I want to make sure I'm interpreting the following sentence properly:

>
> 「三倍の代金を払ってコーヒーを買うくらいなら、水道の水を飲んでいた方がましだ」と言ったマンフレッドがもしもまだベルリンにいたら、また口{くち}喧{げん}嘩{か}になっていたかもしれない。

To give some context, in the previous sentence, the narrator remarks that it
is regrettable that the main character, Mamoru, did not go to the expensive
grocery store the day before since it was the only one that was open. In the
sentence I'm attempting to understand, 「マンフレッド」refers to Manfred, ostensibly
Mamoru's former lover.

Anyway, my initial rough translation was:

> If Manfred -- who once said, "If you're paying three times the price for
> coffee, you ought to be drinking tap water" -- were still in Berlin, we
> probably would have gotten into another argument.

This immediately made no sense to me, but after thinking over it for awhile,
it occurred to me that what it might actually mean is:

> If Manfred -- who once remarked, "If the water is three times the price of a
> cup of coffee, you ought to be drinking it from the tap" -- were still in
> Berlin, we probably would've gotten into another argument.

The second sentence makes much more sense to me, but also implies that the
author is potentially talking about the store selling expensive bottled water
despite not saying that explicitly.

Any help clarifying the meaning would be appreciated. Thanks.
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2017-07-09T02:08:32.010
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2017-07-09T05:16:34.647
2017-07-09T04:31:58.030
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question
translation meaning
Help parsing a sentence
Your first interpretation is correct.

I suspect it was because of Manfred that Mamoru didn't go to the store, and
there were no other store open, and the incident might have caused their
argument. Then I think the story makes sense. No?
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-07-09T02:38:46.973
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2017-07-09T02:38:46.973
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answer
Coffee (and probably other items too) in that expensive grocery store costs
three times as much as in other stores that were not open on that day. So
Mamoru didn't go to that store and now his fridge is empty. He is thinking:
"Manfred once said 'I'd rather drink tap water than buy the expensive coffee
from that store' (when other stores were closed before), so if he were still
here, we would have gotten into another argument if I had bought, or tried to
buy coffee/groceries from that grocery store yesterday."
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-07-09T03:15:51.860
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2017-07-09T05:16:34.647
2017-07-09T05:16:34.647
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answer