Me too petra. I didn’t know what to drink until I was 40 when I discovered gin and olives at the same time. Hurray! I love it now. We’ve just driven up from Portugal through Spain and France. I always assumed g & t was universal but no, apparently it’s unknown in France! We went out for a meal, asked for my usual, this horrible WARM drink arrived, took one sip and it was peach gin or something, vile! So I asked again for an ordinary gin and tonic, same again but with some ice. Then I asked again and specified no peach. A much smaller glass arrived which tasted like Martini! It was highly perfumed but not in a gin way. I simply couldn’t stomach it. I went to the bar and asked what gin they had. It was something called Gibson’s! I told them it tasted like Martini, much shaking of heads. In the end, I got a rush of blood, banged the glass down and said, it’s vile, I’m not drinking it and I’m not paying for it! The bill duly arrived sans gin and I just drank warmish water.
The next night, a different part of France, I just had a coke but looked at the bar and they had Gibson’s gin as well, nothing else. We went back to our hotel thinking at least we could get a drink now. The lady looked through all the dusty bottles on a high shelf, muttering gin, gin, gin. No luck, no gin at all! The salesperson for Gibsons must have had a ball but can you believe there isn’t a gin culture there at all?
We arrived home Tuesday night and 24 hours later, all this gin on the M6 we’d driven up. Do you think I’m being given a message?
