A young woman sits alone in a café sipping tea and reading a book.

　　一位年輕女士獨坐咖啡館，一邊小口喝茶一邊看書。

　　She pauses briefly to scribble in a nearby notepad before showing her words to a passing café worker: "Where are the toilets please?"

　　她停了一小下，在旁邊的便籤本上草草寫上幾個字，拿給路過的服務員看，上面寫着："請問洗手間在哪兒?"

　　This is a familiar scenario in Tokyo's so-called "silent cafés", spaces which appear at first glance to be conventional cafés but where customers are not allowed to speak, communicating instead by writing on notepads.

　　在東京所謂的"沉默咖啡館"裏，這是司空見慣的情景。這些咖啡館乍一看與普通咖啡館無異，但進店的顧客不可講話，只能通過在便籤本上寫字來交流。

　　A growing number of "silent cafés" - with self-imposed chat bans - are opening across the capital, attracting a steady stream of Tokyoites keen to swap the pressure-cooker pace of urban life for solitary silence.

　　顧客自願閉口不言的"沉默咖啡館"越來越多，在東京各處開張，吸引了一批穩定的東京人羣，他們急需這樣的地方逃離城市生活的高壓節奏，換取片刻獨處的寧靜。

　　來源：每日英文簡訊