The Inconvenient Situation

Ever since i came to Mannheim, i was always offered beer or alcohol where ever i went. The comes to no surprise as Germany is famous for their beer. Beer is much cheaper than soft drinks in most restaurants. They have this festival called "Oktoberfest", which for some reason is held in september, where it will be a week of beer drinking to the max. I wouldn't want to get into a sticky situation like that. But despite the "conflict of interest", i have never turned down an offer to go drinking and "talk kok". Well, maybe people might expect me to step away from a meeting where alcohol is present, but why should I?

If we analyze the situation carefully, the main objective of the meeting is to chat, and although others might tend to drink beer, it doesn't mean i have to. I can always have a coke or fruit juice. It only comes down to whether i submit to my friends offer to have a beer. Well, to tell you the truth its not the first time i have been offered alcohol, in fact i have been offered many times before. Because of that its not to hard to reject the offer. I just maintain my cool and decline the offer. If you decline in a polite and civilized manner, people will respect your stance. Although they might insist sometimes, you must know and believe in the reason why you don't drink alcohol in the first place. Well for me, besides being an Islamic rule, i have also secular reasons why i don't drink alcohol, no matter how "cool" drinking alcohol might seem. For all the people that died due to drunk driving, to all the women and children getting beaten up by their drunken husband or fathers and for standing against the people that make money out of the selling, serving, investing, brewing, bottling, transporting and shipping.... I do not want anything to do with alcohol. However, I won't neither encourage nor stop you from drinking because that is your belief. I respect that. I believe we must first respect, in order to be respected.

I think for me its easier to decline, because being a Muslim it's self is an excuse to decline the beer offer. If people offer me beer, i just say that I'm a (practicing) Muslim, they will understand
. But i think it might be harder if your a non-muslim that doesn't really like to drink to decline, unless u have a specific medical condition that disallows you from drinking. What do you think about it? There was one trainee from Estonia that didn't like drinking beer, but because she didn't really have a particular reason not to drink, in time, she began to drink. But I guess its OK. as long as she doesn't go overboard.

I guess the trick here is just don't make a big deal out of it. And its always good to inform people about what you can or cannot eat to increase the understanding among us. Take an example last week i went for a BBQ with the AIESECers . This is a situation where food is a major concern, there are bound to be "conflicts of interests". Instead of avoiding the "conflicts of interest" i decided to face it head on and i think it has payed off. One of them made a salad. As they have been informed by me that i couldn't eat pork, they have thoughtfully separated the meat from the vegetables. That was, to my opinion, one step towards mutual understanding. I think i was the first practicing Muslim they have ever had with them. As for the BBQ meat, as usual i will use a aluminum foil to wrap my (halal) chicken and thus separating it from the other meets that were usually pork. So my BBQ chicken was isolated from the others. In that way i can still join them for a good time rather than just avoid the situation altogether.

Well in these situations one has to think out of the box while maintaining ones boundaries. It takes practice but in the end it will be OK...

in the next edition, I will be talking about a sensitive issue that i call "the vice pyramid"...so stay tuned,,,

Tchuss