I had actually intended to watch the Friday prime time show on TVM till the very end on Friday 12 December, but unfortunately the foolish arguments that there are more social problems in the south than anywhere else messed up my plans and I decided to call it a day and curl up in bed with my cat Yogi Bear and lose myself in sleep.

It was obvious that these people had never come to see with their own eyes the social problems that existed in the lower part of Valletta. Debates of this sort that depict the Bormlizi as people of a lesser god always make me get jealous of Rip Van Winkle who slept for a hundred years.

I made a huge blunder though. I never got to hear whatever his name is had to say about the new drink on the market called... Cocaine.

Of all the names Mr whatever his name is had at his disposal to choose from, he had to choose that. No, not a fancy name that will not keep one up all night to imagine but the name of a drug, a drug which could be snorted, smoked or injected under the skin into a muscle or intravenously. How disgusting!

Here we are reading weekly if not daily reports of drug overdoses, drug-related deaths or drug trafficking and this bright spark had to choose the name of a drug to keep his bank account overflowing. Used as a drug, cocaine produces euphoric intense excitement so no, one does not need to pick the brain cells of the mind Sigmund Freud used to have to realise that the cocaine drink introducer hoped that the young ones would be literally queuing to get at the drink wondering if it would produce the same effect for less money than buying the drug itself.

What I fail to understand is how these kind of people, like the cocaine drink introducer, do not shrink from facing a television audience of parents and expect them to clap their hands in glee upon hearing of his ghastly invention especially if their son or daughter was the victim of cocaine addiction.

What kind of mind would dream up this kind of name for a drink which would no doubt urge the impressionable young, already addicted to some kind of drug or other, to rub their hands in glee at the mere mention of the name cocaine? I sincerely hope that this guy’s project will certainly never be allowed out on the market.

Over and over I have to keep repeating to myself, no, not sexy lexie, not even the name of my lovely putsy wutsy cat Yogi Bear but the name of a drug which many people are addicted to mainly because it is considered a substitute for a sexual partner. Cocaine, the name of a drink... I ask you!

Valerie Borg

Valletta