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FUTURE WITH A FLAVOR
Orange County Register (California)
May 12, 2014 Monday
by LAUREN WILLIAMS staff writer, The Orange County Register
Vicky Demirci says she can see what lies ahead by reading coffee
grounds.
Editor's note: This story is part of a weekly series focusing on the
stories of unique people in our community.
ew things quiet Vicky Demirci's mind like poring over a cup of
coffee grounds.
An effusive woman who wears bright, flowing clothes and gold cat-eye
glasses, Demirci flits between her past in New York and her love
of her maternal grandmother in the same breath, one moment teary,
another breathless from laughter.
She likes to give hugs, and on this Sunday afternoon Demirci gave them
freely to anyone who asked her about the thick, chocolate-colored
grounds oozing from beneath the lip of each cup, spilling secrets
only she could read.
For the better part of 60 years, Demirci has carried on the tradition
of reading coffee grounds, a gift bestowed upon her when she was 18
by her Armenian grandmother, who had reappeared in Demirci's life
after leaving suddenly years earlier.
"I believe a lot of times our deepest talents are revealed in moments
of loss," Demirci said. "Maybe it has to do with loss, suffering and
recovery. I've had all of that."
Now 73, Demirci reads at the Belmont Heights coffeehouse Viento y
Agua on Sunday afternoons, a practice she has kept up for six years.
The gift of looking into the bottom of a mug and seeing someone's
fortune is a way of channeling her intuition, a sort of stream
of consciousness and return to childhood for the retired clinical
social worker.
"When you're a kid, you don't know what you should say and not say.
You just say it. That's intuition," Demirci said. "So to me this is
like being a kid, just doing what comes, the moment it comes and it
feels good that way. It's freeing."
On this warm Sunday afternoon, Demirci met with three women who waited
for her to arrive with the burning questions that young people face.
When will they find love? What should they do with their lives?
Each had sipped a cup of coffee down to the grounds, ready by the
time Demirci arrived. Sisters Emily, 28, and Melissa Simonian, 30,
brought their friend Julia Lerno, 30, for a reading.
The Simonian sisters grew up in an Armenian family and felt compelled
to return after Demirci correctly predicted their youngest sister
would be getting married and moving out of state.
Demirci was the first to know the news by seeing it in the bottom of
their mother's mug.
For Lerno, the reading would be a first. She hoped Demirci would be
able to look into the cup and point her life in the right direction.
"I'm a little bit lost right now," Lerno said. "I want to believe."
Demirci quietly turned Lerno's saucer methodically, peering past the
upturned cup with Lerno's pink lip gloss on the rim.
Demirci saw hesitation, "like your feet are holding you back."
"Do not be weary," Demirci said. "It won't be as complicated as you
might think."
Down the inside the cup, streaks of brown with dots formed the long
neck of a giraffe. Later, Lerno revealed a planned trip to Africa.
Among the three women, several similar themes emerged. A love of
animals, travel and the letter J all appeared in their reading.
Demirci doles out advice in a tone that is between supportive mom
and friendly stranger, telling each young woman that she is ready for
the challenges of life or that she will find what she is looking for.
After each session, Demirci gushed over the findings, eager to discover
what resonated with the women.
"Now you can tell me what I'm dying to hear," she said, cupping her
head in her hands after each reading.
As the women walked out of the shop, Melissa Simonian turned to
Demirci, saying, "We'll let you know what else comes true!"
Although the women were skeptical about the eerie similarities,
they felt the experience was a decent way to spend a Sunday afternoon.
"I think she definitely reads energy really well," Emily Simonian
said. "It's fun either way."
For Demirci, every time she looks into a cup, what she sees is
different.
"It's an adventure," she said. "I just look forward to it."
It's more than a hobby. It saved her life once.
On a Sunday two years ago, Demirci walked from her small home on
Ximeno Avenue to Viento y Agua on Fourth Street and felt out of breath.
She took a seat and drank some cold ice water and felt well enough
to read the coffee grounds of four young women.
When she got up to wait for the bathroom, she collapsed from a
heart attack.
If such an incident had happened in her apartment, where she lives
alone, or inside the bathroom, she could have died.
But in the coffeehouse, people called the paramedics and she survived.
"That makes me even more bonded here," Demirci said. "That's the way
people are here."
She doesn't plan to stop reading coffee grounds any time soon.
"As long as I can breathe," Demirci said, "because I see the glow in
people's eye."
Orange County Register (California)
May 12, 2014 Monday
by LAUREN WILLIAMS staff writer, The Orange County Register
Vicky Demirci says she can see what lies ahead by reading coffee
grounds.
Editor's note: This story is part of a weekly series focusing on the
stories of unique people in our community.
ew things quiet Vicky Demirci's mind like poring over a cup of
coffee grounds.
An effusive woman who wears bright, flowing clothes and gold cat-eye
glasses, Demirci flits between her past in New York and her love
of her maternal grandmother in the same breath, one moment teary,
another breathless from laughter.
She likes to give hugs, and on this Sunday afternoon Demirci gave them
freely to anyone who asked her about the thick, chocolate-colored
grounds oozing from beneath the lip of each cup, spilling secrets
only she could read.
For the better part of 60 years, Demirci has carried on the tradition
of reading coffee grounds, a gift bestowed upon her when she was 18
by her Armenian grandmother, who had reappeared in Demirci's life
after leaving suddenly years earlier.
"I believe a lot of times our deepest talents are revealed in moments
of loss," Demirci said. "Maybe it has to do with loss, suffering and
recovery. I've had all of that."
Now 73, Demirci reads at the Belmont Heights coffeehouse Viento y
Agua on Sunday afternoons, a practice she has kept up for six years.
The gift of looking into the bottom of a mug and seeing someone's
fortune is a way of channeling her intuition, a sort of stream
of consciousness and return to childhood for the retired clinical
social worker.
"When you're a kid, you don't know what you should say and not say.
You just say it. That's intuition," Demirci said. "So to me this is
like being a kid, just doing what comes, the moment it comes and it
feels good that way. It's freeing."
On this warm Sunday afternoon, Demirci met with three women who waited
for her to arrive with the burning questions that young people face.
When will they find love? What should they do with their lives?
Each had sipped a cup of coffee down to the grounds, ready by the
time Demirci arrived. Sisters Emily, 28, and Melissa Simonian, 30,
brought their friend Julia Lerno, 30, for a reading.
The Simonian sisters grew up in an Armenian family and felt compelled
to return after Demirci correctly predicted their youngest sister
would be getting married and moving out of state.
Demirci was the first to know the news by seeing it in the bottom of
their mother's mug.
For Lerno, the reading would be a first. She hoped Demirci would be
able to look into the cup and point her life in the right direction.
"I'm a little bit lost right now," Lerno said. "I want to believe."
Demirci quietly turned Lerno's saucer methodically, peering past the
upturned cup with Lerno's pink lip gloss on the rim.
Demirci saw hesitation, "like your feet are holding you back."
"Do not be weary," Demirci said. "It won't be as complicated as you
might think."
Down the inside the cup, streaks of brown with dots formed the long
neck of a giraffe. Later, Lerno revealed a planned trip to Africa.
Among the three women, several similar themes emerged. A love of
animals, travel and the letter J all appeared in their reading.
Demirci doles out advice in a tone that is between supportive mom
and friendly stranger, telling each young woman that she is ready for
the challenges of life or that she will find what she is looking for.
After each session, Demirci gushed over the findings, eager to discover
what resonated with the women.
"Now you can tell me what I'm dying to hear," she said, cupping her
head in her hands after each reading.
As the women walked out of the shop, Melissa Simonian turned to
Demirci, saying, "We'll let you know what else comes true!"
Although the women were skeptical about the eerie similarities,
they felt the experience was a decent way to spend a Sunday afternoon.
"I think she definitely reads energy really well," Emily Simonian
said. "It's fun either way."
For Demirci, every time she looks into a cup, what she sees is
different.
"It's an adventure," she said. "I just look forward to it."
It's more than a hobby. It saved her life once.
On a Sunday two years ago, Demirci walked from her small home on
Ximeno Avenue to Viento y Agua on Fourth Street and felt out of breath.
She took a seat and drank some cold ice water and felt well enough
to read the coffee grounds of four young women.
When she got up to wait for the bathroom, she collapsed from a
heart attack.
If such an incident had happened in her apartment, where she lives
alone, or inside the bathroom, she could have died.
But in the coffeehouse, people called the paramedics and she survived.
"That makes me even more bonded here," Demirci said. "That's the way
people are here."
She doesn't plan to stop reading coffee grounds any time soon.
"As long as I can breathe," Demirci said, "because I see the glow in
people's eye."