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Drunk but Not Delinquent

For Czech teens, pubs are central to social life, but alcohol abuse is on the rise

Drunk but Not Delinquent
Photo: Will Sabel Courtney
By Katherine Bernard
Thu 24th Jan, 2008 [updated Mon 28th Jan, 2008]		 Add to favorites email print this article Stumble! del.icio.us digg this

This article first appeared in The Prague Wanderer, a web magazine produced by students at New York University in Prague.

Lukáš Voda, in his last year of high school, sits in front of his English class, describing the results of his research into recreational activities in his hometown.

He smiles at his own explanation of low-cost pubs in Hlinsko.

"If you want something to eat, you might get a good sausage there, if it is your lucky day. There are 50 pubs in town, so you can always go somewhere else."

His teacher interrupts: "Are you sure there are 50?"

"Yes," says Voda, 18, finally the age when drinking alcohol is legal in the Czech Republic, not that anyone ever checked. "I went to all of them."

Voda's assignment, to find out what young people do for fun in Hlinsko, revealed that 70 percent of his classmates drink at pubs every week. For the American visitors treated to Voda's presentation, the idea of high school kids at a bar spells trouble.

Remember the teen stars transformed with one drink into raging alcoholics on American television shows like Beverly Hills 90210? But in Europe, youth drinking is a part of mainstream culture.

In Central Europe in particular, the pub has been the main hub of adult social interaction for centuries. And in the Czech Republic, the pub -- and its incomparable beer -- has near-mythical status. This status is handed down to Czech teenagers like a national folktale.

Here in Hlinsko, a town about 75 miles east from Prague, the clash between popular American and Czech attitudes towards youth and alcohol is clear.

But the correlation between culture, youth and alcoholism is more mysterious.

Coming Up From the Basement
Voda stifles a laugh and pulls the sleeves of his Rammstein sweatshirt over his hands as continues his light-hearted commentary on Hlinsko nightlife.

He may be quick with a joke, but Voda is not a class clown.

He attends the best high school in his town; its 350 students took placement exams to get in, and once they graduate, 97 percent will attend college. For many students, that means moving to Prague, or perhaps another European city. Some aspire to go to the United States.

But in the United States, drinking in high school is seen as incompatible with academic success. US households commonly assign a taboo to high school alcohol consumption, and most parents forbid it.

Instead of socializing at pubs regularly, US teenagers drink in basements, parking lots, and houses where adults are away -- anywhere to escape from parental supervision. American teens tend to anticipate parties with alcohol as a chance to get inebriated, rather than a time to socialize.

According to the 2005 World Health Organization Global Report on Alcohol, 18.8 percent of Americans ages 12-20 were binge drinkers, compared to 17 percent in the Czech Republic.

So Czech youth have a better relationship to alcohol, right? Not exactly.

The same report stated that Czech youth ages 15-16 partake in heavy, episodic drinking (the consumption of five or more alcoholic beverages in a sitting), while only six percent of Americans ages 12-20 were heavy drinkers.

Still, according to the European Comparative Alcohol Study, conducted from 1950-2000, ethnic groups that encourage regular, controlled drinking yield lower rates of binge drinking and alcohol-related problems.

As for the big picture, the Center for Disease Control in the US states that five percent of the American population are "heavy drinkers," about half of the roughly 10 percent of Czechs who are "excessive drinkers," according to the website Alkoholik.cz.

Meanwhile, it may be that the nature of youth drinking is changing in the Czech lands, and not for the better.

Dr. Darina Stančíková, a psychiatrist who opened a detox center in Prague in March 2004 for children with alcohol abuse problems, told the Associated Press in 2006 that Czechs are starting to drink at a younger age, and the number of young people with alcohol problems is growing.

In the most recent WHO Health Behavior in School Age Children survey, covering the 2001-2002 period, the average age at which Czech youth reported first trying alcohol was 11, the youngest age of the 35 countries surveyed, including the United States.

However, American youth reported the youngest average age, 12, for their first episode of drunkenness. In this category, the Czech Republic had an older average age than the other former Eastern Bloc countries.

Drinking, the National Sport
Observing a local ice hockey practice, Voda remarks, "hockey is not the Czech national sport, it is drinking and watching hockey."

Lada Kusá, his English teacher, agrees.

"In the Czech Republic, drinking is considered fun -- something you do when you are young," says Kusá, who gave Voda the assignment to research the town's youth activities.

"This was the case as well before the revolution," says Kusá, referring to the peaceful ousting of the Communist government in 1989.

The pub was also a place to escape the drudgery of Communism.

Today's Hlinkso, with its well-tended main square, bustling Vietnamese clothing markets, and factory jobs, hardly seems like a place where the locals need to drown their sorrows in alcohol.

But since the fall of Communism, overall consumption of alcohol in the Czech Republic has increased by 10 percent.

"The situation here is worse than in the United States," says Dr. Karel Nešpor, head of the alcohol treatment center in Prague's Bohnice hospital. "There are fewer adults who abstain from drinking here, and adults set the example for young people."

Openness towards drinking in the Czech Republic may reduce lethal intoxication from binge drinking, but the percentage of young Americans abusing alcohol is declining, while in the Czech Republic, it is rising.

In Hlinsko, alcoholism is a term assigned only to the town's most extreme cases.

"That’s an alcoholic," Voda says, pointing to a thin man sitting in a pile of ploughed snow outside a bar. "Typical."

Later, at the pub with his friends, Voda laughs at photographs on his classmate's camera. The pictures show a student sleeping at his desk in class, drunk from lunchtime at the pub.

Most students only drink in the evenings, taking over tables at the pub with their friends, breaking to play pool or foosball.

Their parents "probably approve a bit because they can remember being the same way when they are young," Kusá says.

"When I was young, it was the same here in the town," says Kusá, who grew up in Hlinsko. "The way young people drink is the same as it used to be. They will stop this drinking at the age of 25 or 26 when they get careers because they have other things to worry about."

Older Czechs, however, may be more at risk of developing alcoholism than before. The rise in successful capitalists has been accompanied by a rise in alcoholics.

Before 1989, waiters, health workers, and workers in assembly plants were prone to heavy alcohol consumption, but now, Nešpor explained to Radio Prague, groups particularly at risk also include businesspeople and managers.

Stress and the overwhelming availability of alcohol are the strongest contributing factors.

The students at Hlinsko's most prestigious high school are typical of young Czechs who aspire to be successful businesspeople and managers, and explore life outside of their small town.

Vladimír Hrbek, 18, is an A student who hopes to attend college in Prague, and one day, travel abroad.

For now, he works with Voda at his uncle's shop, which sells appliances from the local ETA factory, the biggest employer in Hlinsko.

The boys handle deliveries all over the Czech Republic, and Voda proudly shows off his cell phone with GPS, while Hrbek, his dark hair pulled back into a ponytail, tries to find a word in English to describe his friend: an entrepreneur.

Hrbek knows the definition of alcoholism, his mother suffered from it for five years after his father died.

"I hate how much people drink here," Hrbek says at the pub, gesturing to scratches on Voda's forehead. "A drunk driver hit him when he was out delivering goods for work."

Between beers, Hrbek orders sparkling water, and laughs with his friends, who say he only goes for "really, really intelligent girls."

On his way home at night, he takes a path behind his neighbor's house. A drunken man is vomiting on the sidewalk out front.

"I don't like drinking, but I am Czech," Hrbek says. "What else am I supposed to do?"

RELATED LINKS
Alcoholism Rates in the United States
Alcoholism in the Czech Republic (in Czech)

Katherine Bernard is in her third year at New York University, studying journalism and art history. She is from Ellicott City, Maryland.


• This article first appeared in The Prague Wanderer, a web magazine produced by students at New York University in Prague
Article added on Thu 24th Jan, 2008 [last updated Mon 28th Jan, 2008]
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