The Akrotiri Pig
Having read a few of the foregoing inputs to this thread, the subject of the Akrotiri Block bar brings back some seriously amusing thoughts. I was posted to Akrotiri in August 1973. A Jnr Tech it was my second posting since leaving Halton. I was still single at this point and was accommodated in a four man room in the old, sub standard side of the accommodation area. Whilst the posh side had the Peninsular Club etc, we had a WRVS club (home of the weekly country club) and NAAFI bar. All good stuff, but I digress.
The room I was alloted was shared with two, like myself, hard working, learning to drink fellow airmen Gary and John, both SACs working on Bomber wing. Gary a Radio Mech, John an Airframe Mech. The fourth bed space in the room had an empty locker and bed. Stay with me, it's relevant! It's about two weeks before Christmas 1973 and Gary and John have gone out for a night in Limassol. We had been discussing a theme for a block bar, none of the other rooms in the block had plans for one, and we thought, with having the spare bed space we could do something. Saturday morning, I wake up alone. No Gary or John, an all nighter was not that unusual. And then they arrived.
Gary had a sack over his back, in it was a "spaniel" sized pig that was screaming away like a banshee. Still obviously the worse for wear from the night out they explained the plan. We were to enter the block bar competition as "The Pigs Bar", complete with authentic pig. Jackie Grunt, as we came to know him was corralled in the spare bed space using packing cases etc. a rough bar was put together and the whole block contributed to the purchase of bar stock. Jackie Grunt was fed on a daily basis from leftovers everyone scrounged from our "sub standard" mess. All was well, he even settled into a routine after a couple of days and allowed us to sleep at night. My previous experience of working on a farm ensured the room didn't get too "whiffy". Fame began when a whole VC10 crew arrived to see the pig, it seems that somehow it had got back to Brize, they duly had a crew photo at the bar, and off they went. Over the following days/nights we had Hercules and Brittania crews visiting from the UK, plus many local Squadron Crews 9, 35, 56, 70 and 84.
Christmas Eve arrived, as I remember a Monday, and judging day for the block bars. The Station Commander, Air Commodore D P Hall, was to visit as many bars as possible, and select the best. As we had finished work at our usual 1300 hours, the bar was in full swing, with Gary deciding to allow Jackie Grunt a pint of Keo (or two). With loud Beatles stuff coming from the record player, it was going a treat. Around 1900 "the Staish" arrived to check us out. It was only as he walked in that we realised two things. His wife was accompanying him and the pig had stopped oinking. In fact the pig, by now as drunk as a (Skunk)? had collapsed in the middle of the floor, lying alongside him, bollock naked and an arm around Jackie was Gary, happily out of his tree. "The Staish" and wife graciously accepted a swift half, said not a word about the pig and the airman on the floor and then made their exit, what a Lady and Gentleman. The Sgt Policeman who arrested Gary, for attempted bestiality, was not so gentlemanly and off they went to the guardroom for the formal procedure. The pig lasted until the new year, when the RAFP obviously remembered that there had been a pig involved. I believe that the Station Commander had intervened in charges, and Gary was let off with a warning. A week later he and John were given 24 hours to remove the pig from the unit. Which they did.
I'm sorry to drift from the serious topic of the drinking culture, but mention of the Akrotiri Christmas block bars brought that back to me. I don't know if anyone remembers the " Akrotiri Pig", I certainly remember it, the crews from all over who had to "see it to believe it", and did, would surely remember it. I heard at the time that it had been mentioned in both the Lyneham Globe and the Brize Gateway ? Magazines. 4 months later, I was married and left the block, with the coup, invasion and subsequent run down of what was a fabulous station I never saw either Gary or John again. But I always have a little chuckle when I see a "spaniel" sized pig.
Smudge
Last edited by smujsmith; 2nd Jul 2013 at 22:02.