Are you an Alcoholic ??!!

The 1st time I was seriously asked if I was an Alcoholic was at an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting in Chiang Mai, then held in a large colonial-styled bungalow not far from the McCormick Hospital, which I also later learned was a hotbed of ex-pat politics.

I was dragged there by a friend who religiously attended their meets, and partly by my curiosity. What I didn't know was that it was expected from everyone to introduce themselves and say that they are Alcoholics and next whether they are still partaking or proudly declare that they haven't touched the devil's brew for "n" number of years. So when it was my turn to introduce myself, I only stated my name and country, as I didn't consider myself either then or now to be an alcohol abuser.

Immediately a stout bald gentleman in a Pink Hawaiian shirt, a thick gold chain and a young Thai girl on his side, with the demeanour of an ex-US Special Forces guy (but might have been a retired Xerox salesman for all I know), sharply asked me "Sir, aren't you an alcoholic??" I replied with a grin, "not yet, I just indulge occasionally!!"

I regretted it immediately, seeing the expressionless faces looking back at me, realising that humour has no place in AA.

The meeting was a long-drawn narration by each of the participants about their struggle with booze and how it ruined their lives. Most of them also claimed that they haven't touched it in decades if not more, which made me think of them as pretenders and posers in search of a place to belong and flaunt their feathers as most of them did appear to be well-heeled.

The only two Thai faces were the Xerox-Special Forces guy's girlfriend who was busy with her mobile phone and a hapless Tuk-Tuk driver who was snared in by Crazy Maggie. A middle-aged Jewish New Yorker, a former number cruncher turned holistic healer with a penchant of shocking all around with the crudest sex-talk. The tedium ended with tea, biscuits and exchanging phone numbers.

I couldn't wait to run back and open a chilled Singha; I badly needed a drink.

The 2nd time, and something tells me it isn't the last, was during my house hunting spree in Delhi, a city where tenants are strictly divided into familial and single persons with a gigantic self-righteous moralistic wall. Where even a married man living apart from his family or in my case a widower, are all considered Bachelors and who are all collectively branded as debauched whoremongers, drunkards and people who don't pay the rent on time.

Your dietary habits are scrutinized to determine whether you are a real vegetarian or not, along with extensive interrogations about your job and earnings. Where telephones numbers of property rental ads are picked up by sullen and suspicious Bhabis (Brother's wife- a universal nomenclature for married women in north India) who first demand to know how you got her number, least her frail Indian woman's modesty is outraged. When while scrutinizing my moral antecedents and without blinking an eye(so I assume, as it was on the phone) one of the prospective landlords asked me sharply...

Aap Alcoholic Hai kya?? (Are you an Alcoholic??)

When I retorted somewhat sternly asking what did he mean, he toned down and somewhat mildly replied that he wanted to know whether I consume alcohol, as tipplers are not welcome to rent his apartment. But very soon I ran across another ad which clearly said "For vegetarian and Non-Alcoholic families only!!"

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