Beer.. Whats your flavor
- Thread starter ISUclones33
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The situation is somewhat different in Alaska since the majority of the native villages are not connected to a road system making it easier to control the importation of alcohol. About 100 communities have made it illegal to sell, import, or possess alcohol under local laws. The native communities self imposed these restrictions.
So before you fly into a Native village with alcohol, you had better ask about the law. Bootlegging is a serious crime, and serious bad manners, in Alaska Native communities that are trying to address the damage of alcohol abuse.
A nationally known economist earning roughly $100,000 a year working as a tenured professor and consultant was recently convicted of bootlegging alcohol into rural villages. Basically he was flying through the Arctic, sneaking through passes in his Super Cub, and coming in below the radar.
The economics of illegal sales is staggering. What a bootlegger can purchase for $10 in Anchorage will sell for $50 in Bethel, Barrow, or Kotzebue. In more remote areas the same bottle would sell for $150.
A dollar for dollar comparison of alcohol compared with drugs purchased in Anchorage and resold in a village follows:
Substance Investment Return
Cocaine $1.00 $1.50
Marijuana $1.00 $4.00
Alcohol $1.00 $15.00
* source: 2002 annual drug report, Alaska Bureau of Alcohol and Drug Abuse
Alcohol is the primary substance of abuse in Alaska and is the leading cause of violence and death especially in the rural areas. A few bottles of alcohol in the wrong hands in a native village typically spells disaster.
A nationally known economist earning roughly $100,000 a year working as a tenured professor and consultant was recently convicted of bootlegging alcohol into rural villages. Basically he was flying through the Arctic, sneaking through passes in his Super Cub, and coming in below the radar.
The economics of illegal sales is staggering. What a bootlegger can purchase for $10 in Anchorage will sell for $50 in Bethel, Barrow, or Kotzebue. In more remote areas the same bottle would sell for $150.
A dollar for dollar comparison of alcohol compared with drugs purchased in Anchorage and resold in a village follows:
Substance Investment Return
Cocaine $1.00 $1.50
Marijuana $1.00 $4.00
Alcohol $1.00 $15.00
* source: 2002 annual drug report, Alaska Bureau of Alcohol and Drug Abuse
Alcohol is the primary substance of abuse in Alaska and is the leading cause of violence and death especially in the rural areas. A few bottles of alcohol in the wrong hands in a native village typically spells disaster.
You know, I've lived in Germany for over 5 years, and I've never attended a formal Volksmarch? My wife and I are enthusiastic walkers, and they always have the volksmarches when we have something else planned.
Hefeweizen is okay; (I had some Schneiderweisse Friday night, and it was "just right") and there are certainly a time and place for it, but Germany is going through a revival of the traditional beers, of which Helles is one of the hallmarks. Helles is a hoppy, clear beer. You can go to the Weltenburg monastary on the Danube and get a 1 Liter mug of Anno 1050, if you really want some traditional German beer, brewed that way for nearly a thousand years.
Pilsner Urquell is the original Pils beer; very nice stuff, but if you want something a little more "earthier" go a little farther east, where you can get "Zlaty Bazant", a Slovakian beer that comes in 8, 10 and 12% alcohol variations.
I was out in Long Beach, CA for an engineering society meeting this past weekend. I got in Saturday evening, and stopped at the Rock Bottom Brewery for dinner (or supper, depending on your local dialect). I went to a RBB in Cincinnati a few years ago, and it was pretty good, so I figured I'd give this one a try.
I had a glass of their Pale Ale before my meal. I started to feel a little buzzed. My meal came, and I got another beer. More severe buzz, at which point I was starting to worry that something was going wrong...high blood pressure, low blood pressure, blood sugar, who knows. Anyway, it was late (for me coming from the central time zone anyway), so I just walked back to the hotel, and turned in.
I met up with a friend the next day at the meeting. We were looking for a place to have dinner, and I told him that I went to the RBB the night before. He said he did too, but quite late, so we missed each other. He asked me if I had the Pale Ale, to which I replied that I did have the Pale Ale. He also had two of them and commented that they pretty well zapped him too.
So we went to another restaurant and each had a couple of local microbrews...negligible buzz effect, which relieved some worry that our health was failing. I don't know what was up with that batch of Pale Ale...it was only supposed to have 6% alcohol content according to the beer board at RBB, but that beer seemed to be a hec of alot stronger than that. Maybe it had something to do with drinking it on an empty stomach after traveling all day...
I had a glass of their Pale Ale before my meal. I started to feel a little buzzed. My meal came, and I got another beer. More severe buzz, at which point I was starting to worry that something was going wrong...high blood pressure, low blood pressure, blood sugar, who knows. Anyway, it was late (for me coming from the central time zone anyway), so I just walked back to the hotel, and turned in.
I met up with a friend the next day at the meeting. We were looking for a place to have dinner, and I told him that I went to the RBB the night before. He said he did too, but quite late, so we missed each other. He asked me if I had the Pale Ale, to which I replied that I did have the Pale Ale. He also had two of them and commented that they pretty well zapped him too.
So we went to another restaurant and each had a couple of local microbrews...negligible buzz effect, which relieved some worry that our health was failing. I don't know what was up with that batch of Pale Ale...it was only supposed to have 6% alcohol content according to the beer board at RBB, but that beer seemed to be a hec of alot stronger than that. Maybe it had something to do with drinking it on an empty stomach after traveling all day...
