Booze

I couldn’t care less if Zeus himself thrust a goblet full of amber colored Ambrosia in front of me. I’d still prefer a bottle of my favorite San Miguel Superdry anytime.

I was a sophomore in high school when I had my first taste of booze. During one of the gang’s innumerable drinking sessions, my friends succeeded in persuading me to down a glassful of Tanduay rum. A “virgin” when it came to alcoholic drinks, I went into coughing fits and my eyes watered as soon as I swallowed the liquid. It tasted awful. I immediately reached for the “chaser”- a cup of cola - and drank liberally to extinguish the burning sensation that I felt in my throat. My friends cracked up at the sight. They never succeeded in forcing me to drink a second “shot” that day.

When I was a little kid of about five, I vaguely remember my older cousin and several of my Titos and Titas enjoying Coolers cocktails in our family gatherings. In one occasion, I asked my mom for a bottle of the concoction, but she handed me a carton of chocolate milk instead. She firmly told me that what my grown up relatives were drinking was not for kids. I sipped my chocolate milk sullenly, and promised myself that I’d get my hands on that stuff one day when I was old enough. Coolers was eventually pulled out of the market, so I went on to try other brews.

I tried beer, vodka, rum, gin, tequila, “sioktong” or Chinese wine, red wine, white wine, champagne, and even local spirits such as tuba, basi, and lambanog. I have yet to try brandy and whisky. I drank out of curiosity, not because i had a thirst that needed some slaking. I eventually grew a fondness for beer, and it became my favorite drink, notwithstanding the ill effects (aesthetically) it has wrought on my belly.

Beer became my constant companion throughout college. It provided me a respite from the drudgery of schoolwork or the banality of life. I was never without a bottle of San Miguel beer in hand whenever I gamboled with friends in bars until the wee hours of the morning. Whenever I wanted to drown my misery, beer came in handy. Booze, it seems, became a tacit symbol that I was already grown up and free to do everything I wanted to do. Of course, I was naïve to think that way.

Indeed, we tend to learn things the hard way. I experienced passing out and waking up with a killer hangover the next day, no thanks to several bottles of Tanduay rum the night before. I experienced making a fool out of myself after seven bottles of San Mig strong ice. I puked inside my Tita’s car because of tequila. I am quite genial when sober, but tend to spew and fling sordid words when I get intoxicated.

All the bad effects of booze notwithstanding, it can be quite enjoyable when taken in “reasonable” amounts. I placed quotation marks on the word reasonable because the limit varies from one person to another. I know it’s time to call it quits when my face has reddened considerably and I feel a little tipsy. Other people won’t stop unless they’ve peed in their pants, puked themselves silly, or if they managed to divulge a nasty secret about themselves.

Nothing beats being with old friends and sharing a table teeming with tasty pulutan (appetizers) and bottles of ice-cold Red Horse beer. I miss the good old days when we trooped to our nearby watering hole in between classes or after school just to enjoy each other’s company, and of course, several tagays of beer.

Truly, the proof of booze is in the drinking.

Moderately, that is.