Booze Britain

If you have read this blog before, or if we have spoken in the past few months, you will know that we have both been shocked by the public drunkenness and overall alcohol consumption here in the UK. Back in March, we spent a long weekend in Edinburgh and witnessed 17-year-olds drinking pitchers of green booze at 11:00 AM on a Saturday morning, and in July we were stunned by the folks at a street festival being so inebriated at 1 PM that they couldn't stand. In London we live on a street with two pubs and are nightly serenaded by a combination of thousands of bottles being dumped in recycling bins as well as drunk revelers talking on cell phones, getting into arguments and flirting both with each other and disaster.

Overall we have thought this pretty amusing. It didn't stress us out--it was just part of the local character. We watch a TV show here called Booze Britain where the camera follows groups of Brits out on the town drinking to excess. Imagine starting out your evening at home with a few cases of beer washed down with some Smirnoff vodka. Then hitting the pubs with your "lads" or "ladettes" challenging each other to drink dozens of shots of black Sambuca, super-chilled Jägermeister or some other ungodly concoction. This inevitably leads to public displays of rowdiness, urination, vomiting and some really unmentionable behavior. But it's all captured by the camera. We assumed that people on Booze Britain were encouraged somewhat by the presence of the camera to indulge in over-the-top behavior. Well, we were wrong.

We just returned from a weekend in the West Country, having deposited ourselves in the city of Bristol. On Friday night we were walking back to our hotel from dinner and a visit to a great 17th century pub named for Charles II. It was after 11 PM when we rounded the corner near our hotel. Lying flat on his back on the pavement was a man in his 40s wearing a tuxedo (dinner suit to the locals). We didn't know what to do, and certainly didn't want to risk moving him and causing injury. His breathing was shallow and there were no apparent cuts or bruises. Had he had a stroke? A heart attack? We didn't know. Amazingly this man had keeled over in full view of the night watchman of a nearby building, but we had to tap on the glass and get the guard to call the emergency services (999). We waited, not for a police car or an ambulance, but for an emergency response car purpose built to handle drunks on the street. The dead man came alive when the medical technician touched his neck to get a pulse. He was able to get the man to sit upright, at least briefly. The medic asked if he had been drinking. The man said yes. No drugs, only drink. He admitted to drinking since 7:00 PM. In 4 hours he drank himself into a state so he didn't know where he was, how he got there or how he would get home. He could easily have died on the pavement that night. Booze Britain isn't so funny anymore.

(Creative credit: John and Peter)