BootsnAll Travel Community

now i love bali and have been there five times,but encountered a new scam just recently.
was in a bar and ordered a johnnie walker red but when i tasted it was not as i have had a few in my time and know what it tastes like
as we were in a bar where i knew one of the staff i told him and he was quite open about the fact that they produce the local scotch and put it in a johnnie walker bottle.
now you may like it(i didn't)but just be warned you will still be charged at the johnnie walker red price.
maybe this has been going on for ages but was definetly the first time i had encountered this.

Thanks Ida. We'll be there soon and one of the party is a Johnnie Walker Red drinker. Mind you, he douses it in coke so may not know the difference. At least he'll have been warned.

Hardly a scam. I'd have been most surprised if this hadn't been happening for years and besides, anyone who drinks his Scotch with Coke deserves the vilest of local brews.

My mother in law was doing this in her Oz pub 30 years ago, off to Payless to buy the no frills brands and decanting them into JW red and Bacardi bottles. She knew her customers and always kept a bottle of genuine Red Label on hand for the one or two who knew the difference. If, perchance, a knowing stranger or an uncharacteristically sober local picked the difference she would exclaim that the glass must have been previously been used for Ouzo and that the strong taste must have tainted the glass.

And further! When Courage Breweries opened in Melbourne my brother in law bought a truckload of their ales, feeling that it would inject a little variety into the drab lives of those who shared his community. Connoisseurs all, the local populace rejected this foreign brew as an abomination. Faced with ruin, Joe had but one choice. He put the Courage through the Carlton taps and no one ever noticed or complained.

So I'm not really surprised by this Balinese "scam". I think that it's probably been going on in much of the world for a long time. Three cheers for Balinese marketing enterprise! They've got to earn a quid too, so why shouldn't they emulate the success of western entrepreneurs.

But if they started refilling their Bintang bottles with Fosters, then I would be truly P***ed off.

I really think this has been going on for more than 30 years. Isn't this what Capone did and Jethro did with his home made stuff.
And about Courage beer, if that John Courage beer, I thought it was great. John

this could happen in any bar in the world...heck at my fraternity parties in college we would take grey goose bottles and fill them up with 9 dollar handles...pubs are no different...i think more than 60% of the time when I ask for a Jack and Coke in NYC or a bar I get cheaper stuff, probably Jim Beam or something to the like...damn I wish i owned a bar they make so much money

hmm this is new (for me), thanks for the heads up!