and every detail. He says the first thing he does when he gets back to the office every day is to make himself a cup of coffee to start the day's work.

Coffee is very similar to red wine, this is the experience of Thomas, they all have very personal taste labels, and they are drinks that can be shared with friends. Thomas's love for coffee may not have occurred to him. He chose to enter Pacific Coffee in the hope that he can give full play to his energy in this industry and field. It is a very happy thing for him to watch the growth of such a brand.

Self-reflection from sports

In Thomas's daily life, coffee is naturally a protagonist, accounting for a large proportion, and he also admits that he is a very serious and strict person, so the high-intensity work every day puts a lot of pressure on him. This pressure comes more from himself than from others, which has something to do with his character and attitude. At one time, he was even so tired that he had heart problems because of his pursuit of excellence in his work. The colleagues he works with will also feel very hard because of his seriousness and high standards. To put it this way, if the average person's requirement is to do as much as possible, then Thomas is definitely asking himself or his colleagues to do 200% or more.

He himself knows that it may be too serious to be so serious, so he is constantly reflecting and adjusting himself, and at the same time trying to find ways to relax and release pressure through some exercise. There are two sports he likes best and must go to every week, one is football, the other is Muay Thai.

These two kinds of sports bring different feelings to Thomas, of course, in addition to sweating after each exercise to help him release stress, it is more important for him to constantly reflect on himself through exercise. For example, he said that the touch of playing football requires not only the technical level of the individual, but also the cooperation and spirit of the team. Thomas has a long history of playing football, from school to work. It has been one of his favorite sports for so many years, and by playing football, he has also met many people from different industries, including people in important positions, but on the pitch, no matter whether you are an important position or not, it is about skills and cooperation.

If football makes Thomas know more about teamwork, then learning Muay Thai allows him to have a "Vipassana" process. Football is outward and toward others, Muay Thai is inward and self-directed, and Thomas knows more patience and introversion from the process of learning Muay Thai. Muay Thai can be regarded as his "new lover". He has only learned it for more than a year, but the weekly one-hour Muay Thai course is no less intense or even stronger than playing football. In the confrontation with the opponent, how to maintain their physical strength to find the most powerful opportunity to defeat the opponent is the patience and waiting that Thomas learned from it, which is a kind of self-test and challenge.

In Thomas's view, playing football and Muay Thai are not only sports that can help him keep fit and relieve stress, but also tools that can make him understand the philosophy of being a man and doing things. He feedback these feelings and reflections back to his coffee career, making him a real "coffee prince".

Chen Bin