What does a drink or spirit say about the culture where it is produced?
It doesn’t necessarily identify a country but it’s a great way to get under the skin of a local culture. Some wines, beers or spirits speak of certain customs and traditions. Some were integral to celebrations and traditional family gatherings. In Canada, for instance, one could take the Molson Canadian or the Labatt Blue and build cultural significance around them as the representative beers of our national phenomena: our obsession with hockey. In Japan, business is only conducted when business partners have had enough to drink. It is believed that intoxication can bring out the devil in one’s personality. And the sake—a slow, ceremonial drink—fits into this modus operandi. If you come to India to film, what drink would you profile? When The Thirsty Traveler comes to India, like we’re planning to soon, we’d have to make it a 1-hour special (laughs). It would be impossible to pick a single drink but I’d say feni, palm-wine and definitely Kingfisher! What about Old Monk? Haven’t tried i
