Do they have to be this big?

If I send two supersized cargo ship full of empty beer bottles, will they sent back a supersized beer ship fully loaded?

 

I'll repeat a sea story that happened to me. The Renown, a british sub, was in Port Everglades Florida the same time our sub was there. There was a crew exchange. Very shortly after this started, every cube of ice on our entire sub vanished in a few minutes. Our crew discovered that the British crew would barter a little of their rum ration for a lot of ice.....

 

Yep.

 

Ah, yes. Our meters now no longer take 5c coins, which is very annoying.

 

Beer, not soda.

It's gone on for a very long time - certainly since the 80s. A lot of it is because bottle manufacturing is quite energy-intensive. So they wanted to re-use, rather than recycle, beer bottles. Even today, you'll often find that your beer comes in a bottle that's quite scratched up.

The motivation was saving energy because China's electricity supply was inadequate. These days, the motivation is saving energy because of pollution and CO2 emissions.

There were some problems. The biggest thing was people hiding non-beer bottles in crates and getting back a deposit they shouldn't have got. If they got through QC (such as it was), they'd be refilled with beer. But something like a soy sauce bottle isn't strong enough to handle the pressure of fizzy beer. So a lot of people got injured by exploding bottles. These days, there are strict regulations making sure that re-used beer bottles are actually beer bottles.

Of course, the other beer packaging method in China is a special one.

In Qingdao, home of Tsingtao beer (Qingdao and Tsingtao are the same word, romanised differently), if you buy beer on the beach, it comes in a plastic bag with a straw. None of this deposit-bottle nonsense.

I haven't been to Qingdao, so I've never tried it. But it certainly looks like a stylish and classy way to serve beer.

 

They're missing a trick: they should put goldfish in there.

 

I don't recall the exact date, but you've got me beat by a few years. Not many, and you may have had a head start.

Beer in a bag? Ewww.....

 

It is my understanding that all ships of the United States Navy are dry (i.e. no alcohol), so it's not for no reason that any ships of The Royal Navy are warmly welcomed when on courtesy visits! Cheers (…hic!)

 

Then you are a smarter man than me.

 

This is the saddest sentence I have ever read.

 

That and the British subs of the time did not have any ice machines aboard(?). (Remember they were visiting FL in the summer, not home in Scotland)

 

Too bad.
That's what I love and hate about the UK all at once.

The US is a warmer and more arid climate (for now.) That's why our beer is so much lighter and colder than the excellent ales that you will find over on your side of the pond....but they're also a LOT cheaper, and you don't have to chat up an inn keep for a quarter hour to get them to pull you a pint.
There are advantages to each of course....

As pointed out above, a typical 24-oz serving of your second favorite carbonated beverage is going to have about 18-oz of ice in the US, whereas in the UK it will probably have one and ONLY one ice cube.

Face it.
We're different.

 

I like the way it is being delivered in the first pic.

 

In Taiwan, you get a glass that's full to the brim with ice, and you pour your beer over it. In part, that's because Taiwan is hot and humid in summer, and in part it's because getting the beer down to near freezing means you can hardly taste the formaldehyde.



In Mainland China, you get American-style lager, but warm. More and more restaurants are offering you the option of cold beer, though, thank goodness.

 

If you can't dispense your own soda, I guess you don't have any of the magic Coke machines with over 100 flavors.
Soda Machine | Coca-Cola Freestyle

 

what's with guiness and the new american style lager? blech.