Who Taught You to Drink?

Why do some traditions become so deeply rooted that we stop asking where they came from? Through Punjabi alcohol culture, this essay explores how struggle, migration, identity, and belonging shape the rituals we inherit.

— Samantha Fortney, Unsplash 2020 —

The Bar Was the First Thing I Noticed

I took a deep breath before walking into the venue of our family friends’ wedding reception. Social gatherings are a place of joy and wonder for many, but for me, they’re just another one I have to get through without leaving early — or camping in the bathroom, staring at the wall.

I remember noticing how open it felt; the sky seemed endless, with large windows framing the sun resting its head for the day. The salwar I was wearing was a deep red, chosen quickly in my attempt to make it through another function. Itchiness. I felt it all over my body; I was prone to adjusting myself every 2 minutes, trying to escape the fabric clinging to my skin. My glasses only added to the frustration. My nose became a slip-n-slide for them to ride down on, forcing me to adjust them every second. To make matters worse, my beloved sister would shove a camera in my face before I had even recovered.

But before I noticed the sky, the itchiness, my slipping glasses, or the windows that opened the room to life, I noticed the bar.

The busiest corner of the venue was the bar. Everyone gathered there seemed to be having the time of their lives — laughing, talking, and creating memories that would later become stories. Yet I couldn’t help but wonder why this particular corner always seemed to attract people. The dance floor was well and alive. The dining area was filled with conversations between old friends and distant relatives. But somehow, everyone found their way back to the same place. Every few minutes, another uncle wandered over.

Whiskey. Scotch. Rum.

The bar had become a place to connect freely. And that was what fascinated me. How had something as simple as drinking become so deeply woven into the threads of our existence and celebration that people rarely stopped to question it?

Punjabi functions are often described through their abundance: music, colour, family, food, and celebration. Yet one element seemed to appear almost as consistently as the others: alcohol.

The family friend who was hosting the event was Sikh, as was pretty much everyone else who attended. Growing up, I was taught that the only intoxicant you should partake in is the ultimate source of spiritual bliss. My mom taught me about our holy scripture; there is a notable passage by Guru Amar Das Ji warning against the consumption of alcohol. It is stated that by drinking it and by partaking in the toxification of your body, it causes one’s intelligence to depart while madness enters unexpectedly.

Yet here I was, watching more than 75% of the attendees participate.

I used to chuckle when I thought about the blatant hypocrisy. Those who were drinking today at sundown would still be up at sunrise to recite prayers. At first, I honestly just assumed it was simple hypocrisy. But the older I got, the less satisfying that answer became. If nearly everyone around me was making the same contradiction, perhaps there was something larger at work than individual inconsistency.

It wasn’t just at the bar either. It was rooted everywhere in everything. I’ve seen it in my own home too. Even if it were someone coming over to our house, one of the first things they’d be offered is alcohol. We have bottles sitting out on display too, quietly collecting dust. I started to wonder if they’re displayed because of what is inside of them — or because of what they say about the people owning them.

This is an observation that led me to a deeper question I wanted answered. How does a community come to embrace practices that its own philosophy discourages, and what does that reveal about the power of history and culture? So I started to look at the ‘why’.

The Weight We Inherit

When I think about Punjabis as a whole, struggle is a topic bound to come to mind. Whether it was the 1984 massacre against Sikhs or the thousands of farmers who have committed suicide from rising debt costs and uncertain incomes, struggle alongside trauma is inherited, carried, and remembered. Our history is rooted in labour-intensive work and primarily agriculture; it wasn’t just mental but physical too. There’s been pain carried from each generation down — containing the struggles of life.

When my parents came here with no housing, income, or real community, struggle accumulated there too. Sometimes my mom would tell me stories about how she had to continue working through pregnancy — even when her mother died. Stories like that made me think deeper — it also gave way to another question. Throughout history, Punjabis have been no strangers to struggle; if a community has endured generations of hardship, what kinds of rituals develop to help people cope or simply keep going?

Many Punjabi families have histories shaped by events such as the partition, migration, economic hardship, and decades of political conflict. Trauma can influence emotional habits. Sometimes, it’s reflected in behaviours or emotional habits instead. “Lok ki khenge” — literally, “What will people say?” — is a phrase many Punjabis grow up hearing. It’s the fear of community judgement, of becoming a topic of conversation, of reflecting poorly on your family. It’s about people using your family as the subject of gossip, which can ultimately discourage people from seeking help or openly talking about mental illness. It’s kept private out of concern for family reputation, resilience, or simple survival, which makes sense as a collective community.

But what happens to emotions that are never given a place to exist? They don’t simply disappear. I began wondering whether, for some people, socially accepted rituals — like sharing a drink — can become one of the few spaces where vulnerability, connection, or even temporary escape feels permissible. Cultures can inherit pain, adapt to it, and unknowingly pass those adaptations down as traditions.

The Men Who Never Said They Were Tired

I think our history helps to explain why pain exists in the first place; masculinity could be a reason why some people have limited ways of expressing it. I began noticing that, for many of the men around me, emotional expression often had boundaries. Love was shown in ways that were honestly sometimes confusing. It was shown through sacrifice, and care was shown through providing. The biggest act of love my parents have provided me is leaving their own families and futures in Punjab — playing the gamble of life to raise us in Canada. Stress was usually shown through working even harder. But openly saying “I’m struggling” was much less common.

For many men I grew up observing, especially those from older generations, strength was expected, not something to admire in others. You weren’t praised for being strong; you were expected to be strong. To be defined as a good man, there were boundaries you had to follow. First, you had to provide for your family — making sure they were able to pursue any opportunities you couldn’t. Next, you had to endure hardships silently and remain composed through difficult times, no matter what they may be.

When I was younger, I could remember my own dad working gruelling hours and switching between jobs, with my mom trying to make our lives as full as they could be. I think a lot of the expectations of being a provider were clear as day for him, and it was something he had to complete. Emotions were usually replaced by action, and vulnerability was the most uncomfortable.

Alcohol seemed to be more socially acceptable where vulnerability wasn’t, but why? I think because it might create permission for people to be emotionally expressive. A man who may not normally say “I miss you” might say it after a few drinks; people who don’t normally talk about stress might open up. Alcohol is not there to cultivate emotions; they were always there, but it might just be lowering the barrier to get through to them.

Leaving Home, Carrying Culture

Earlier, I talked about migration. It’s the biggest act of love my parents showed me. They left somewhere they called home, one where their big families, lifelong friends, and colourful traditions lay. If I were faced with the same situation — moving to a new country with barely any support — I’m not sure I’d have the guts to do it, even if it were for a good cause.

I’m honestly not sure how my parents did it either. They spent a good portion of time without a home, staying with family until they could afford one. I look down at their shoes often, wondering if I could ever fill them — I would never come close. The number of sacrifices they made for my sisters and me is something I’m still not able to fathom today.

But that long journey comes with stress. Emotional stress from being faced with a double-edged sword — leave home and everything you’ve known and have a chance for a better future, or stay with your family. It also came with physical stress. The stress and pain of working on a blueberry farm in a new country doing physical labour, but also as a mother and father trying to make sure your child was okay, too. This was the reality of not only my parents but also many other Punjabi immigrants.

It’s not something simple like moving from one place to another. It also means leaving behind your roots: your friends; grandparents; neighbours that watched you grow up; and a language that didn’t need a middleman or translator. Along with a warm home, many immigrants also leave behind the quiet routines that made everyday life feel more familiar. When you arrive in a new region, you’re no longer surrounded by people who automatically understand your culture. Suddenly, preserving your identity requires high amounts of attention. Traditions naturally become something you start to seek out.

Because of that, community gatherings begin to matter much more. Weddings, family functions, and celebrations become more; they become a place where language is spoken freely. It’s where the culture is remembered and where people can feel briefly at home again. If alcohol were already present in many of those gatherings, its role might have become more deeply embedded than we think. It often became one of the rituals surrounding those moments of connection.

When Celebration Learns to Drink

That made me think more. Up until then, I’d been asking why people drank. I started asking a different question instead: when did they drink? The answer was surprisingly consistent. Alcohol wasn’t just present during hardship; it appeared during a lot of moments of celebration too. Whether it was weddings, birthdays, holidays, or family gatherings, all of them seemed to carry the same expectation. Somewhere along the way, celebration itself had become intertwined with drinking. How did those two ideas become so inseparable?

I don’t think it happened by accident. Like many traditions, the association is constantly reinforced. It’s present in the jokes we make, the stories we tell, and the media we consume. Over time, alcohol stops feeling like a choice attached to celebration and begins to feel like part of celebration itself.

I remember watching Karan Aujla’s Jameson music video when I was younger and thinking, alcohol cannot possibly be that good, like, absolutely no way. Yet there it was again, being celebrated, romanticized, and woven into another story about having a good time. I started realizing how often alcohol quietly appeared in the background of the cultural moments I consumed. The more I paid attention, the more I noticed it wasn’t just at weddings anymore. It was in lyrics, music videos, jokes, and conversations. The expectation wasn’t simply that people drank; it was that drinking belonged.

Culture, Faith, and Contradiction

I also realized that I was treating my culture and religion as if they were interchangeable. Punjabi culture and Sikhi? Absolutely weren’t. Sure, they do often overlap, especially in regions such as Punjab itself, but they are not the same thing. That distinction suddenly mattered.

Culture has a way of being like a sponge. It absorbs a lot of practices that don’t necessarily originate from religion. Over generations, communities develop customs that become so familiar they begin to feel inseparable from identity itself. The more I looked, the more I realized I wasn’t observing a mere contradiction, but rather two different systems of identity operating at once. One asked, “What does my faith teach?” The other asked, “What does my community do?”

What We Carry Into the Room

I thought about myself for a while too. Whenever I enter a function, my heart slowly dissipates. I cannot find joy when ten different anxieties fight for my attention. I wondered if that’s how a lot of others might feel too. Overwhelmed. Irritated. Frustrated. We all arrive carrying something different into the same room. Some carry grief. Others carry loneliness, homesickness, expectations, or exhaustion. If that’s true, perhaps alcohol isn’t simply the thing people are reaching for. Maybe they’re reaching for connection, relief, belonging, or even permission to be themselves for a little while without masking.

Now when I walk into another Punjabi function, I still notice the bar. I probably always will, and even more after writing this. But I’ll start to notice something else too. I’ll notice the sacrifices each person might’ve carried. The sacrifices that brought them all into that room. The culture they carried across oceans, the laughs they gambled. But most importantly, the traditions they inherited without ever asking where they truly came from.

Alcohol became a window into something much larger. It wasn’t just about what people were drinking, but also about what they were carrying as humans. History. Migration. Masculinity. Celebration. Identity. None of these explain every person or every story, but together they helped me see that traditions rarely appear without a past.

I’m still not a fan of going to large social gatherings, and you’ll still probably find me in the bathroom taking a couple of minutes or adjusting my glasses with a frustrated look on my face. But now, when I look around the room, I wonder less about the drinks in people’s hands and more about the stories they’re carrying with them.

July 25th, 2026: Sophia Dhami

Hi! I’m Sophia Dhami, a 16-year-old passionate about medical innovation and regenerative science. Right now, I’m working on ClotGuard, a project focused on using nanotechnology to detect and stop external bleeding — all completely autonomous. You can contact me at sophiadhami123@gmail.com!

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