Brewing the bitter life

The first lesson about coffee that she was taught was that "fragrance is the soul of coffee."

Lu said she did not fully apprehend the true meaning of this lesson until 10 years later, when she was burnt by a pot of scalding coffe and experienced a philosophical epiphany. "Coffee beans need to experience pain and high temperature first and then the fragrance will come out. Human life is the same."

Fifteen years ago, Lu's coffeeshop was the first shop in Taiwan to import the top-class Blue Mountain beans from Jamaica.

At that time, the shop's only business was selling beans. "But so many customers wanted a cup of freshly brewed Blue Mountain on the spot. There were no seats and tables. People just sat on the gunny bags and enjoyed their coffee," Lu said.

Ten years ago, she divorced her husband and in the separation got to keep the coffeeshop while their two daughters were entrusted to the husband.

Another painful episode took place in 1999, when she decided to expand the coffeeshop into a restaurant and fell deep in debt. Exhausted mentally and physically, she fell twice down staircases and was hospitalized once for two weeks.

Director Tsai has witnessed the ups and downs at Yin Lu Shop. Eighteen years ago, Tsai was drawn by the fragrance of coffee and became a frequent customer, writing scripts at the shop.

Tsai, at the time a director for a TV drama, made friends with Lu and invited her to play a minor role as a hair salon assistant. Thus began her dual career as an actress and coffeeshop owner.

Tsai's Wayward Wind, a musical about porn actors, was yet another challenge for Lu. In the film, which is in post-production, Lu sings a sentimental ballad from the 1950s in front of a statute of Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) and then begins to make suggestive gestures at it.

"I grew up a student who cried so hard hearing about Chiang Kai-shek's death on TV. So it was quite a transformation for me to start caressing the statue," Lu said.

Lu's role in Wayward Wind is again not a happy character. She plays an actress who sees her time passing too quickly and becomes a porn star. The movie also contains a "very explicit" sex scene between Lu and actor Lee Kang-sheng (李康生) that might fall afoul of the Government Information Office's sense of propriety.

"It was like having my skin peeled off. I have to say it was so unpleasant that it was almost unbearable. I almost gave up acting because of the film," Lu said.

After acting, Lu always finds herself back at the coffeeshop.

"My life seems like a constant process of finding flavor in pain and bitterness," she said.