International Café
International Café on Ninth Street has long been a go-to place for Mediterranean food in town. Run by the Venezuelan-Libyan couple Elizabeth Hernandez-Gumati and Mohamed Gumati, the cafe serves a variety of gyros, falafel and hummus with a strong feeling of welcome.
Yumivia Rojas shapes falafel Sept. 23. The falafel is produced fresh every other day.
Mohamed takes an order from an International Café first-time clients.
After 10 years of service, COVID-19 caused an explosion of delivery services and a resulting workforce shortage that threaten the well-being of the restaurant’s business.
The place is lively and visibly busy during lunch hours. Apart from Mohamed and Elizabeth, there are only two more people on staff — Yumivia Rojas, who recently immigrated from Venezuela, and Mike, a family friend.
A child looks into the display case at the International Café in late September. The cafe has a loyal and diverse customer base from all over the city. College student regulars mix easily with professionals from downtown, local families and immigrants from many different countries and cultures.
Like many other family-run restaurants, International Café has been financially impacted by the introduction and expansion of food delivery services in town.
“It all started a year or two before COVID,” said Mohamed. The café would hire and lose employees within a couple months. The majority of them would shift toward delivery work, which promised flexible hours and payment. Because of that, Mohamed and Elizabeth reduced the working hours of the place, from 11 a.m. to 8 or 9 p.m., to 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Changes like this can be seen in places all over the city.
A stack of orders sits in the International Café. Many of the guests in the café have been going to the place for years. "Columbia is small, it reminds me of cities in my country. Our customers are our friends," says Mohamed Gumati.
“We don’t have a shortage of customers, we have a shortage of workers,” said Mohamed.
Due to the shortage in the workforce, the Gumatis do a huge part of the work in a café. Now they employ only one staff member - Yumivia Rojas, who recently immigrated to Columbia from Venezuela. They also get support from family friend Mike, who regularly comes to help in the kitchen.
“When you have a restaurant change their hours, that’s probably because they have a shortage of employees,” said Mohamed Gumati.
Despite the reduced work hours and shortage of employees, the International Cafe is still profitable. The majority of people have been coming there for years and spread a good word about the place around town.
Gumati kneels on his prayer rug on Sept. 22, 2021. At the end of the day, when International Cafe’s customer service ceases, Gumati is able to resume his prayer.
Mohamed Gumati holds a photo of himself from the 1970s on Sept. 23. Gumati came to the United States from Libya in the ‘70s with the initial plan to study English and eventually return to help his father with their agrarian business. However, after Muammar Qaddafi rose to power, the possibilities for private business were almost non-existent, and Gumati decided to stay in the U.S. and pursue another career path.
Elizabeth Hernandez-Gumati laughs with her employee, Yumivia Rojas, during their coffee break Sept. 23 at the International Cafe in Columbia.
“Usually, we have a very strong lunch, and that’s why we can afford to close earlier,” Mohamed Gumati said.
Regardless of the daily challenges, Elizabeth and Mohamed continue to run the café and serve their food to regular customers.
This story was created during the 73rd Missouri Photo Workshop Hometown Edition — an annual photo workshop concentrated on the discovery of human stories in small towns around the globe.
The mentors of this photo story were MU alumni Lois Raimondo and Torsten Kjellstrand.