My personal recommendations
Those who come to the UK might be surprised to learn that Wednesday is when everyone in uni and a large segment go out for alcohol at the pub. It is a time honoured UK tradition, and it is a quick way for new arrivals to make friends is to hang out at the pubs, not even to drink necessarily,
There have been plenty polls and surveys that indicate what the most popular drinking brands are. But some of my favourites are:
- Budweiser
- Heineken
- Blossom Hill White Wine
- Smirnoff Vodka
Stores like Asda, Morrisons, and Tesco are some of the places I go to most often, with discounts and sales and rollbacks. But drinking alone is not the way people in the UK tend to do it. I do, but generally speaking pubs are where people go to drink and socialise. If you want to keep costs down when doing this, popular pub brands in the UK include places like Wetherspoons (the most affordable and my personal go-to) or Greene King
Before I finish this blog post I want to be responsible and say that alcoholism is a serious problem. The UK is definitely not the exception. There are resources for getting help and I am going to list them.
- NHS Alcohol Support
- Alcohol Change UK
- Drinkaware
Never feel forced to drink if you do not want to. I explained above that social culture in the UK is heavily associated with pubs and thus, getting drunk by default, but never feel forced into it. You can still meet and socialise with people in the UK without drinking, and I am going to write a post soon explaining other ways in the UK you can meet with and socialise. I just felt it was important for me to say this in relation to drinking despite this post being how I go about it and explaining the culture around it to new arrivals.
