Just when you think there’s no hope for us, you see something like this and start to feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

The story of The Pending Coffee, below, was uploaded to image-sharing site Imgur earlier this week by user Gastyz, an Argentinian programmer. 

The post told a story of an unnamed person who witnessed an unusual phenomenon while out for coffee. It reads:

 

We were in a small coffee shop. Two customers arrive.

“5 coffees. 2 for us, 3 pending.”

They pay the 5, they only get 2. 

“What’s a pending coffee?”, I ask. “Wait and see.”

More customers. Two girls get they coffees. They pay normally. 

After a while, 3 lawyers ask for 7 coffees, they only drink 3, but paid for the 7.

While we were talking, a poor man enters the shop.

With a soft voice he asks “Do you have any pending coffee?”

This type of charity was born in Napoli (Naples, Italy).

People pay in anticipation for the coffees and even meals for others who can’t.

 

Though the post itself began with “Not sure if true…”, it appears as though this is a real everyday occurrence. Hundreds of comments on both the original post and the same image on Reddit have suggested that this charitable act is based a system of honour in the Italian city. As one Redditor commented: “I am Italian and I can confirm that this happens in Naples. Naples is a very troubled city and I usually give a lot of advices to foreigners that want to visit. However, even the shadiest bars in Naples do not cheat on pending coffees (they are called "caffè sospeso" in Naples). Coffee is serious business.”

 

The original image: