A Healthy Appetite for Beer

As a twenty-four-year-old Scottish emigrant arriving in South Africa in 1969, I was struck by many of the differences between the country of my birth and what was to become my adopted homeland. Although my drinking was yet to become a problem for me (or others), the most significant beauty of South Africa in my eyes was that "booze was cheap." This was a drinker's paradise. The letters I wrote to my fiancé, who was to follow me to South Africa some months later, informed her not so much of the physical, social, or practical aspects of South Africa but told her, "You can get drunk for a Rand" (about 85 cents in U.S. money). In retrospect, this was strange behavior; getting drunk, while not an unknown experience for me, was not yet a priority.