Alcoholica

Before I came to Rhodes, I had heard about the amount of drinking that went on at this place. 'The highest alcohol consumption per capita' they said. I also had heard loads of 'scary' stories about alcohol, like the one that you had to drink a whole bottle of vodka on your first night, or about how much of a killer the Cane Train was. I was both frightened and excited to find out if the rumours were exaggerated or were in fact true. I knew that I was keen to come and test for myself the 'Rhodent Booze Theory', and have a crazy party at the same time. When I got here I came to the realisation that the rumours were both unfounded and true, at the same time. I realised that I could group the Rhodes population into three groups, 'The People Who Don't Drink', 'The People Who Drink', and 'The People Who Drink Drink Drink Drink Drink.'

The People Who Don't Drink: Now this group is without a doubt the smallest and least popular of the groups, and consists only of the seriously hardcore religious fanatics, and that one guy who got liver poisoning in matric and can't drink any more. All in all, it comes to about 20 people. That says a lot about the drinking at Rhodes, doesn't it? These guys prefer to hang around at cafe's drinking tea and trying to convert people to Christianity with their 'friendly-but-totally-serious-about-Jesus' approach, or in the case of 'that one guy', hang out with everyone else, coolly sipping a coke, wishing it had just a pinch of Jack Daniels in it. Indeed, you wouldn't even realise these people existed at Rhodes, after hearing the rumours.

The People Who Drink: I'm pretty sure I fit into this group. I mean I'm definitely not a paying member of the previous group, and there's no chance I fit into the next one. This group probably makes up the majority of Rhodes students. The guys and gals here usually go out 2-4 times a week, naturally drinking every night but maybe getting drunk on one to two of those nights. Sure, they drink to have fun, or maybe they just like beer. I know I do both. You can usually catch these guys sitting at the Rat and Parrot, or any one of Grahamstown's other prestigious watering holes, with either beer or cider in front of them, talking the night away with friends. On a party night, however, you'll probably find them with some hard liquor, such as cane or vodka, being generally rowdy and good-spirited. Just having fun. This is what I kind of expected Rhodes to be like, I just wasn't fully prepared for the final and most extreme of the drinker categories;

The People Who Drink Drink Drink Drink Drink: Where do I even start on this species? When these guys aren't getting absolutely trashed out of their bracket at Friars or The Union (sorry, I mean the Biko), they're suffering through a hangover and talking about the insane night before (well, what they can remember of it), or planning their next big phuza. Yup, its that bad, and I'm not even exaggerating, believe it or not. They might possibly be verging on alcoholics, since it's apparent that they need alcohol to have a good time. Invite them somewhere where there's no booze, and you'll be greeted with upturned noses and shrieks of "Screw this, lets go get waaaasteeeeeed!!". And the sad thing is, there's a lot more of these people than you want at an academic institution like Rhodes. Sure you're allowed to have fun while doing shots and down-downs, but there's no need for the utter dependency on it, up until the point of insanity.

So, are the rumours true? Yes and No. A huge majority of the university partake in the drinking game, but the fact of the matter is that some people go just a tad too far. Come on, people, lets have some substance-free fun for once. Somehow I just don't see this happening. 'The highest alcohol consumption per capita'? I can believe it.