The Drinking Monster

                                                    The Drinking Monster 

By Kefa Onditi

Last semester when we got our projects, I researched the students' business ideas. Most of my respondents agreed that liquor stores are the best to invest in.  When I cast the net wider, I realized that the idea of selling alcohol was in the societies we live. The youth are just a product of their environments. There is an insatiable demand for alcohol. The population is addicted, and the copious business people are well aware. The reasons many choose this poison are varied.

In the past, elders set a drink in their midst when they needed to deliberate on heavy matters of their people. Sharing a drink was a sign of friendship, hospitality, and invitation. However, times have changed. Many young people drink alcohol out of pleasure and as a way to kill their weekends. There can be no party, no dancing, and merry-making without alcohol involved. Some drink to gain confidence and courage. If someone wants to approach a girl and is somehow anxious, alcohol is always a proven remedy. Public speaking is never accessible for some people unless accompanied by shots gulped down hurriedly. It’s always as though drinking summons courage from the pits of one’s liver.

We have heard tales of men battering their wives after drinking spree or a bitter wife maiming a husband for drinking away the family fortune.  Those that have walked the alcoholism path find it hard to endure a day sober. People find it more challenging to communicate and articulate their feelings after throwing away their sobriety. How can a man keep a family and a relationship with which he does not connect? How do you tell a spouse you love them when your drinking is the reason why they languish in abject poverty? How does a father ask his sons to be upright when he cannot stand?

It is no surprise that many justify drinking as an escape from their daily misery. They always say alcohol drowns their sorrow and makes them float in ecstasy. For a moment, their problems are not their own, which becomes the gratifications sought. Some drink because they have been caught by other people drinking. This type can easily be swayed because they do not have a particular reason rather than the bandwagon of peer pressure.

Drinking has consequences in the short term and long term. While it is true that the gratification sought is to relax, the price to pay comes from empty pockets and addiction. Alcohol is expensive and continuous consumption is bound to have financial implications. People have spent months in therapy and rehabilitation for something that started as one shot for the pain …