Red and Flushed

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We all had a small sample of wine when we were young. Depending on the state and country, it’s legal for minors to consume alcohol under guardian supervision and educational purposes.

Personally, I don’t like the taste of wine, considering my age. I shouldn’t even be worried about it. But when you’re a kid, you thought that alcohol was the worst tasting drink but when you got older, things started to change. This was one thing I never understood. Was it due to desensitization? The pressures of society? Or the susceptibility of mind altering chemicals as you got older?

With alcohol flushing, drinking alcoholic beverages is unbearable, especially for me. I’ve only had wine on special occasions, under supervision but it hasn’t gone down too well. In fact, about 80 percent of Asians have alcohol flushing and it’s one of the reasons my dad doesn’t drink.

Then there’s school. What sometimes frightens me is when students come back to school drunk. It sounds stupid but I’m not joking. I will talk more about this issue in another post. As you see, there’s my dad who doesn’t drink at all and those who come to school drunk. It’s simply ridiculous.

So what about you? Did you make the choice to stop drinking or does alcohol flushing deter you from taking a sip?

Or are you one of those “lucky” individuals who don’t need to deal with the side effects?

10 thoughts on “Red and Flushed”

  2. I think it’s amazing and challenging that you are taking on such big issues. I also think you have a great way of balancing perspectives. Because my family is Italian, our cultural tradition is to allow the children exposure to/ tiny tastes of wine (with water!) at special occasions. I feel that we enjoy it (I love the flavour of wine and always have) responsibly to model to our children. That said, there are always examples in every family of people who misuse alcohol. It is so important to be honest about the use and responsibility!

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    1. I was also raised in that style, so sometimes we were allowed a half glass of sparkling or white with a formal lunch on Saturdays. We were never fascinated with alcohol growing up and it was socially unacceptable for women to consume a lot so I guess that helped. It is a big issue right now and I can’t really understand why this is a problem.

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      1. There’s a double standard when it comes to the consumption of alcohol. It deters some but it unnecessarily pressures others. Education is valuable and early exposure to alcohol is good, in this case.

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  3. I agree with Mrs L Martini that you raise some great and sometimes controversial issues!

    It is odd isn’t it how as children we tend not to like the taste of alcohol and then somewhere down the line, can like it. Funnily enough I have always hated the taste of beer / ale / lager. My eldest child won’t taste alcohol at all and my youngest is happy tasting any drink. Odd. I agree with the European model of exposing children to wine from a young age so that it is less taboo as a teenager. The problem we have in the UK is perhaps not following this pattern so that teens feel they need to hide any drinking from parents. But I also suspect our pub culture is to blame for a lot of over-consumption. In ‘warmer parts’ of Europe, there tends to be more cafes and people are happy to linger over one or two drinks in the sunshine, rather than drinking one drink after another until they feel ill. Is the rain to blame in the UK?! I certainly over-indulged at University and in my 20s…and then realised I needed to take better care…

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    1. Thanks! It’s better to tackle these problems at an early age. One thing I don’t understand is that some people are fine with alcohol, but when it comes to vegetables such as broccolis, they’re picky eaters. I’m sure that daily consumption of greens is better than the daily intake of red wine.

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