(bright music) (upbeat music) - [Narrator] Coming up on Nebraska Stories, meet one of the best baristas in the country.

(upbeat music) A Husker honors her father at every game.

(upbeat music) And conversations with animals.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) - [Narrator] In a world where two billion cups of coffee are consumed every day, an Omaha man is on a mission to be the best barista on earth.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music) He's already a national champion and placed fourth in international competition.

(upbeat music) His name is Isaiah Sheese, and he's a rockstar in the world of coffee.

- [Isaiah] I am the 2023 United States Barista Champion, fourth in the world.

(upbeat music) Top six is where you wanna fall.

(upbeat music) That kind of locks you into coffee stardom as being top six in the world.

(upbeat music) It kind of just puts you in that weird niche world of coffee fame.

- [Narrator] Most days, you can find Isaiah working at one of his three coffee shops in Omaha.

(upbeat music) He opened his first shop in the historic Blackstone District in 2014.

(upbeat music) - [Isaiah] There was nothing really open, a couple bars, but everything else was kind of like boarded up or run down at that point.

We were the first one open in that whole district, first coffee shop, first restaurant, first anything at that point.

(upbeat music) - [Narrator] Now, almost a decade later, Archetype Coffee has expanded to the Little Bohemia and Millwork Commons neighborhoods.

(upbeat music) Isaiah shared his passion for coffee might be rooted in a family tradition.

- [Isaiah] I think my grandma was gonna make sure that I drank coffee.

So to carry on the legacy, right?

And so I started drinking coffee probably when I was like five or six, you know, just a little cream and sugar, you know, probably more cream and sugar than it was coffee.

(upbeat music) - [Narrator] While in college, Isaiah worked at a small coffee shop and he says that's where he got his first taste of competition.

(upbeat music) - [Isaiah] The guy that owned that coffee shop signed me up for one of the regionals, and my first year to compete at that qualifier, I came in fifth, and so it was just kinda like a slippery slope to becoming a little bit more passionate about competition.

(upbeat music) - [Narrator] Isaiah's been competing since 2009.

- Laser focuses them and transforms them.

- [Narrator] But it was the year he qualified for the United States Barista Championship when he realized the seriousness of the craft.

- [Isaiah] And there were just, you know, 50 baristas, you know, across the US, just like polishing all of their wares with a polishing cloth, headphones on, stressed out of their minds.

I walked back there and I was like, I will never be like these people.

You know, where I'm polishing my, like what is this?

So like it's coffee, you know?

That year, needless to say, I didn't do very well.

All of the hard work.

I realized really quickly that if you're gonna be an expert in your field, you have to compete at a very high level.

Let's write down some tasting notes.

- [Narrator] Competitors have 15 minutes to present and prepare three different coffee drinks for a panel of judges, and before a large audience.

- And a pleasant lingering dark chocolate finish.

Now, Diego's processing is in, by no means a happy accident, but what does it do to the coffee?

It takes..

The way that we always describe it is kind of like a coffee Ted Talk while making 12 drinks, while also curating the music as well.

I believe if we want to continue to progress the landscape of our industry, that's gonna take intentional innovation.

You have to come up with the concept, you have to come up with the coffee, you have to come up with the tasting notes, a signature drink.

It's a pretty involved competition that takes a lot of creativity and to be able to execute on a high level.

Thank you, time.

(crowd cheering) (soft music) - [Narrator] Isaiah's winning presentation was inspired by a popular American painter.

- [Isaiah] My presentation really wasn't focused on Bob Ross.

It was just that little concept in the beginning of just talking about happy little accidents.

- [Bob] I know this is gonna look like we're destroying everything.

Don't worry about it.

We don't make mistakes.

We have happy accidents.

(soft music) - [Narrator] As part of his winning strategy, Isaiah sourced a high quality, specialty coffee from a small grower in South America.

(upbeat music) - [Isaiah] Lucy is a small holder female farmer from San Augustine, Colombia.

(soft music) We've been buying all of her Pink Bourbon, which is a special variety, for the last six years.

If we're gonna win, we wanted to win with a farm that really represented us, and so Lucy was gracious enough to grow the coffee (soft music) and then let us transport it three hours over the Andes Mountains to a rising star producer named Diego Bermuda, where he processed her coffee in a very special way to elevate it to a whole nother level and another dimension.

- [Narrator] Specialty coffee is the highest grade of coffee and differs significantly from the standard supermarket options.

- [Isaiah] Our competition style coffees are those very expensive coffees.

We sell probably 97% of those on our website all over the US and all over the world, and I would say only like maybe 3% of those in Omaha.

And when you're trying to work closely with the farmers, making sure that they're making more of a livable wage, you're paying a higher premium, but in Omaha's market, you know, being able to charge that premium, it can be a tricky thing to navigate.

- [Narrator] Since winning national and international titles, business has picked up.

(soft music) - [Isaiah] Growing pains are painful, but winning, you know, pushes you into a whole nother level, but you can't plan for that on the business side of it.

You got a large oat vanilla latte.

(crowd chatter) Yeah, I'm wearing more hats now than I ever have.

Jason, who roasts for us and helps me with all these competitions, he's wearing even more hats, and so it's definitely a juggling act.

- [Narrator] Jason Burkum has worked with Isaiah since the early days of Archetype Coffee.

He's also a Grammy Award-winning artist who prefers roasting coffee.

- [Jason] Coffee roasting kind of scratches the same itch as a lot of things that when you're making music for people or any kind of art, I mean, you put something out in the world, you kind of see what people do with it and hopefully there's a reaction.

(coffee beans tinkling) - [Narrator] Isaiah and Jason share a common goal: the pursuit of the perfect coffee taste and roast.

- [Jason] I think, as both Isaiah and I have always had this idea of, you know, what's the perfect coffee taste like and what's the perfect roast for any coffee that we buy?

- [Isaiah] We have these coffees that taste like flowers and fruit juice as opposed to just a good strong cup of coffee.

People have always treated coffee kind of as like a wake me up drug.

You know, you just want something that you know what that coffee cup is.

We're all set.

Thanks, man, have a good day.

When you're competing on the world stage, it's like you're supposed to bring what's cutting edge, and so it's been a tricky dance, navigating and bridging that gap between where our consumers are and where we would like to push our industry.

We're trying to be recognized just like a culinary art, like food and wine and craft cocktails.

For Archetype, our goal is, you know, we wanna be one of the best roasters in the world.

- [Narrator] Coming from the fourth-best barista on planet Earth.

- Oh, yeah.

- [Narrator] Chances are, Isaiah and Jason will realize their dream as they continue to embrace the joy of creating something extraordinary, one cup at a time.

(soft music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) - [Sarah] The most succinct way that I could describe Vada is that he was just this fierce, intense personality, but at the same time, like just a real softy and a really loving family man.

(upbeat music) - [Narrator] In the late 1980s, Vada Murray wore number 27 for the Michigan Wolverines.

As a safety for the great head football coach, Bo Schembechler.

- [Sarah] Playing for Bo changed his life.

The things that Bo instilled in him were the things that Vada, it's the way that Vada lived his life.

Not just in being punctual, but being disciplined.

You know, working hard and fighting for something that you believe, you know, being disciplined in every aspect of your life.

(gentle music) - [Harper[ I am from Ann Arbor, Michigan, and my sister, my brother and I all lived there with my mom and my dad.

I loved growing up there.

(gentle music) - [Sarah] When Harper was three, her sister was six and her brother was nine.

She just kind of grew up having to be a little spitfire and not just to keep up with them, but in order for them to let her hang with them, (gentle music) and she wasn't gonna be left behind by either one of them.

We went from, you know, just probably your average family, living your life, working hard jobs that we both liked, raising kids, you know, to suddenly we were just kind of thrust into this (gentle music) crisis.

(gentle music) - [Narrator] In 2009, Harper's father, Vada Murray, was diagnosed with advanced stage lung cancer, a terminal diagnosis.

(gentle music) - [Sarah] So we spent the next couple years trying to find a treatment that would stop the growth and relieve his pain and that, you know, meant several clinical trials in different hospitals and different oncology protocols, but nothing ever really worked.

(gentle music) It turned things upside down very, very quickly.

(gentle music) - [Narrator] On April 6th, 2011, Vada Murray lost his fight following a two year battle with cancer.

- [JohnÑ I spent a lot of time with her and her mom in the recruiting process.

He was a big part of their lives, and you can tell being around them that you see all the memories.

- [Harper] In honor of my dad.

I love to wear the number.

My sister wears it at Michigan.

It's our way of honoring him, and I actually have a tattoo on my finger for him too.

It's 27.

(gentle music) Every time I step on the court, I play for him.

- [Sarah] I'm fighting this lump in my throat all the time at the start of matches, at the end of matches.

I cried during the match in Memorial Stadium.

I was unexpectedly emotional.

(dramatic music) - [John] I think there's a definite deep motivation in her why, why she plays volleyball and why she wants to be great.

I think she still wants to show her dad that she can do that.

(gentle music) - [Harper] It's shaped all me and my sister and my brother into the people we are.

(crowd cheering) (upbeat music) - [Sarah] I mean, I'm already beaming with pride, but to see both of them out there at the same time, really meaningful event for my whole family.

(upbeat music) It's hard for me to not watch these matches and see them with that jersey on and see how they resemble him so much physically.

(upbeat music) You know, it's hard for me to not think about how much he'd love watching them, (upbeat music) and I think he'd just be bursting with pride.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) - Hi, come here.

Yay!

- [Narrator] Cindy Downing wants to bring animals and humans closer together.

- Is she not cute?

- [Narrator] She says animals are smarter than we think, they hear us and there's a lot we can learn from them.

- Here's my girl, there's my girl.

They're here to help us live our lives, bring us joy, they're here to teach us stuff.

I mean, every animal that meets up with their human is here for some reason.

(gentle music) - [Narrator] How does Cindy know this?

She's been talking to animals since she was a little girl.

And she says, they talk back.

- [Cindy] When I was a kid, I spent a lot of time by myself.

I had my tea parties with my invisible friends.

We had cats when I was growing up and I would, I would talk to them.

To me, it didn't seem abnormal, I would just talk to them.

They were my friends.

(laughs) - [Narrator] When Cindy started school, her mom said it was time to say goodbye to her invisible friends.

- My mom said, "you're gonna make real friends "as opposed to your invisible friends and the animals."

- [Narrator] For the next 30 something years, Cindy's invisible animal friends were barely a memory.

And then suddenly one day after a serious health scare, the conversations picked up where they left off.

- My husband loves it.

At first he was like, "don't tell anybody what you do."

You don't know how people are gonna respond to this.

- [Narrator] Cindy says she hears and sees words and images.

Sometimes the messages require a bit of interpretation, but when she's on the right track, Cindy says she gets goosebumps.

Understandably, people are skeptical.

- Unfortunately, there's scammers.

I always tell people, you should be able to validate the information the person is giving you.

It doesn't have to be 100% but I would say at least 75%, 80% of the information that they're giving you, you should be able to validate.

I always tell people I am not a vet.

- [Woman] We have two eagles up here, one of which- - [Narrator] Cindy reads animals of all types, wild and domestic.

She even volunteers at animal nonprofits.

Betsy Finch with the Raptor Conservation Alliance, - Wow, oh my God she's beautiful.

- [Narrator] Wants to release this young bald eagle in time for migration.

But the raptor is making a slow recovery from a broken wrist.

- [Cindy] She knows she's beautiful, wow.

I just want her to tell me if she thinks she's ready to go free.

Because the wing is, is a little wobbly yet.

She's telling me she's really gotten a lot of strength since she's been here.

-[Betsy] Yes.

- Like from zero to 95%.

-[Betsy] Okay.

-What would you say?

- [Betsy] Yeah, yeah, because she couldn't fly at all when she came in.

- So I'm getting goosebumps and she's telling me she'll get even stronger 'cause she's limited.

-Even though this is huge.

-True, true.

She's telling me, "I can't go".

Oh wow, I'm about to cry.

She's just so brilliant.

She said, "I need to soar with the wind currents."

And the eagles are supposed to soar, is what she's telling me.

How fast can eagles fly?

- [Betsy] 30, 40 miles an hour, maybe.

- Because she's telling me that when she gets out of here, she will be able to fly really fast.

- [Betsy] Good.

- [Cindy] Wow.

- [Betsy] All right, lady, take it easy, thank you.

- [Cindy] And she's telling me to tell you, you're really special and thank you, thank you for doing the work.

Wow, I tell Betsy the pictures that I see or the feelings that I get and I'll ask Betsy, does this make sense to you?

Because I don't, I don't know, this is not my environment.

- Yeah, I'm a trained biologist and medical technologist.

So science is, you know, is basic to me but I am open to ideas like this.

- [Cindy] But she's saying that she's blessed to be here.

- I needed to know if she thought she was ready to go because she does fly just a little crooked.

(wings flapping) - I'd love to have her come every day.

(laughs) But if, if there's a bird or something that again, is having issues or that I'm concerned about, I do, I'll call Cindy and she's been really helpful, really helpful.

- [Cindy] Hello.

-[Jane] Hello.

Hi.

- Hi, I'm Cindy.

- [Narrator] Just north of Lincoln, Jane Shanahan is meeting Cindy for the first time to have her do a reading with her horse Lou.

- Okay, I'm getting goosebumps.

Okay, first thing I heard as we were breathing, "handsome, handsome, handsome.

"I'm handsome, handsome, handsome."

- [Jane] People do tell, tell me that he is gorgeous.

- He's telling me he's really a gentle heart.

Very gentle, very kind, he's a gentleman.

He's telling me you got him at a good price.

- Well, he was free.

- I saw him.

- Oh, my God.

(Cindy laughing) - Sight unseen.

- That's a good price.

- Do you have any questions for him?

- Like today, we went over the bridge and he just walks across the bridge, no problems.

When we go riding with my friend, he stops at everything and makes, almost makes the other horse go first.

Why does he do that?

Because he's been over these bridges like maybe 12 times a week.

First let me ask, are the bridges wood?

-Yeah.

-Okay, because that's, I'm being shown wood bridges.

I'm being told he's a gentleman, he's letting, and I'm getting goosebumps.

He's letting others pass by.

Watch when you, the next time you guys go riding, because he's showing me, I'm riding, riding, and maybe this horse is behind me and we get to the bridge and then it's kind of like, he just takes a step or two over.

-Okay.

- Like the other, okay, you can go first.

- Okay.

- You're not the sacrificial lamb, I'm just being the gentleman.

- Okay.

- Because he did say at the beginning he was a gentleman, wow.

- [Narrator] A few days later, as Jane rode with a friend, her horse, Lou, behaved just as described.

- [Jane] Okay, go ahead.

He was letting the other horses go first and not having him go first, which is awful sweet.

You know, he's, you know, he seems like that, it's just right up his alley.

(steps thudding) - I've been telling her all week, she's gonna be a movie star.

- [Narrator] In Bellevue, Keith and Terri Taute and their dogs, Izzy and Morty have a session with Cindy.

- I kind of feel like she might need an upgrade in food or something.

So she's the queen.

Would you consider her to be the queen of this house?

The queen bee.

- Absolutely.

- Oh my God, I'm getting goosebumps.

And I'm being shown that she really likes food.

I'm being shown cheese and hot dogs, and to me it looks like lunch meat.

Is that stuff she eats?

-Yes?

-Since I've been working from home, I make a lunch meat sandwich every day and she gets a piece of lunch meat and cheese.

There you go.

And we'll give Morty some too.

- Did he have a KONG?

Because he showed me, "I haven't had the KONG in a long time."

- He gets that on the weekends and we were gone last weekend.

-And he demands it.

-And he, yeah.

And he didn't, we didn't have it with us.

- [Cindy] So did he get it since you've come home?

-No.

-[Keith] No.

Okay, you might wanna work on that today.

He doesn't like soap operas.

I have no idea why he just told me that.

Do you watch soap operas?

- I did, I gave them up though, during COVID.

-Okay, there you go.

-Yes, yes.

- I'm like, why are you bringing that up?

"There was a hole in daddy", is what she's telling me, "and I was here," and I'm getting goosebumps.

"I was here to fill the hole."

So did you, somebody depart or did you have an animal depart or did, maybe a human or an animal depart?

-No, his princess.

His princess Bobo, yes.

- Oh, so she had passed, she had crossed the rainbow bridge.

- Yes, yes.

- Oh, okay.

Oh, no wonder she showed me the princess again and she's going like this and she's showing me queen.

I'm not princess, I'm queen.

- [Terry] Bobo was the princess.

-[Cindy] Wow, wow.

-Absolutely, wow.

When I was taking a breath to get hooked up to her, linked up to her, she showed me princess and she put a big X over it and then she wanted me to know she was not a princess, she was higher than that and that she was the queen.

- [Keith] She mentioned the princess, that was my little dog, Bobo.

Bobo kind of filled a void for me.

When she passed, it was really, really difficult.

She saved me.

(soft music) - [Narrator] Even for those who remain skeptical, Cindy hopes humans can be open to one important message from the animal world.

- Be kinder, kinder to the animals, kinder, kinder to your animal and kinder to your fellow human beings.

The world needs a lot more kindness.

(soft music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) - [Narrator] Watch more Nebraska stories on our website, Facebook and YouTube.

(upbeat music) Nebraska Stories is funded in part by the Margaret and Martha Thomas Foundation.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music)