Social Evolution

Just read a story of an American lightweight boxer who fought in 1916 against the legendary Freddie Welsh, real name Frederick Thomas but born in Wales, who had his car pinched, it brought back to mind something that happened to me a few years ago. Brittany has calmed down now and pubs are closing here same as everywhere else, but when I arrived there were six or seven bars to each village, not counting the clandestine ones in certain isolated homes with a bottle on the table inside the door and the money going into the table drawer; twenty something establishments in the small towns and nearly every village had a night-club, with six in my nearest town of Karaez/Carhaix. I'd close the bar at 1 o'clock in the morning and go down there to relax, of course it wasn't always possible, one day I was hit over the head with a bottle of kronenbourg as I was standing at the bar and only woke up with the blows of the kicks into my ribs touching a nerve; I got to my feet, started punching the person who was responsible, then I was grabbed hold of by the bouncers who asked me to leave, they having missed the source of the conflict, anyway by the time I'd gotten outside the keys to my car were missing and I caught a lift home with the newspaper deliveryman who went from village to village in my direction, be that as it may however, that is not my story; as I was saying, I went for a few pints after work to a little nightclub near the canal in Karaez/Carhaix and when I decided I'd wound down enough I left to get my car in the car park, after a good look around I decided it wasn't there, went back in and mentioned it to a friend at the bar who asked me to describe it, after which he discreetly went to see someone; about a half an hour later I was approached by another person offering me back my car keys; "sorry Byn I wasn't to know it was yours." I was relieved to get my car back but angry it had been stolen, which didn't help the situation, because he was angry that I was angry because he had done me a favour in chasing after his friends to get it back and I wasn't showing any gratitude seeing as they had stolen it in the first place, we both let it drop and I drove home to bed. In those days, 30 to 35 years ago it was like the 'Wild West', we never saw the police, especially during the big holiday feasts like Christmas & New Year. Another time in another night club in Karaez I had a gun pulled on me, I tried to imagine how some Hollywood hero would react but put it out of my mind until the situation diffused itself. All of the clubs are now closed except for one that re-opened later to a different climate. The Breton culture is the fest-noz, never any trouble there but this is the countryside, with the restrictions and the necessity to drive it's no longer guaranteed to fill the coffers of a local charity by organizing a function on a saturday night and dancing and drinking right through to the early hours; we used to be many leaving at 5am, now there's no more catering for after 2.