RANDOM REMINDER

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31586, 25 January 1968, Page 14

RANDOM REMINDER

HABIT

This may be a short story, but it is a reminder to us all of how hard habits die. The West Coast of the South Island is a romantic area, with more legends than inhabitants. But whatever history puts into perspective, the last legend to perish will be that the West Coasters start quaffing schooners of beer the moment they awake, and continue with this practice

throughout the day and most of the night. The aprocryphal stories tell of hotels which never shut their doors, of a complete disregard for the licensing laws of recent times, of competition among hotel proprietors to serve the most tempting 11 p.in. counter lunch. But there does seem to be a germ of truth in the suggestion that before late closing of hotels was introduced, there was a West

Coast hotel owner, here and there, who permitted his customers to remain after 6 p.m. But even then, some of the conventions had to be observed, doors would be closed, the blinds drawn, So it was that in a West Coast town on December 11, 1967, a black car drew up beside an hotel for one of the passengers to make a purchase in a shop nearby. The time? 6 p.m. And in the hotel, down came the blinds with a rush.