Master Of All I Serve, Eh?

In return for either a bar tab or internet access (guess which one I chose), today I took a survey for the company that owns this hostel.

Most of the questions were asking us which potential new logos we liked best - easy.

A couple of them asked what we thought of the hostel.

They were paying me for my answers, so I thought I'd better be honest.

I told them it was a lovely place, spoilt by the bar downstairs. I reminded them that cancer kills 1 in 4 people in the most heartbreaking way possible, so selling cigarettes was plainly irresponsible.

Then I wrote that I was tired of listening to so many people agonise about how they went down to the bar last night, got drunk, and then wished they hadn't when they woke up this morning underneath another naked drunk. These stories are always followed by said individual saying, inexplicably, that they don't want to go back down the bar tonight, but they must. Just for an hour. There is no-one more gullible than a drunk. It messes up people's lives.

I also explained that casual sex will later devalue a person's marriage.

Despite all this, the bar employees continues to giggle over the tannoy every night "Get yourselves smashed for FREE!", they sell cigarettes behind a sign that actually says they'll kill you, and sex in the bar's toilets is encouraged over the microphone.

I concluded that the bar felt that raking-in money was more important than other people's health, happiness and marriages.

As I handed my form in, she took it and read it. She asked if I ever went down the bar. I replied that I usually had a fruit juice there each afternoon. She replied "Ah well, so you still support it then." I explained that I'd never spent any money there, I just used the free drinks vouchers that people get given upon checking-in, and then discard. She asked me how long I'd been staying here. I told her 5 months. She said "Oh well, you've been here so long that you're just bitter then." On analysis, I think it actually made sense to her that the longer someone stayed here, the more bitter a person they would become. She actually expected that reaction.

Smiling and wishing her well, I went downstairs to get this afternoon's free fruit juice, only to be told that those free drinks vouchers that I'd been using were no longer valid for anything non-alcoholic.

Of course they're not. To get your money, First they need to get you drunk.

Epilogue:

After today, the bar put a sign up and printed on all their free drink vouchers the phrase "The ***** bar will not serve alcohol to any person who is intoxicated." Riiiiiiight.