The Law of the Land

[BeeMused]

A Sighting in 2 Parts

Part 1
This morning I shopped for snacks before work. Right before me was a group of male teens buying beer. They got carded and showed their passports. They were Americans, taking advantage of the German law. You can buy beer and wine at age 16, any other booze at age 18. I had to laugh about their excitement and remarked about it to the cashier. Afterall, I had learned about the American laws here in this forum.
I went about my merry way and thought nothing of it.

Part 2
This late afternoon I went into the discount market again. As I entered I could already hear agitated voices, one sounding American, the other with a German accent. A few steps in I saw the storemanager, the teens from this morning, looking rather sheepishly, a woman, perhaps a mom or a chaperone and two police officers.
repeat
Woman: How dare you sell beer to 17 year olds!!1111!!eleventy!!11!!!
loudness of woman = loudness of woman + 1
Policeofficer: It's legal to sell beer to them.
patience of policeofficer = patience of policeofficer - 1
until "patience of policeofficer = 0"
Policeofficer, rather forcefully: The store did nothing wrong!
Woman: ARRGGGGGGLLLBLLLLAAAARGGLLLL // I couldn't even make out what she said!
Policeofficer: Stop it, or I'll arrest you! // He had the cuff already in hand.
Woman: ARRGGGGGGLLLBLLLLAAAARGGLLLL
And she flounced out with the teens in tow.

I could help laughing, the woman was screetching her demands, the policeofficer just kept explaining that there was no crime. I didn't even need a mindreading device so see that he was thinking: WTF!

A bit later I caught the storemanager and told her what I had seen in the morning, offering to be a witness, in case the woman tried something. In return I learned that things like that happened once in a while. Hamburg is a tourist destination and esp. younger tourists from the US like the German laws.

[Nunavut Pants]

Back in the Age of Dinosaurs when I was in college, my choir group used to get excited when we went on tour to different states. Because some of the ones we visited had not (yet!) adopted the 21-year-old drinking age, so basically all of us were legal where the age was 18.

Yes, there was some excitement.

But our director never pitched a fit about it. Nor did our parents, though to be fair our parents weren't along on tour with us.

[Racket_Man]

Back in the Age of Dinosaurs when I was in college, my choir group used to get excited when we went on tour to different states. Because some of the ones we visited had not (yet!) adopted the 21-year-old drinking age, so basically all of us were legal where the age was 18.

Yes, there was some excitement.

.

That same thing happened with me but I was just at the cusp of 18 when my state raised the drinking age and the state across the river was still 18 but I had no way to getting across said river.

AND on the senior class trip (I did not get to go *&*^%*(^&&^&&*^&^&* IT) they went to Hawaii which was 18 at the time

[CyberLurch]

That same thing happened with me but I was just at the cusp of 18 when my state raised the drinking age and the state across the river was still 18 but I had no way to getting across said river.

AND on the senior class trip (I did not get to go *&*^%*(^&&^&&*^&^&* IT) they went to Hawaii which was 18 at the time

I played the 'chase game' when I was younger. I turned 18 and could drink the 3.2 percent piss water they sold. 6.0 percent and hard alcohol was only available to the 21-and-older crowd.

Two months in, they raised the minimum drinking age to 19 for beer, but in a rare instance of compromise, they did away with 3.2 and it was all 6 percent, yay!

I was six months in when they raised it to 21 for everything. Oh, the howls of rage and despair from the college campuses!

Oddly enough, it didn't affect me the second time around. I had enlisted and at the time, if you were old enough to enlist, you were old enough to drink - provided it was at the E-club on base. Civilian rules applied if you went outside the fence, a few in my barracks found that out the hard way.

When I came home from the service, the legislature was making noises about raising the drinking age again - to 25 (!). I think every single college student in the state turned out to shoot that down so hard it left a crater....

[Mytical]

<clip> I think every single college student in the state turned out to shoot that down so hard it left a crater....

/off topic

One of my favorite sayings about 10 years ago was "Nuke em till they glow then shoot them in the dark."

Why? No clue.

/end off topic

[Deserted]

Oddly enough, it didn't affect me the second time around. I had enlisted and at the time, if you were old enough to enlist, you were old enough to drink - provided it was at the E-club on base. Civilian rules applied if you went outside the fence, a few in my barracks found that out the hard way.

That changed in the mid-90's, at least at Naval Station San Diego (where my ship was homeported). The main reason, at that place, was to keep the idiot kids on base, rather than going down to Tijuana to get wasted.

Of course, somebody decided it needed to be 21-and-over, and the rule changed. My thoughts (at the time) were, I'm old enough to smoke, old enough to vote, even old enough to die for my country... but not to drink? Eh, whatever, TJ is 40 minutes away by trolley.

[Slave to the Phone]

Oddly enough, it didn't affect me the second time around. I had enlisted and at the time, if you were old enough to enlist, you were old enough to drink - provided it was at the E-club on base. Civilian rules applied if you went outside the fence, a few in my barracks found that out the hard way.

When I enlisted we were still using Pterodactyls as delivery systems for bombs. There were beer machines in the barracks and beer dispensers at the mess halls. The mess hall beer went away about a year in my enlistment with many cries of outrage and distress.

[mathnerd]

That changed in the mid-90's, at least at Naval Station San Diego (where my ship was homeported). The main reason, at that place, was to keep the idiot kids on base, rather than going down to Tijuana to get wasted.

Of course, somebody decided it needed to be 21-and-over, and the rule changed. My thoughts (at the time) were, I'm old enough to smoke, old enough to vote, even old enough to die for my country... but not to drink? Eh, whatever, TJ is 40 minutes away by trolley.

For the low, low cost of a $5 round trip, the trolley still dumps you right at the Mexican border. Somebody didn't think through the drinking age thing. Keeping the idiot kids on base would have been a better idea than raising the age.

[Deserted]

I agree with you, but neither of us is the policy maker there.

[CyberLurch]

When I enlisted we were still using Pterodactyls as delivery systems for bombs. There were beer machines in the barracks and beer dispensers at the mess halls. The mess hall beer went away about a year in my enlistment with many cries of outrage and distress.

I just missed beer-vending machines when I arrived at school. I mean, they literally had JUST THE WEEK BEFORE removed them from the barracks and mess hall. There was much lamentation and gnashing of the teeth amongst the enlisted personnel.

There was, however, good reason for this action. See, drunk on duty is a serious, SERIOUS no-no. As is often the case, it only takes a handful to spoil it for everyone.

Interestingly enough, the rule did not disallow beer in the barracks - at least, not at first. You could bebop on down to the PX and buy tax-free, inexpensive beer and return to your barracks, carton in hand, haul it up to your room, and drink until you pass out. Just don't be on duty like that.

Then, once more, a scarce smattering of idiots got the whole thing 86'd.

[WishfulSpirit]

While I will never understand the appeal of drinking, I at that lady. Research the laws when you travel idjit. I assume Germany has disturbing the peace (or equivilant) laws. Maybe Officer Friendly's German cousin could have arrested her on those.

[BeeMused]

The policeofficer had the handcuffs out, cops from the famous Davidwache in St. Pauli have a no nonsense attitude, they have to, each weekend they need to control hordes of drunk people, it's a red-light district, and a party area, and (mostly) normal people like me live there. So what's one screeeeeeching American woman...

On the other hand, an arrest would have been fun to watch, as a native of St. Pauli I admit to harbour some resentment towards annoying tourists.

[Kit-Ginevra]

When I enlisted we were still using Pterodactyls as delivery systems for bombs. .

Are you Fred Flintstone? !

[Crai]

On the other hand, an arrest would have been fun to watch, as a native of St. Pauli I admit to harbour some resentment towards annoying tourists.

Anyone that has ever lived or worked in a Tourist town Harbours resentment towards the entitled annoying tourist. Yes we all love to watch them get their just rewards.

[Geek King]

On the other hand, an arrest would have been fun to watch, as a native of St. Pauli I admit to harbour some resentment towards annoying tourists.

What about us not-so-annoying ones? Germans have some really awesome cake too.