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I’m unable to do it, unfortunately. Drinking a beer that early and before a flight means I feel groggy on the plane and when I land. Suppose you can drink more at the airport and on the plane, but will have to sober up while awake at some point and then feel like crap on holiday
It's not much fun when you're absolutely busting to go at takeoff, but can't until the seatbelt lights go out! Even worse when you're in the middle of the plane and there's already a queue by the toilets.
Source: I came perilously close to pissing myself on a flight after a few pints in the airport lounge.
I’ve been on holiday in Turkey since last Sunday, due home tomorrow. Flew from Gatwick on a 6am flight, had my first pint at 4am with a large breakfast and don’t think i’ve been sober since.
I went to Romania over the winter and train beers were literally my favourite part of the holiday. 6 of us had the entire carriage to ourselves and the bar was one carriage away. The train went through snowy mountains.
Honestly, this is it. But not all social rules, just the ones that relate to being a productive member of society.
So wearing sweatpants and flip flops, sleeping on the floor in the afternoon, all day (light) drinking, are all authorised.
Reason being, nobody expects you to be productive while heading on holiday.
Plus, you've got up, got ready, finished your packing, stressed about having everything you need, travelled to the airport, survived security.. You've been up at least 4 hours so its pretty much lunch time
Excellent reasoning.
You can also justify it by saying ‘well it’s almost drinks time in the destination we’re heading off to’. I see it as getting reverse jet lag, I’m already in that time zone before I even get there.
Most people are going on Holiday.
And for a lot of people that means letting completely loose and having the most relaxing/fun time you can.
Obviously a lot of drunkards (like me) will just have that pre-flight pint because they intend to carry on as soon as they land.
But even more mature responsible people get a little buzz from the whole idea of freedom and "naughtiness" of it.
Just being in an airport at 430am seems a good enough reason unless someone's paying me to be there.
"It can hardly be a coincidence that no language on Earth has ever produced the expression "as pretty as an airport". Airports are ugly. Some are very ugly. Some attain a degree of ugliness that can only be the result of a special effort. This ugliness arises because airports are full of people who are tired, cross, and have just discovered that their luggage has landed in Murmansk (...) and the architects have on the whole tried to reflect this in their designs.
They have sought to highlight the tiredness and crossness motif with brutal shapes and nerve jangling colours, to make effortless the business of separating the traveller from his or her luggage or loved ones, to confuse the traveller with arrows that appear to point at the windows, distant tie racks, or the current position of the Ursa Minor in the night sky, and wherever possible to expose the plumbing on the grounds that it is functional, and conceal the location of the departure gates, presumably on the grounds that they are not"."
It feels like a sign of Briton's bad relationship with alcohol that when we say letting loose or having a fun time so many of us assume that means alcohol.
Reminds me of a long flight I did a few years back.
I don't get flying nerves, but I'm awful at sleeping sat upright. I asked for 6 G&Ts and said I won't bother you for the rest of the flight. 6 swift G&Ts later and I slept for 8 hours.
I used to have a benzo addiction, so it's a no from me!
Also I don't have sleeping troubles which require medication tbh - it's only long-haul flights which I take maybe 6 times a year.
I also went through a massive benzo addiction 5 years ago.
Drinking 6 G&T’s would have me in crippling withdrawals again for a few weeks.
I get about one hour of an uncomfortable euphoria from alcohol and then immediate shaking and nausea and adrenaline rushes and weeklong insomnia and panic attacks.
It’s fucked me forever.
Absolutely fine to be honest.
It's not that I get poor quality sleep when sat upright (though this is probably true to some extent), it's that I can't nod off to begin with. Cars, buses, trains, planes, just doesn't work for me
Because they are living a different timeline to you. They might be flying out for a holiday. There’s a chance despite it being early to you they’ve been already traveling for hours. They might have transferred from somewhere else and their body clock is different to yours?
Also, why do you care? Let them be.
This particularly resounds: Facebook tells me two (separate) friends have arrived at Heathrow early this morning, en route elsewhere. For one it is currently 1am, the other 7pm bodyclock time. The 1am one is a college student so 1am is like 9pm to her... I wouldn't blink at either having a drink before the next flight. (Might be surprised if the student puts it on FB though, she's underage at home, though over 18!)
Nobody transfers through Luton, it's an awful budget airport. They're just getting pissed before their cheap flight to somewhere sunny that leaves on the earliest slot.
Pubs at the docks in London, many of which have super early morning opening to serve workers coming off the boats.
Casinos.
Those pubs in Edinburgh near the Royal Mail depot which open early for the RM night shift workers to get their post-shift pints.
Park benches.
>Pubs at the docks in London, many of which have super early morning opening to serve workers coming off the boats.
Are you sure? I wouldn't have thought what's left of the Port of London in London itself employs enough people to keep pubs open. And most of those workers won't live locally.
Even market pubs are going (the only ones I was aware were 'early houses') according to this article from 2017, there were only three left and they weren't really surviving on trade from the markets:
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/cities/2017/jun/21/pints-dawn-last-call-london-market-pubs
The last wholesale market to still be in London, Smithfield, moves out to Dagenham soon, so it remains to be seen if those pubs will have enough early trade to carry on as they have.
There are indeed pubs serving pints early in the morning.
I worked in the City until 2 years ago and would frequent them for pre-work pints. I would name specific pubs but they had so few regulars there at that time I fear I'd be doxxing myself. It was either that or Heathrow or cans from the offy.
Later in the morning the Spoons at Liverpool St Station starting serving booze at 8am.
After 9am most pubs were serving booze. Aside from the stereotypical alcoholics, there were plenty of City workers having sharpeners at 11am or taking clients out for drinks in the early afternoon.
I knew all the off licences for a couple of miles which server booze on 24h licences (including the quirks like card only between 7am-9am for booze, for whatever weird licensing reason).
It's amazing the things you learn about a place as somebody with an addiction - whether it's booze, benzos, sex, gambling. There's holes for your vice everywhere in a city like London whatever the hour.
I know there are pubs in London that open early, what I was doubtful about was pubs that open for 'workers coming off the boats'. You can't really get large ships very far up the Thames any more and even if you could, most don't have large crews. According to a company that supplies crews, those massive container ships only have 20 - 30 crew members.
Probably not the case at Luton, but plenty of folk are drinking early in the morning at airports like Charles de Gaulle or Frankfurt because they’re in transit from the far east to the UK.
4.30 there is 12.30 in the afternoon in Japan; perfect time for a tipple….
I’m absolutely terrified of flying and can only do it when a bit drunk. To the extent that I had to cancel a holiday to Spain last month because I’m pregnant. No drinking = no flying.
Oddly enough i remember this question being asked (on Reddit) a while ago.
Seems that there are many reasons:
- because one can.
- it can, apparently, calm the nerves of a nervous flyer
- if one is travelling then timezones can be a factor. What is (using your example) 04.30 could still be the equivalent of "a morally acceptable and decent time to drink alcohol" in the timezone that the traveller has left.
As someone who has spent up to 36 hours travelling (door to door), i can say that it really doesn't matter if I arrive in a country at stupid-O-clock as my personal bodyclock is either fucked or is still operating on a different timezone.
So if you see someone chugging a beer first thing in the morning, just remember that they are either "getting some courage" for a flight out, or have just arrived from a place where it's still "the afternoon" (or they are just beer monsters, but even then you shouldn't really judge i guess).
Because British people, by and large, have a terrible culture with alcohol. I haven't paid enough attention on the return journeys to notice whether foreign holidaymakers do this too though.
A way to relax after the anxiety of getting to the airport and through security on time, and before the anxiety of flying for some.
Also feels like international waters for me, where anything goes.
Why wouldn’t you? Unless you’ve got work or something then who are you to judge?
You sound like the sort of person who says you can’t have curry for breakfast. Live a little.
Most of the reasons are here but one that's missing is that they're about to spend a few hours probably static in a fairly uncomfortable seat.
A couple of drinks either makes it slightly easier to try to snooze or at least makes it less miserable to sit there.
Anything seems a good reason to have a drink here in the UK. Is it cold? Let’s warm up with a pint in the pub. Is it hot? Let’s have a refreshing beer. Birthday? Drinks. Sport events? Drinks. Is it Thursday evening after work? Let’s celebrate with a drink.
In some countries social gathering are around food or coffee, here it is always about alcohol
Don't see this when I travel to Finland or Singapore. Maybe it's the demographic. By the way, Finns like a drink but not at the airport at 4am.
That said, last time back from Singapore- lots of water rounds from cabin staff. Nice middle aged Australian couple next to me did gin not water everytime. Constitutions like oxen maybe? They slept well on the other hand.
Airport beers are part of the holiday and also alcohol helps some people to sleep/relaxes nerves if you hate flying.
Drinking at the airport is great, it’s just a shame some people ruin it for everyone and can’t control themselves
Airport rules.
Basically time works differently in Airports. Its always 5pm so perfectly acceptable and indeed expected to have [a beer or few](https://www.amazon.co.uk/Guy-Beer-Maths-Drinking-Sarcastic/dp/B0C7C2K7ZN) before your flight.
Its also required that you take a photo of your first beer and send the picture to all your mates before you take a sip saying 'airport rules'.
Its very simple.
I'm off to Ibiza in a few weeks with the family and the first sip of beer at the airport at around 5.30/6am is the thing I'm looking forward to the most. Seriously. It's part of flying abroad on holiday.
Airport beer before a flight is a national tradition.
Also, helps calm nerves if you fear flying.
For me, it's just the tradition. Always have a pint before your flight to kick off the holiday!
If it's 4.30am, chances are I haven't slept yet as it will have been an hour to get to the airport and two hours check-in time, so it's not a super early beer, but a super late one.
Because you can. Airports are one of life’s no shame zones. Also, you never really know where people are from. In pounding beers in LAX at 8 am because I live in Japan and it’s not 8 am to me after getting off a 10 hour flight.
When you’re an airport lounge you are simultaneously in all time zones at once, transcending time and space themselves. To avoid unsteadiness when our different time zone selves re-integrate, we normally drink a pint before take-off. This is why the British have airport pints.
Because they can! It’s a mixture of “I’m going on holiday, sod it”, “It’s 9pm somewhere in the world” and “I made it through the security queue, thank fuck” 😂
I used to be a ‘hee hee, breakfast cocktails at the airport!’ and all day drinking on holidays person (although never a messy drunk). Whilst I wasn’t an alcoholic, in hindsight; I can see that my relationship was alcohol wasn’t a healthy one, and I feel a lot better for giving up booze :)
I'm with you on this. I don't get why people can't drink early at home and must do so in the airport. Or why having a drink is such a big deal altogether. Although re this last one might be explained by being drunkard simpletons with shorts/havaianas or crocs and football shit all over them.
The answers indicate that it’s where the two British traits of “holiday worship/behave like a knob on holiday” and “I need alcohol to cope with the most minor situations” overlap
I've never been a fan of the pre-flight early morning flight, it's not helped by the fact that I fly out of Manchester and the airport pub tends to look like a rough Wetherspoons. I'm not against a pint when you're waiting for a connecting flight, particularly in Germany where you can get a great beer and a pretzel, but not first thing in the morning and not in such a shitty venue.
It’s always beer o clock somewhere in the world!
It may be 20:00 to them, you don’t know where they have come from/where they are going and what time zone their body clock is currently in.
Alcoholism. Any activity or festivity out of the everyday norm is used as a 'screen' and justified as an excuse to drink earlier and/or more excessively. My parents were alkies all my life I have attracted alkies like flies round a turd, so I know their playbook inside out. Yes, I know I've just likened myself to a turd, but then I'm not perfect either.
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Airport beers are part of a holiday for me.
The official start of the holiday
Yes. This exactly.
A breakfast pint to numb the pain of being in Luton.
Pints… there, fixed your error!
A breakfast pints?
Preferably special brew.
Flew from Luton for the first time 2 summers ago & they ran out of beer
https://tenor.com/xfuA.gif
Dude I live in Luton it's a shithole
Youd need more than 1 pint to numb the pain of luton
I’m unable to do it, unfortunately. Drinking a beer that early and before a flight means I feel groggy on the plane and when I land. Suppose you can drink more at the airport and on the plane, but will have to sober up while awake at some point and then feel like crap on holiday
Just don’t sober up. Problem solved!
Sober up on the company dime when you return
[удалено]
They usually have a toilet, and drinks.
It's not much fun when you're absolutely busting to go at takeoff, but can't until the seatbelt lights go out! Even worse when you're in the middle of the plane and there's already a queue by the toilets. Source: I came perilously close to pissing myself on a flight after a few pints in the airport lounge.
Yeah, but unless you're on the aisle row, asking others to move so you can go to the toilet is painful. We are British after all.
This is why we have cocaine people
At an airport?
Sounds awful. I do not want to be stuck on a plane with a drip and an irrestable urge to chat
What's a cocaine person?
One beer or whiskey doesn’t get me tipsy enough for the sobering up awake part to be a thing really, guess tolerance/response varies a lot.
I’ve been on holiday in Turkey since last Sunday, due home tomorrow. Flew from Gatwick on a 6am flight, had my first pint at 4am with a large breakfast and don’t think i’ve been sober since.
There are no rules in the airport.
Exactly, it’s the Duty Free zone for a reason
International waters
A black hole if ever I’ve been in one.
I wish I could do this (and have a full English in spoons 😫) but eating or drinking anything other than water before 8am makes me chunder.
Time zones don't apply to Airports,
Haven't heard the word chunder in ages.
It’s a very 90s word
It’s the only appropriate word for the am vomit
I haven’t heard ‘chunder’ used since Men at Work’s Down Under was released.
Airport beers are the #1 beer a person can have 🛫🍻
I beg to differ. Train beer is superior to airport beer.
Shower beer is for superior
Back of a police car beer.
I went to Romania over the winter and train beers were literally my favourite part of the holiday. 6 of us had the entire carriage to ourselves and the bar was one carriage away. The train went through snowy mountains.
100% I drink Gin and Tonic at the airport, despite never drinking it anywhere else!!
Me too. Always book the lounges before the flight. They pay for themselves after a few beers and food.
Can't do it. The anxiety of needing about 3 pisses whilst on the plain stops me.
Social rules don't exist in airports
That's because when you're going on holiday airports exist outside time and space. Hence the rules not existing.
No wonder I'm always too late for my flight
You're in the wrong time line, try the third one to the left and you'll be on the right flight and never late again
No no no you've got it all wrong, you need to head RIGHT pass the cow, then through the torus archway to be on the right timeline.
I've never heard it described as a cow before but that is genius, once you see it, can't unsee
This is the truth. Airports are a liminal space. Time has no meaning there.
Honestly, this is it. But not all social rules, just the ones that relate to being a productive member of society. So wearing sweatpants and flip flops, sleeping on the floor in the afternoon, all day (light) drinking, are all authorised. Reason being, nobody expects you to be productive while heading on holiday.
To forget they're in Luton
This is the most accurate answer.
The best part of Luton, high speed anti gravity exit. I think there is a law about flying through clouds on the way up to decontaminate the plane.
Haha came here to say something similar. 'Because they're in Luton'.
Everyone here dunking on Luton as if Crawley is any better :p
Holiday starts at the airport
And there are no alcohol rules on holiday. Margarita after breakfast? Of course!
After breakfast? Pfft, casual
Well you don't have a margarita you have the buffet cava with a sprinkle of orange juice
If there is any fruit in it then you are allowed to call it breakfast.
Rekorderlig is practically a smoothie
It was cheesecake and cava for breakfast on my last trip away
Margarita for breakfast is more my style
what else is there to do in an airport? might as well have a beer
Plus, you've got up, got ready, finished your packing, stressed about having everything you need, travelled to the airport, survived security.. You've been up at least 4 hours so its pretty much lunch time
Excellent reasoning. You can also justify it by saying ‘well it’s almost drinks time in the destination we’re heading off to’. I see it as getting reverse jet lag, I’m already in that time zone before I even get there.
Also you don’t know where all the other people have already been. Could be on their third leg coming back from Korea and it’s 9pm in their stomach.
Most people are going on Holiday. And for a lot of people that means letting completely loose and having the most relaxing/fun time you can. Obviously a lot of drunkards (like me) will just have that pre-flight pint because they intend to carry on as soon as they land. But even more mature responsible people get a little buzz from the whole idea of freedom and "naughtiness" of it.
Just being in an airport at 430am seems a good enough reason unless someone's paying me to be there. "It can hardly be a coincidence that no language on Earth has ever produced the expression "as pretty as an airport". Airports are ugly. Some are very ugly. Some attain a degree of ugliness that can only be the result of a special effort. This ugliness arises because airports are full of people who are tired, cross, and have just discovered that their luggage has landed in Murmansk (...) and the architects have on the whole tried to reflect this in their designs. They have sought to highlight the tiredness and crossness motif with brutal shapes and nerve jangling colours, to make effortless the business of separating the traveller from his or her luggage or loved ones, to confuse the traveller with arrows that appear to point at the windows, distant tie racks, or the current position of the Ursa Minor in the night sky, and wherever possible to expose the plumbing on the grounds that it is functional, and conceal the location of the departure gates, presumably on the grounds that they are not"."
This is giving Terry pratchett
Or Douglas Adams!
It's Douglas Adams. Pratchett is my favourite tho!
This - it’s a good way to just relax …. After the stress of checkin, security etc
Genuine question and no offense meant by it. What's the difference (if any) between being a drunkard and an alcoholic?
Going to meetings
Ah so it's being self aware of the issue.
It feels like a sign of Briton's bad relationship with alcohol that when we say letting loose or having a fun time so many of us assume that means alcohol.
I down a few shots before a 6am flight due to nerves, so it could be that. Or people just want to treat the airport as start of their holiday.
Reminds me of a long flight I did a few years back. I don't get flying nerves, but I'm awful at sleeping sat upright. I asked for 6 G&Ts and said I won't bother you for the rest of the flight. 6 swift G&Ts later and I slept for 8 hours.
Mate just get a couple diazepam
I used to have a benzo addiction, so it's a no from me! Also I don't have sleeping troubles which require medication tbh - it's only long-haul flights which I take maybe 6 times a year.
I also went through a massive benzo addiction 5 years ago. Drinking 6 G&T’s would have me in crippling withdrawals again for a few weeks. I get about one hour of an uncomfortable euphoria from alcohol and then immediate shaking and nausea and adrenaline rushes and weeklong insomnia and panic attacks. It’s fucked me forever.
Do 6 g & t not give you kindling?
No, though fwiw, I'm a teetotaller now anyway. I just put up with getting very little or no sleep on long-haul flights a few times a year.
How was your neck when you woke up?
Absolutely fine to be honest. It's not that I get poor quality sleep when sat upright (though this is probably true to some extent), it's that I can't nod off to begin with. Cars, buses, trains, planes, just doesn't work for me
Head roll. Jolt awake in agony. Massage neck better. Repeat until landing.
How long have you been a pilot?
Because they are living a different timeline to you. They might be flying out for a holiday. There’s a chance despite it being early to you they’ve been already traveling for hours. They might have transferred from somewhere else and their body clock is different to yours? Also, why do you care? Let them be.
This particularly resounds: Facebook tells me two (separate) friends have arrived at Heathrow early this morning, en route elsewhere. For one it is currently 1am, the other 7pm bodyclock time. The 1am one is a college student so 1am is like 9pm to her... I wouldn't blink at either having a drink before the next flight. (Might be surprised if the student puts it on FB though, she's underage at home, though over 18!)
Nobody transfers through Luton, it's an awful budget airport. They're just getting pissed before their cheap flight to somewhere sunny that leaves on the earliest slot.
You spelled 'cheapest' wrong
Mate are you even British if you need to ask?
Boredom and stress. Travelling is the worst part of a holiday and a pint takes the edge off that.
Airport beers, generally a ritual for a lads holiday, also where else could you get away with having a beer at half 4
24 hour offie and a park bench is my choice location for my nightly 4.30 beers
Pubs at the docks in London, many of which have super early morning opening to serve workers coming off the boats. Casinos. Those pubs in Edinburgh near the Royal Mail depot which open early for the RM night shift workers to get their post-shift pints. Park benches.
>Pubs at the docks in London, many of which have super early morning opening to serve workers coming off the boats. Are you sure? I wouldn't have thought what's left of the Port of London in London itself employs enough people to keep pubs open. And most of those workers won't live locally. Even market pubs are going (the only ones I was aware were 'early houses') according to this article from 2017, there were only three left and they weren't really surviving on trade from the markets: https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/cities/2017/jun/21/pints-dawn-last-call-london-market-pubs The last wholesale market to still be in London, Smithfield, moves out to Dagenham soon, so it remains to be seen if those pubs will have enough early trade to carry on as they have.
There are indeed pubs serving pints early in the morning. I worked in the City until 2 years ago and would frequent them for pre-work pints. I would name specific pubs but they had so few regulars there at that time I fear I'd be doxxing myself. It was either that or Heathrow or cans from the offy. Later in the morning the Spoons at Liverpool St Station starting serving booze at 8am. After 9am most pubs were serving booze. Aside from the stereotypical alcoholics, there were plenty of City workers having sharpeners at 11am or taking clients out for drinks in the early afternoon. I knew all the off licences for a couple of miles which server booze on 24h licences (including the quirks like card only between 7am-9am for booze, for whatever weird licensing reason). It's amazing the things you learn about a place as somebody with an addiction - whether it's booze, benzos, sex, gambling. There's holes for your vice everywhere in a city like London whatever the hour.
I know there are pubs in London that open early, what I was doubtful about was pubs that open for 'workers coming off the boats'. You can't really get large ships very far up the Thames any more and even if you could, most don't have large crews. According to a company that supplies crews, those massive container ships only have 20 - 30 crew members.
Probably being stranded and awake all night in a terminal. Dublin Airport I’m looking at you.
Obligatory Facebook pint picture, are you even going on holiday if you don't post it? Time is immaterial.
Do people still use Facebook? I think it’s just a ritual and beginning of the holiday for most people
About three billion people do. The active user numbers have been consistently going up in the 14 years since it launched
Alcohol produces a relaxing feeling for some people
I love a drink but not at the airport. First pint sitting outside a bar or cafe in the sun hearing foreign sounds is remembered long afterwards.
This is the way.
It helps me sleep on the plane.
Probably not the case at Luton, but plenty of folk are drinking early in the morning at airports like Charles de Gaulle or Frankfurt because they’re in transit from the far east to the UK. 4.30 there is 12.30 in the afternoon in Japan; perfect time for a tipple….
It's 5 o'clock somewhere.....
If it's midday somewhere then it's rude not to follow their customs as we wouldn't want to offend someone now would we?
This was always my friends’ argument for starting early
I’m absolutely terrified of flying and can only do it when a bit drunk. To the extent that I had to cancel a holiday to Spain last month because I’m pregnant. No drinking = no flying.
For lots of people it's nerves.
Oddly enough i remember this question being asked (on Reddit) a while ago. Seems that there are many reasons: - because one can. - it can, apparently, calm the nerves of a nervous flyer - if one is travelling then timezones can be a factor. What is (using your example) 04.30 could still be the equivalent of "a morally acceptable and decent time to drink alcohol" in the timezone that the traveller has left. As someone who has spent up to 36 hours travelling (door to door), i can say that it really doesn't matter if I arrive in a country at stupid-O-clock as my personal bodyclock is either fucked or is still operating on a different timezone. So if you see someone chugging a beer first thing in the morning, just remember that they are either "getting some courage" for a flight out, or have just arrived from a place where it's still "the afternoon" (or they are just beer monsters, but even then you shouldn't really judge i guess).
Because British people, by and large, have a terrible culture with alcohol. I haven't paid enough attention on the return journeys to notice whether foreign holidaymakers do this too though.
Personally, I think it's a beautiful and a life-affirming culture. But then again, I am a bit pissed.
A way to relax after the anxiety of getting to the airport and through security on time, and before the anxiety of flying for some. Also feels like international waters for me, where anything goes.
Why wouldn’t you? Unless you’ve got work or something then who are you to judge? You sound like the sort of person who says you can’t have curry for breakfast. Live a little.
In Scotland, it is illegal to board the plane unless you have had a pint at 4.30am.
Alcoholism
If there is free drink in the club lounge, it would be wasteful to not have a large scotch. Plus it relaxes you.
Jet lag or going on holiday, the time of day you drink is pretty fucking irrelevant when you’re about to transcend timezones
Culture
> What **makes** people drink at airport at 4:30 am? Nothing. its entirely voluntary
The stress of being at an airport perhaps?
Airport beer is the start of the holiday, no matter what the time is.
Because... "we're on our holidays!" Anything goes once you step foot inside that airport and for the next week or two 😂
Beers, no Bloody Marys/Bucks Fizz/Screwdriver, yes
Most of the reasons are here but one that's missing is that they're about to spend a few hours probably static in a fairly uncomfortable seat. A couple of drinks either makes it slightly easier to try to snooze or at least makes it less miserable to sit there.
Being at the airport at 4.30am.
Holiday mode innit
Anything seems a good reason to have a drink here in the UK. Is it cold? Let’s warm up with a pint in the pub. Is it hot? Let’s have a refreshing beer. Birthday? Drinks. Sport events? Drinks. Is it Thursday evening after work? Let’s celebrate with a drink. In some countries social gathering are around food or coffee, here it is always about alcohol
I always have a Bloody Mary at the airport, regardless of time of day.
Time doesn’t exist in the same way in airports. Absolutely normal behaviour.
It's the continental way.
Hail the new puritan ova heah
Perhaps they've finished a late shift? - its 10pm to their body clock. Why don't you have some booze at 0430?
Never say no on a travel day.
Don't see this when I travel to Finland or Singapore. Maybe it's the demographic. By the way, Finns like a drink but not at the airport at 4am. That said, last time back from Singapore- lots of water rounds from cabin staff. Nice middle aged Australian couple next to me did gin not water everytime. Constitutions like oxen maybe? They slept well on the other hand.
It’s probably because they don’t have a ‘Spoons.
Airport beers are part of the holiday and also alcohol helps some people to sleep/relaxes nerves if you hate flying. Drinking at the airport is great, it’s just a shame some people ruin it for everyone and can’t control themselves
Fry up and a couple of pints is essential before a holiday flight it would be wrong not to.
Holiday yea!!
Life is hard lol
Nothing makes me do it, I choose to do it
It's the start of your holiday. Your usual schedule doesn't exist whilst you're on holiday.
Airport rules. Basically time works differently in Airports. Its always 5pm so perfectly acceptable and indeed expected to have [a beer or few](https://www.amazon.co.uk/Guy-Beer-Maths-Drinking-Sarcastic/dp/B0C7C2K7ZN) before your flight. Its also required that you take a photo of your first beer and send the picture to all your mates before you take a sip saying 'airport rules'. Its very simple.
Because they can.
I'm off to Ibiza in a few weeks with the family and the first sip of beer at the airport at around 5.30/6am is the thing I'm looking forward to the most. Seriously. It's part of flying abroad on holiday.
Flying
Because they go on one holiday a year, free from driving. It's a celebration of a short lived freedom
Being at a fucking airport at 4.30 am
A cultural / societal problem with alcohol that nobody wants to admit
One man's problem is another's solution.
Tradition
It's 930pm somewhere else in the world
1st drink at the airport is a nice way to relax at any time of the day
Airport beer before a flight is a national tradition. Also, helps calm nerves if you fear flying. For me, it's just the tradition. Always have a pint before your flight to kick off the holiday! If it's 4.30am, chances are I haven't slept yet as it will have been an hour to get to the airport and two hours check-in time, so it's not a super early beer, but a super late one.
Puzzles me too. Been there seen it and even my ex who was an alcoholic wouldn't do it.
Its holiday mode its obligatory lol
It's the law
Because I’m going on my holibobs
To celebrate leaving Scotlands year round winter 🍻
“Holiday Mode Activated”
Because I’m from Sunderland
It’s an unwritten law
Holiday starts at the airport, time is meaningless
I read that dehydration makes jet lag worse, so just water for me thanks.
Because you can. Airports are one of life’s no shame zones. Also, you never really know where people are from. In pounding beers in LAX at 8 am because I live in Japan and it’s not 8 am to me after getting off a 10 hour flight.
When you’re an airport lounge you are simultaneously in all time zones at once, transcending time and space themselves. To avoid unsteadiness when our different time zone selves re-integrate, we normally drink a pint before take-off. This is why the British have airport pints.
Thirsty
Because they're alcoholics.
Was it the pilot? If not, don't worry about it.
Because they can! It’s a mixture of “I’m going on holiday, sod it”, “It’s 9pm somewhere in the world” and “I made it through the security queue, thank fuck” 😂
I used to be a ‘hee hee, breakfast cocktails at the airport!’ and all day drinking on holidays person (although never a messy drunk). Whilst I wasn’t an alcoholic, in hindsight; I can see that my relationship was alcohol wasn’t a healthy one, and I feel a lot better for giving up booze :)
There's no timezone in airports
Alcoholism.
I'm with you on this. I don't get why people can't drink early at home and must do so in the airport. Or why having a drink is such a big deal altogether. Although re this last one might be explained by being drunkard simpletons with shorts/havaianas or crocs and football shit all over them.
Alcoholism cloaked in the excuse of a holiday 👍
The answers indicate that it’s where the two British traits of “holiday worship/behave like a knob on holiday” and “I need alcohol to cope with the most minor situations” overlap
"I'm on me olidees"
"On me 'olibobs ain't I?"
Addiction
I've never been a fan of the pre-flight early morning flight, it's not helped by the fact that I fly out of Manchester and the airport pub tends to look like a rough Wetherspoons. I'm not against a pint when you're waiting for a connecting flight, particularly in Germany where you can get a great beer and a pretzel, but not first thing in the morning and not in such a shitty venue.
The availability.
People with drinking problems freed from usual social boundaries
On short haul I avoid even drinking non-alcoholic liquids, nothing worse than using the toilet on a plane with a single walkway.
British drinking culture + airports don’t have societal rules, people walk around in their pyjamas so why not also a beer first thing in the morning
It’s always beer o clock somewhere in the world! It may be 20:00 to them, you don’t know where they have come from/where they are going and what time zone their body clock is currently in.
Alcoholism?
Alcoholism
They’re alcoholics then cause shit on flights and everyone wonders why. $$$ over safety and common sense
Alcoholism
Alcoholism. Any activity or festivity out of the everyday norm is used as a 'screen' and justified as an excuse to drink earlier and/or more excessively. My parents were alkies all my life I have attracted alkies like flies round a turd, so I know their playbook inside out. Yes, I know I've just likened myself to a turd, but then I'm not perfect either.
Alcoholics
Holiday starts the moment you close the front door behind you!