Essential Snobbery 101: Sir Hans Sloane disturbed

What we truly endured

Bluebird took me down memory lane, for what I remember is it was the model of one of the official cars granted to my father in his accountancy prime of the 1980s in the Nissan range, though now, I realise it was a broader model dating from 1995, the one in our fleet of vehicles being the U11 series. This was the thought on my mind as we sought the entrance to the King’s Road restaurant in Chelsea for brunch.

The pictures of food we saw on Google Maps after we realised the Chelsea Farmer’s Market had been gentrified to the standard of unrecognisable and inaccessible, this became our fallback. The young lady, nails all done in a shade of pink that would appear as just pink to men, looked like she had taken on a part-time role as a waiter, untrained, nervous, and unsure, like she was just earning a crust she did not need to be able to go out to party with her girlfriends.

All the appearances of sophistication and shabby chic were soon dispelled, the service was unsupervised and unprofessional, the food pitiable in presentation, I had to scrape the dollops of hollandaise sauce off the eggs royale and still had enough to paint the walls, if I was so inclined. We sat through it with regret and left in haste, for one should resist posting a review on TripAdvisor, for a couple of stars would be overly generous to the lasting impression. Like a Jehovah’s Witness proselytiser, I did half shake the dust off my feet as I left.

Everything off in this place

Then, for the first time ever, I set foot in Harrods and nothing, absolutely nothing, endeared me to the place, and it is why I had never been there before when Fortnum & Mason had proved its standing.

Stopping over at a Harvey Nichols café for a cream tea, two ladies refused to be seated beside us. I won’t want them for company either, as they looked like Madeline Ashton and Helen Sharp, the two protagonists of Death Becomes Her, so artificially enhanced to occlude any semblance of natural beauty that once blessed their visages. Perchance there was a child in that restaurant, it would have squealed in terror at sighting them.

In a fashion for the history

Another patron was so grandly attired in exorbitant designer label apparel that altogether failed the basics of coordination, and it did nothing to enhance her; she was more a clothes ass than a clothes horse. All that money and no fashion sense. Yet, I am informed that having the same designer label in 3 textures and 4 layers of clothes is termed Ghetto Fabulous; what do I know about fashion?

This area of Chelsea and Knightsbridge with its pomposity of class, old and new money, and antiquated aristocracy long past aspiration or adulation, that radiates from Sloane Square was named for Sir Hans Sloane, an Irish physicist from the 18^th Century, who was buried at the Chelsea Old Church and out of whose bequest formed the foundations of the British Museum, the British Library, and the Natural History Museum in London. The unsavoury aspects of his provenance and activities are not accounted for in this piece.

Essential Snobbery 101: A few whines on wines

The first in the land

We were at Groot Constantia, the oldest wine estate in South Africa established in 1685 when it was built by Simon van der Stel, the first Governor of the Dutch Cape Colony. As we arrived after the restaurants had closed to serving breakfast even though it was well before noon, the prospect for a lunch did not appeal to me and nothing on the menu looked like brunch.

We both had a glass of Groot Constantia Method Cap Classique Brut Rosé, the Méthode Cap Classique (MCC) is the equivalent of sparkling wine from the Champagne region of France, but it cannot be called Champagne outside France.

Sniffing and tasting

Now, whilst I appreciate the work that goes into winemaking, one needs to be excused from the snobbery of liking wine by consensus when one does not find the wine to one’s taste and we have poured a lot more down a spittoon than drank of the wines we have tasted at many wine estates.

Of the five wines that I got to taste, there is not much of the superfluity of the oenophile in my description, it either worked for me or it did not. I suppose my nose is not as attuned to perceiving distinctive aromas as my palate might not be as sensitive as that of a Komodo lizard either.

Groot Constantia Rosé 2020

After the first sip, we found ourselves craving the proximity of a spittoon, for we were not enamoured, the Rosé was pale to a brownish hue and there was no lingering aftertaste. Forgettable was almost too effusive in praising the wine. Yes, it has won prizes, nonetheless not with us.

Groot Constantia Gouverneurs Reserve White 2018

The bouquet was fresh, and it touched the nose delicately. The first taste was good with a hint of elderflower, though I could not say this feeling would endure. Whilst it was vaunted as a flagship wine, for me, the ship has sunk, and all hands lost.

Groot Constantia Merlot 2018

In the glass, this presented long tears, it has been crying for a long time in French oak barrels for 18 months for maturation and distinction. A slight fruitiness, I perceived with a beautiful palate, though I felt it might need decanting to give my tongue the full experience.

Groot Constantia Gouverneurs Reserve 2018

I saw a full dark colour with a strong bouquet. Good enduring taste that was quite thick on my palate. Definitely one for meats and strong flavours. I could buy this, but not today. Best in class, they say, but who’s attending?

Groot Constantia Cape Ruby 2018

Cape Ruby is the designation for port wines in South Africa. This was sweeter and fruitier than what you get with Tawny port. I felt it did not have that strong port provenance that challenges the occasional aftertaste of a Stilton cheese. This would not do; I have to look elsewhere.

Essential Snobbery 101: A class of crass

Class is a state of mind

“You have no respect for 1^st Class, that’s why you have your feet on the seats.” That was the part of the conversation that began a bit earlier when 6 or 7 girls took up seats in the carriage, completely unaware of other occupants.

The train conductor then asked if they had 1^st Class tickets, which they didn’t and as he tried to move them on, they remonstrated that they did not know they were in first-class seats, which was a blatant lie because when they got on the train, that was the first conversation between them before they decided to stay rather than find other seats matching their tickets.

Class treats you as you are

One of the girls made an unnecessarily rude comment, to which the train conductor retorted that she should get her eyes tested. Then came a torrent of abuse and invective along with the comment that he, the conductor, was not respectful of customers and that if he was unhappy with his job, he should resign. All for asking them to move to the seats for which they had tickets.

The train conductor could have asked them to get off the train or called the British Transport Police on them for their abuse, but he let them move to the next carriage. Unfortunately, that was not the end of the matter, for when he did go through the train checking tickets, the truculent and unruly girls continued their atrocious behaviour, which he ignored.

They all got off at the next station, and rather than walk away, they came up the platform to swear at and make rude gestures at the train conductor. I felt quite sorry for him, yet it was all in a day’s work.

Class is being attentive

If you do not want to be talked down to by officials, read the signs, and when you are unsure, ask questions. Behave yourself so that you do not attract sanction or opprobrium, and do not take the patience or docility of staff for stupidity; they have rights and powers that can frustrate your about-to-become-inconsequential existence.

I could only wonder what the girls were doing at home at that time of day. They probably had no homes they belonged to with any structure, discipline, or social comportment, and that is why they were flipping out even though they were totally in the wrong and could not accept they were wrong or being told that they were. If I view the future through my observation of those girls, I would have been filled with trepidation; there must be better ahead than that.

Essential Snobbery 101: Lazy profiles and social mis-engagement

A profile absent of you

A message arrives on my phone from an unidentified number without an introduction, but a greeting with familiarity suggesting we met somewhere some time ago and the expectation that I will immediately respond as if by some divination or telepathy I have fully acknowledged who that person is.

I will call it social mis-engagement, the mistake of seeing yourself through the profile or attributes of another and by that believing the other can see the same of you when you have provided no identifiable or distinguishable information to make you recognisable.

This presents in many places, in emails, text messages, profiles, and other forms of social and communication forums. This is the scenario: you have a profile, an apparently blank one, let’s say, for purposes of discretion and nothing wrong with that. You view another profile that has all the fields diligently filled in, personally identifiable information, maybe pictures and descriptive text highlighting particularities and more. This is enough to pique your interest, and so you decide to engage.

Know yourself from others

Whatever might have inspired the engagement in the profile viewed is not present in your profile, but something suggests to you unawares that this person is as interested in you and you are in them, even as your profile remains completely nondescript. You fall into presumption, thinking the person you engaged with, without you sharing anything of yourself, is enthralled by you.

Through that engagement, you test patience, courtesy, respectfulness, and niceness, totally unaware that you’re losing, making good conversation, their interest and failing to sustain their engagement. Then the sheer effrontery of asking for more personal information without having volunteered anything of yourself is quite a lack of goodwill and is done in bad faith. You must first attempt to balance out the deficit of information in your profile before asking for more.

Unwittingly, you are also being profiled; your parsimony with personal information belies an absence of generosity, awareness, or empathy when meeting strangers. A selfish streak of finding only satisfaction for self without some mutuality comes across as an involuntary character trait for which you might be judged, and can well prejudice that engagement. It may not be seen as rude, but the absence of social graces is too obvious to ignore.

Be quick to volunteer

When anyone is engaged with an imbalance of essential profile elements, they should not have to wait to be asked to present those pieces of information and avoid frustrating the engagement. People maintain interest through stimuli; a blank profile, be it contact information, on social media, or on LinkedIn, is hardly such; it is a put-off at best.

A one-sided kind of engagement breeds unnecessary resentment and reeks of self-importance. The apparent secretiveness, if that is the reason, is the harbinger of social mis-engagement that once the patience of the other, who had put the work into their profile, is exhausted, all means of continuing communication will be lost rather than being met with silence. You will be blocked and depending on the forum as unprofessional, unserious, or a time-waster.

Do the graft work

There are no hard and fast rules, but as a matter of courtesy, if you intend to engage others in a forum that provides means to populate a profile, do the work. Do not invite people into a conversation when you sport a lazy and empty profile or readily provide the information without prompting to bring the other person up to speed about who you are and why you are interested in them. By the same token, you also give them the opportunity to have reference points that will grow their interest in you.

Then also, if the information is already in their profile, read it and understand it, only ask questions to confirm or clarify content, or to elicit more information about elements not already in their profile. Do not assume because you think no one will read your profile, and that having informed your decision not to populate it means others have been thinking the same way as you.

Don’t be a parasite

Engagement should tend towards the symbiotic and mutually beneficial; it should not be parasitic and demanding, caring little for the other. The enthusiasm with which you engage others would be reciprocated with the willingness to volunteer as much about yourself or else it is just the unfair exploitation of others. Invariably, do unto others as you expect to be done unto.

If you will not do your profile, stick with birds of the same feather without profiles; at least you have a level playing field and will know that your interest was out of mere curiosity rather than a genuine interest in the person and what they are about. Selah!

Essential Snobbery 101: Writing letters you hate to write

It has always mattered

I remember once asking to go on an assertiveness course; those courses exist for a reason, my manager scoffed. He said, “Akin, anyone but you needs an assertiveness course.” Whilst I seemed to doubt myself, it appeared there was no doubt that I was an effective communicator.

In my engineering class, many of my classmates did not pay heed to the need to study English, which was a necessary elective. Obviously, we had to run the gauntlet of English lecturers who came to show off their loquacious vocabulary, communicating nothing but providing the entertainment of malapropism and meaningless sesquipedalianism of words strung together without grammatical structure or purpose.

Put it all in

My view was that, regardless of what profession you were in, it was essential that you could convey your ideas in your chosen language of expression with clarity to persuade and to convince. Now, when to comes to written communication, I like to think I am better equipped to get my point across, the intent, the context, the tone, the appeal to their humanity, the veiled insult politely delivered as a slow-working poison that causes little offence whilst eliciting praise, maybe an English putdown can find a showing too.

Concision is not my strongest point, and brevity is probably only needed for telegrams; clarity in prose is what matters more to me, so that by the time the reader is done, I am both comprehended and understood with responses appropriate to my requirements.

That it might tend to flourish or the flowery is a temptation I have too often yielded to, yet as a copy editor and proofreader of other material, I would be more conservative, active, and direct.

Then a grubby email

I guess I hate writing emails that have to do with contractual negotiations; they can be emotional and easily be grubby when professional persuasion is required. In such cases, it must be in the view of a sensible seamstress, like a good skirt, long enough to cover the detail, yet short enough to keep the interest and close the matter.

Once a client wrote to demand payment on the premise that I had been overpaid, by the time I put together the whole chain of evidence that suggested otherwise, what I received was a curt thank you in response and nothing more. Too recently, I noticed an error in my remuneration, not too significant, but on a matter of principle, we had an agreement that appeared to be irregularly and unilaterally recast as something else.

Now, I say

At first, I thought it was an error at the payment processing company; their prompt and useful response suggested it was further up the chain. Grudgingly, I made the case for respecting gentlemen's agreements and signed contracts that had no indication of the variation of terms, then closed with the deployment of the polite 3^rd person singular. “As such, one is owed moneys due.”

The purposeful switch from the apparently casual and familiar to the stuffily formal was for maximum effect. If as a person well known to me, you need to be addressed with titles and formality, you can be sure we are on the business end of issues that need to be addressed with alacrity, importance, and seriousness.

What mattered was that my intervention was effective and what I have requested will be granted; the slight on their part might suggest the need for an apology, not grovelling, just the acceptance of an administrative error on their part that would be made right is enough. Effective communication matters always, and if you are not that good at it, get the training to represent and express yourself better than anyone can.

Essential Snobbery 101: To serve and be served reveals a mindset of wealth

A fictional pandemic life

The different perspectives journaled of lives during this Coronavirus pandemic have given some insight into the way we deal with situations somehow out of our control. The organ grinder of our government’s spouse created a veritable work of fiction about the Coronavirus experience of their family situated in London when in reality, they had driven up to stay in Durham.

All on the premise of the need for childcare, which left us reeling from realising some people were above the law. Lest we forget, Make Wakefield’s family does own a castle; they are too established to follow the rules. [iNews: Mary Wakefield Spectator article: How Dominic Cummings’ wife’s coronavirus story differs from his statement]

A wealth pandemic life

A few days ago, we were brought to luxurious Kensington, a large house with enough space to invite other occupants to sequester as part of the enforced quarantine process. What followed was a life lesson in the power of wealth to insulate you from the common that the exclusive almost begins to grate.

Now, I have no issues with the piece Shruti Advani wrote for the Financial Times, it was a window into the cares, concerns and priorities of those who do not have to bother about the means to get anything done. Self-absorbed and lacking in self-awareness as it might seem, you begin to realise that you have to find ways to create your own bubbles in a turbulent world. If wealth gives you that opportunity, then so be it. [FT Wealth: The awkward lessons of my luxury lockdown in Kensington]

Accommodations of orderliness

What places her in this exclusive situation is borne of many things: she inherited wealth, used to edit a magazine about private wealth, and her husband is a venture capitalist. She retained a sense of order around the house, tripling the delivery of flowers, and when she found that kiddie arithmetic was a bit out of her league, she hired a private tutor for her son, whose educational challenges appear to be between schoolwork and chess, forestalling the future need for a psychiatrist.

There is a method to the whole narrative. Engaging in some conversation on Facebook, someone noted that she was name-dropping. The names dropped were those of helpers rather than of friends or colleagues. It exudes, in my view, a sense of confidence without a hint of social climbing; the designer or brand names simply mirroring her comfort zone. Obviously, she has a personal shopper.

Reality is at the door

Yet, her world is not devoid of reality; the pandemic bears weighty risks, death being present and threatening, with the recognition that wealth offers some protection, but it is not a talisman. The pandemic spread around the world, and the rich has inordinately affected the poor and ethnic minorities more.

The undercurrent of the writing still points to the many pressed into service to make our lives bearable, the nanny, the florist, the delivery men, the private tutor, the house help that cooks, the personal shopper, the police, and the ambulance crew. Eliminate those you cannot afford.

I came away with two thoughts: if I were ever to be affected by it at all, that wealth is a mindset and something you need to be conditioned for and that it is a nice life if you can afford and live it with any sense of guilt or apology. We are not called to carry the world on our shoulders; there is usually enough on our plates.

Essential Snobbery 101: The majestic art of conversation with a fork and knife

The distraction of gadgetry

There are times I tend to check my old-fashioned view of things just to determine if I have been left behind by the times, or I am being too judgemental. Yet, there are some things that should never become old-fashioned, like respect, courtesy, consideration, the art of conversation and basic table manners.

On our trip to Cape Town, there was a family sitting in the front row, the young man, about 10 years old, was wearing his mega headphones connected to some device on which he was playing dexterity games that had him hooked on the stroboscopic effects of the lights and colours as if hypnotised as he pressed buttons incessantly without being able to get to the next level. I saw that much.

In that time, getting his attention was literally impossible, for each announcement, the air steward had to come round to have his mother prod him to take off his headphones. The same for when the food and drinks trolley came down the aisle, he was completely disengaged from our reality. He had left the responsibility for everything, his comfort, his safety and maybe his welfare to others.

No human skill gained

It would be easy to blame this on technology, but we have been doing technology since before it became commonplace; the benefit in human interaction cannot be underestimated. It is the responsibility of guardians to ensure that this aspect of growth, education and development is nurtured and fostered because it would always matter above the version of the game being played.

From my perspective of grandparenthood, I could see no particular development beyond gaining the skills to be a forklift operator, maybe even by providence the operator of an unmanned combat aerial vehicle (UCAV), also known as combat drones, I just fear for the victims of decisions made without human or humane insight, which cannot be gained by just playing games, for life and lives are not a game.

Fork and knife 101

In another setting, we were in a restaurant where another family on a night out were tucking into cuisine that called for the basics in table manners. The use of cutlery, for which the abuse I witnessed began to look like entertainment. Now, how people choose to eat their food is up to them; you can have your soup through a straw for all I care, though, that is why a spoon is provided.

I have occasional issues with chopsticks; they are quite different in Chinese restaurants, where they are wooden, roundish and long, suited for eating from shared dishes, compared to Japanese restaurants, where they are short, as the communal sharing of food is not traditional, and for the Koreans, they are metal, as a test for whether the food offered to royals was poisoned. If my handling fails me, I switch to the customary cutlery.

I would guess the spoon, knife and fork are the somewhat universal standard of cutlery, and any education should include the basic use of the knife and fork. Yet, from what I observed, my tendency to disgust quickly became one of sympathy, as I could not have been the only one to have watched the swordplay and farmhand’s use of a garden fork without the urging of a heel, all on a plate of pasta or a pizza.

Opening doors with skill

If anything, just as it is important to give our kids swimming lessons, it is critical to impart the appropriate use of a fork and knife, whether at home or as part of a primary school curriculum. I hate to say, these rather fundamental skills have decided whether one has access or not to certain circles. How conversation, social skills, and emotional intelligence have been the determining factors in fitting in or being an outcast. We can’t all be anarchists in the service of some obscure counterculture raging against the establishment. It is not a bad idea to ensure this is done early; adults devoid of this skill are not a sight to behold if one were to suggest it is a situation to be pitied.

On another table, everyone was on their phones, preferring the virtual to the company of those you are attending dinner with. I can only wonder what to say. It is bad manners at first, and where do you cultivate the art of conversation if you cannot do it at the dinner table? Except for emergencies, the phone can wait, respect the company you have or decline the invitation for your virtual world. We can be better behaved; we only have to put some effort into it.

Essential Snobbery 101: For your noise be couth

Like really?

“That is what you say to unruly teenagers, not to 36-year-old professionals.” She said, at the top of her voice. I had just alighted from the tram on my way home when what came to perturb my silent contemplation made me look towards the commotion.

The sight I beheld left me raising an eyebrow, accompanied by a snigger. She was in argumentation with two police officers, much of it quite disagreeable, as she sat on the embankment of the tram station on the side where the trams would come to stop, so she had to be moved on, but she was not budging one bit.

A raucous cacophony ensued as I minded my own business, but could not help but think about what she said and how much like an unruly teenager she was in attitude and definitely not a 36-year old professional in appearance or demeanour.

What a pity

It might well be that at another time in her somewhat vibrant life, she was a professional of sorts, a confrontation with the law then welled up the urge for a sense of self-importance in order not to be treated shabbily, though every indication pointed towards a shamefaced humiliation.

She had, with her demonstration, brought a public audience to her pending predicament, and there is no doubt that every pretension to being a lady had been lost to the vociferous outbursts that were quite unbecoming.

The moral of the tale is, never make noise when your cause is not in the quest for justice but in the folly of notoriety and the unnecessary charge of disturbing the peace. Little doth it take to respect thyself, or none of it shall ye get.

Essential Snobbery 101: Devoid of Perception

He walked away from danger

This is a blog I started almost two months ago, but never got to finish because, like some blogs that I have posted before, the ideas might be pertinent, though the time and occasion are not ripe for publication.

A tweet I read this morning allows me the opportunity to finish this blog and hopefully get to post it. The tweet concerns a man who suggests he nearly got killed by a cop. He was returning from the gym, and he entered a shop to buy some things before he was accosted by the police with guns drawn, shouting at him to respond to some commands.

Here’s a story about how I nearly just got killed by this cop. pic.twitter.com/3IYZFM9Ggh

— Ziggy (@TheHipsterRebbe) January 3, 2018

He did not hear the commotion surrounding and directed at him because he had noise-cancelling headphones on; it was a matter of luck and fortitude, if not some restraint from the cops, that meant that he walked away from that encounter unharmed.

Shutting out the world

It transpired that the shop assistant had called the police about some criminal activity going on in the shop, and somehow that was read to be an armed robbery, with this man the supposed perpetrator. There is much to comment on about this, but that is of no particular concern to me.

My issue is with the headphones and noise-cancelling ones at that. The man says in a tweet, “Sometimes I like to shut the world out and listen to music.” That is the problem, you are in a public place, and you shut the world out, just imagine if he had walked into the shop and without that isolation bubble of his headphones blocking out the world, he might have seen and acknowledged the shopkeeper, who then, with that interaction, would not have suspected him of being up to no good.

I can comment on a lot of things in this thread, the one I am most concerned about is how headphones covering both ears limit your spatial awareness and sensory perception, not just in this instance but in many other situations. https://t.co/7U1bGeuaoX

— Akin Akíntáyọ̀ (@forakin) January 4, 2018

For all the commentary that followed his narrative, no one picked on the fact that the situation is as much his own fault in the first place, and it could then be that of others. When you shut off any of your working senses to external stimuli in the world around you, you place the responsibility on others either to look out for you or the anxiety on others to consider you a threat.

Devoid of perception of others

The same goes for people who ride their bicycles in the streets with headphones on so that they are unaware of the sounds and movements necessary for them to anticipate and avoid danger. It is just irresponsible at best and without doubt selfish and reckless.

The other day, I got on the train, but could not get to a free seat because a lady was standing in the way. Thrice, I said 'Excuse me, please', and she neither heard me nor budged; she was too engrossed in her mobile phone to be bothered or aware of her surroundings. It took me poking her with a finger for her to respond and reluctantly step out of the way for me to pass.

This is becoming the norm, a lack of awareness and the absence of perception that reduces our humanity from that of being social beings to the exemplar of being wild animals, uncivilised, inconsiderate, unconcerned and apathetic.

Just selfish and inconsiderate

Then, on a Sunday night, in a hotel full of business guests, the fire alarm went off at 4:20 AM, because some restless and noisy young men decided to smoke in non-smoking rooms. To cover the evidence, they broke the window and lied to the night concierge about the deed. I doubt they suffered any other consequence for waking everyone up in the hotel.

For them, nothing and no one else mattered in their selfish quest for self-satisfaction at the expense of everyone else. Sitting in a railway station waiting room, a passenger thinks it is socially responsible to play their music loud to the hearing of others, unafraid of being asked to behave.

In many cases, you cannot ask them to be considerate because that infuriates them, and it could lead to violent acts committed against you, as such a challenge to their antisocial behaviour is taken as an act of disrespect.

Why does it happen?

Meanwhile, another brings a can of alcoholic beverage onto the tram platform as we await the next one. He finishes the drink, drops the can to the floor and walks away as if it had nothing to do with him. This is despite the fact that there is a wastebasket 10 yards away. Then you imagine if everyone dropped their litter without any consideration, whether we would have anywhere to walk without running the gauntlet of refuse heaps.

Too many episodes and events I observe of carefree and careless people lacking in consideration or social skill, devoid of spatial awareness and the useful utility of their senses to do the right thing.

Unschooled, uncouth, untamed, uncultured to the point of stupid existence, upsetting everyone without any sense of offence caused or bad behaviour, you do wonder if it is a deliberate act of self-expression or just the absence of social graces, breeding, tutelage and much else.

Essential Snobbery 101: Simply respecting others

For all that is simply human

In this modern age, where technology has become such a distraction that certain elements of human interaction are lost to engagement with electronic devices, one could be forgiven for the sense of shock that overwhelms when strangers are encountered.

By this I mean, certain generational shifts have deprived people of the richness of communication in facial expression, the art of conversation, the use of language, and, if one were not to be too greedy, the finesse of politeness.

Already, I might be considered old-fashioned, for the simple reason that I put my electronic devices away when I am walking the streets, and I would definitely never be looking at a device when I am crossing the road. I never wear earphones in both ears to deprive me of the perception of my environment.

People are everything

When I meet people, I want to engage with them; my electronic device does not have to be a part of the crowd. We diminish our necessary heightened sense of perception and spatial awareness when we ignore our surroundings to concentrate on the world of our electronic devices, and we become oblivious and endangered.

People forget they are standing in the way because they have not developed the communal skill of consideration and presence, the concept of knowing that a public space is, in fact, public, requiring possession and allowance in equal measure, being aware of what is in front and around you, just in case you walk into someone, a ditch or a pole.

Sadly, some have walked into harm and fatality just because they had become unaware of the dangers around them, hoping they could pass that responsibility on to others, when each individual is responsible for how they access a public space.

Treat strangers politely

However, what irks me most is those who, without greeting, introduction, conversation, or acquaintance, arrogate to themselves an entitlement to ask personal and private questions, expecting answers.

I would be too stunned to react in any useful way to such rudeness. Much I have excused that behaviour from the highly fed and lowly taught of recent times, who probably know no better; it is completely inexcusable of those of my generation. Maybe I am being nostalgic for an era that only existed in my imagination, but I am tempted to believe there was an age of politeness, very middle-class and conforming in many ways.

The simple old ways

You covered your mouth when you coughed or yawned, and covered your nose too, hopefully with a handkerchief when you sneezed. In acknowledging those around you, even as you succumbed to the involuntary acts of nature, like belching, farting or bumping into someone, your minor social violations suggest you ask for forgiveness, expressing regret, and you will be acknowledged with respect.

Respect, that is, the due regard for the feelings, wishes, or rights of others, has all become something of a rarity. We begin to wonder whether social graces were never taught, or people just feel too entitled to be bothered about others. It is not something I understand at all.

Yet, we must remind ourselves on occasion that we are social beings and hope that the better side of our humanity will not be lost to the passing of the times.

Essential Snobbery 101: David Cameron was being silly

In company of class

I arrived home yesterday to the conversation recorded between Her Majesty, The Queen, the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Prime Minister, the Leader of the House of Commons and the Speaker of the House of Commons.

The Prime Minister, after being introduced by the Speaker to the Queen, decided to engage in small-talk (polite conversation about unimportant or uncontroversial matters, especially as engaged in on social occasions) with the Queen, and this would have been separate from the formal weekly audience with the Queen, where the Prime Minister visits the Queen in camera to discuss matters of state.

Quite nasty talk

As the camera rolled, capturing this seemingly private banter, the microphones, hot and ready, picked up a declension into unguarded commentary by a Prime Minister who once had a life in public relations. Almost boastfully boisterous as if to show familiarity and ease before royalty, he declared, “We've got some leaders of some fantastically corrupt countries coming to Britain ... Nigeria and Afghanistan, possibly the two most corrupt countries in the world.” [BBC News]

Now, there is no doubt that Nigeria and Afghanistan have great and almost overwhelming problems with corruption. The Prime Minister had invited the leaders of these countries to his much vaunted anti-corruption summit, and it now appeared that he had in mind to ridicule them for the problems in their countries.

Reprehensible indiscretions

On the one hand, this kind of banter, which skirts the bounds of the typically politely rude English, also smacks of old colonial snobbery of the worst kind. The very kind where someone jocularly abuses, insults and offends you and then pats you on the back with the faux-sympathetic apology of not meaning to hurt you.

On the other hand, as we observed of George Osborne some years before, it is the kind of indiscretion that obtains from public school-educated toffs who fawn obsequiously in the presence of royalty or money, people who have a heightened sense of self but are immediately self-conscious in the presence of those whom, for one reason or another, they deem their betters.

Blog - Discretion still matters

Fishing for laughs

Now, the well-educated Englishman usually got away with utterly bad manners as a matter of status, class and privilege. Their misdemeanours happen behind closed doors with witnesses holding their peace in disgust and disapproval, but shine a public spotlight on any of this, and it stinks to the high heavens of odium most vile.

The Archbishop, given to circumspection, interjected, saying, “But this particular president is not corrupt... he's trying very hard” The Queen concurred, before the Speaker, hoping to make a joke of the slight and bring humour to obloquy, then asked, “They are coming at their own expense, one assumes?”

This would have been funny if it were not to add insult to injury, the Speaker aping the Prime Minister in an off-hand game of attempting to amuse the Queen.

Just a silly boy

The end result of this contemptuous activity was that it became the headline news of every media outlet and the papers the next day. Quite unbecoming, very uncouth and socially maladroit, one could almost subscribe to the conspiracy that this was deployed intentionally by the Prime Minister to take Brexit away from being the centre of cynosure for a day or more.

Yet, it can only be one thing, a silly boy trying to show off and slipping on a banana skin, a spectacle with a necessary sense of schadenfreude. Aside from all the offence caused, the only conclusion that can be drawn is that David Cameron has been a rather silly little boy. Even if you could get a good laugh, some thoughts are best left unspoken.

Essential Snobbery 101: To reach and to retch

Friends frightened

Sometimes, a good telling off will not eventually end up with smiles or friendship in the future, and this is what I meet each morning on the train: the stony-faced silence of people I have upbraided for bad behaviour in a public place.

Some have been subjects of my Essential Snobbery 101 blogs, not only in the way I told them off for putting their fully shod feet on seats, but also for the way they responded and reacted to being told they were in the wrong.

The trains also have a way of bringing together a broad spectrum of society, from the well-groomed to the unsophisticated, all of whom one can find a means to engage and converse with; it is the downright dirty that leaves one literally weak and speechless.

Of the yuckiest sort

This morning, I sat across from such a person, as I was leafing through my issue of The Week magazine, out of the corner of my eye, I saw him stick a finger in his nose, bring out a string of the yuckiest colour of mucus and deposit it in his mouth.

I can only wonder why I was destined to be a witness to this nauseating spectacle, but there was more to the problem than I had to resist the urge to look again. He had a sniffling, running nose and nothing with which to blow his nose, so he devised this means of rubbing his nose with the sides of his forefinger and discreetly licking it off, like a cat grooming itself with its paw.

The only thing was, it was neither discreet nor surreptitious, and it makes you wonder about where the age-old parenting and community moderation breeding fell off the rails. Things like covering your mouth when you cough or yawn, sneezing into a handkerchief and well, not picking your nose – at least not in public.

Some good old advice

I guess many do subconsciously pick their noses and do nasty unprintable things with the stuff, and I am not against people doing what they are wont to away from the public glare, as it will cause no revulsion in others who are unequipped for the ultimate reaction to the revolting, which is reaching for a sick bag and retching uncontrollably until emesis creates a total evacuation of food seen again after mastication.

It makes one suggest that every man and boy, just as the girls and the ladies do, must never leave home without a handy pack of tissues for the emergency of blowing their noses.

Much as this matter called for an intervention, as I was quite ready to throw my pack of tissues onto the paper he was reading rather than politely offer him a sheet or two to blow his nose. It would have been almost too aggressive, but I cannot end up making so many enemies on the train just because I am being old-fashioned. The times have indeed changed. Good manners in public are too much of a rarity today.

Essential Snobbery 101: On good manners and seats

Well brought up

I grew up in a different time, or rather, I was brought up differently, and I am constantly met with the shock of contemporary attitudes and behaviour that the worldview I inhabit finds quite grating.

The reason why the different time matters is almost irrelevant, because I see people of my age behave in ways that leave much to be desired, so it must be the different way that is more significant.

I do not believe that certain things should become old-fashioned, be consigned to conservativeness and passed off as traditional values. Self-awareness and consideration of others still matter a great deal; besides the fact that manners should never be negotiable, they must be acquired at all costs and deployed at every opportunity.

Give up your seat

Yet today, as I sat on the train, an elderly lady boarded the train at the next stop carrying some luggage; it did not appear she was helped on, and there was no place for her to sit.

Even though I use a cane, I could not watch her standing, holding on for dear life as the train began to move. The many able-bodied people around us remained decidedly oblivious of her out of ignorance, the absence of breeding or sheer selfishness.

I got up and gave her my seat, which is what any well-taught person is supposed to do, at least, in the different way I was brought up. It was another two stops, some 20 minutes later, before a seat became vacant for me to sit down.

Make all allowances

Meanwhile, further along the carriage, there was a heavily pregnant woman who, in another time, would have been ushered to take a seat somewhere in the carriage. Someone would have initiated the move and asked another to give up their seat. The person giving up their seat, seeing the condition of the woman, would have happily obliged.

However, this appears to belong to a bygone age, people rush for priority seats, literally tripping up less able people in their race to be comfortable at the expense of seemingly more deserving people, and they hardly ever care when reminded of the fact that the notices do state an incontrovertible fact.

On good manners

Ladies are surprised when I take off my hat to chat to them, some might even take offence if you open the door for them or if you ascribe to the chivalry of ‘Ladies first’. Other bad habits like coughing and yawning without covering your mouth, eating on the street, elbows on the table – the list is endless, make one think we have become a global village of the uncouth and uncultured with air, grace, comportment or finesse.

Rough on all edges that we rub people up the wrong way, quite an appalling reflection on society today. It is not like one wants to rewrite Debrett’s guide on manners, etiquette, protocol, address or dress, but some things are just so, so as to really separate us from the wildness and chaos of the animal kingdom.

As I disembarked at my station, the elderly lady acknowledged me and mouthed a thank you. I tipped my head and smiled. We both knew there was a world we once knew that was fast disappearing from our present-day experiences.

I am saddened writing this, but we have attained, with the absence of certain aspects of social schooling, a level of inconsiderate selfishness where manners are the exception rather than the rule. A shame indeed.

Essential Snobbery 101: How not to seek advice

A sad reflection

The conversation I relayed below left me wondering about where things might have gone so horribly wrong in our society that we are bringing up such uncultured children.

I decided the blame lay first with the parents who are most probably my age mates and then with the educational system in the person in engaged in any at all, the society because it condones the proliferation of such attitudes and primarily with the person, due to circumstances I cannot begin to elicit.

I reproduce the conversation, properly punctuated, because that in itself is necessary for my blog; besides that, this is what transpired in a chat session that others have found to be useful and obtained quite useful advice from just by reason of noting my age and by extension, possibly my experience.

The exchange

Stranger: Can I have some advice?

[I first checked if this was the continuation of an old conversation, because it was almost too familiar; it was not, before I responded.]

Me: Hello. You accost strangers for advice without a greeting or an introduction? I don’t think so.

[Expressing incredulity and offering a typical street analogy in the hope that it might check something in his engagement.

Stranger: OK. I’m just a young lad who wanted help, but thanks.

[The thanks at the end here is not a substitute for good manners; in fact, it does not demonstrate any manners, but rather, it reads more like. Thanks, but no thanks.]

Me: Being young does not excuse bad manners.

Stranger: OK, Never mind. I just wanted help, because I was worried, but never mind, sorry to disturb you.

[Whilst he appears to have relapsed into the submissive, probably a cue and a hint for me to engage, I guess by now, we had literally lost each other. Opening the way for my final message.]

Me: You still don’t get it? Good night.

We both lost an opportunity

The conversation ended without me ever getting to help the young man, and I will probably never know what he contacted me for.

Much as it is probably evident from our short exchanges that the person probably needed help, there was nothing much I could do if we could not establish protocols of engagement, which, in my old-fashioned view of the world, are critical to communicating effectively.

Reading through, he was worried about something, which is why he wanted some help and so invariably sought my advice.

In my responses, I first tried to alert him to the fact that he was going about it the wrong way, then I reinforced that view with the use of the phrase ‘bad manners’ before I resigned, because there was nothing for me to build on.

What we tolerate

Maybe I could have been more patient and attempted to take the young man under my wing just to ensure he does not repeat the error elsewhere, but sadly, at the point in time, I left him as a lost cause. My inflexibility in terms of the need for good manners might have consigned me to a worse fate.

Yet, there is a possibility that I am the only one who noticed; others could have, in the spirit of the times, ignored the situation and gotten on with giving the advice, happy and honoured to be asked in the first place.

Then, before I get consumed in self-flagellation, just imagine what difference it would make to start a conversation in another way?

Stranger: Hello! Please, can I have some advice?

A lot of difference, I say, a world of difference, in fact. My attention undivided, my seriousness applied, my experience engaged, my humanity disposed to being every nice and good disposition I could muster, along with manners reciprocated with respect and consideration.

Allowances to the inflexible?

It bothers me that the quality of conversation and consideration that the ease of communication allows in text messages and social media allows us to dispense with the basic formalities, which still matter and are noticed if deployed.

In a short conversation with my dad using text messages yesterday, I noticed that I had lapsed in standards when, after my greeting and message, I forgot to sign off properly. It is something I immediately realised and was very ready to correct in my next message.

My father had initiated the conversation, and I responded. We both knew we were chatting to each other, yet I felt I had let myself down. At the same time, one must add tolerances and allowances to certain areas of inflexibility.

The accommodation of much beyond the narrow view of things, but at the end of the day, it will still bring us back to the second point I made. “Being young does not excuse bad manners.” No situation or circumstance, in need or in plenty, in pain or in peace, in youth or in elderliness, can excuse bad manners.

Essential Snobbery 101: Anticipated Consideration

A window on our world

This morning, as I got on the train to work, I was offered a view on society that had brought expectations and personality into focus.

Expectations of others and the personality of people, both of myself and the other person involved in the incident. It got me thinking about how things are changing and why some things have come to stay.

Feet off

The schoolboy who could be no more than 12 years old was sitting on a 3-seater, his bag and classical musical instrument case occupying the whole space, and then he had his shod feet on the seat in front of him.

Nothing particularly annoys me as much as people who put their feet on seats, especially where there are clear signs that feet should not be put on seats. Besides, even if they do take their feet off the seats, it is not like they make an effort to clean off the dirt they might have put on those seats.

So, I motioned with my cane and intensified that with a scowl for him to take his feet off the seat. I brushed it off and took my seat. Hardly a minute after that, he decided it was too much for him, so he moved to another seat in the train carriage.

As he settled in that seat, I said to him, putting his feet on the seat was anti-social behaviour, and it was important that he knew that, even if he did not like the fact that it was being pointed out to him.

Anticipated consideration

Yet, in that little encounter was a whole set of narratives. A public school-educated boy who had exercised a sense of entitlement in a public space without what I might call ‘anticipated consideration’ and, when challenged, expressed rebellious dissent by moving away.

Anticipated consideration is when, as in this case, you know that you do not put your feet on seats others might want to use, and you do not occupy more seats than you have paid to occupy, especially when the train or vehicle is still at a major boarding port, like a terminal train station. It is having consideration for others long before it is demanded of you to consider and adjust.

Rebellious dissent, however, is the case where, rather than acknowledge that you are wrong with contriteness and apology, you take evasive action to avoid proximity with the challenger of your behaviour.

The fear of challenge

I dare say, we now live in a society where, sadly, many young people will not brook any scolding or correction, and those who dare challenge bad behaviour run the risk of coming to harm by such people lashing out in aggravated resentment. We have a delicate balance to manage between wanting right and yet being fearful of demanding things be done right.

The question is, if as a society we, for the fear of retribution, maintain silence rather than challenge anti-social behaviour, what kind of society will we have?

The other nuanced narrative is in assumptions and appearances, as this young man was a day student at a public school in Hale, there are general expectations of behaviour and conduct. Whilst entitlement is drilled into their psyche, comportment has a particular importance because it moderates behaviour in polite society and defines the quality of integrity, which is what you do when nobody is watching.

Maybe I was a bit harsh

Much as I would like to explore this further, it is best left for now, because it will reflect on not just the school, but on the parenting too. Suffice it to say that having a classical instrument case does not necessarily suggest one has class or has been schooled in the decorum that pertains to performing for sophisticated audiences.

On my part, I thought about my attitude to anticipated consideration and my acceptance of the inconvenience of rebuke when I have been wrong, and I might have been a tad sterner with the schoolboy because he could easily have been one of my youngest sons.

When I was his age, I would never have done what he did, and surely, as another black man, yes, we shared the same racial profile, we are a lot better behaved than this, especially if we have the benefit of a privileged education.

Essential Snobbery 101: Look back in anger

All the loo roles

I know I like to play with alliterations, and a visit to a place downstairs just had me wondering how beneath the veneer of faux-respectability of people milling around, as co-workers are habits that leave much to be desired.

The loo, lavatory, latrine, ladies, toilet, gents, bog, urinal, cottage, water closet (WC) or convenience is a somewhat private place for movements and activity nature intended.

That we have found systems to manage and handle the different deposits is credit to creativity and ingenuity of man to bring elements of sophisticated, yet understated finesse to the handling of foul substances.

Noticing notices of note

Once upon a time, to evacuate really did mean to let things go from the bowels, but now, it is mostly used to mean getting people out of a building, especially out of dangerous buildings or vehicles.

There are things that are expected in these places that people do not feel disposed to do, and you end up reading notices like, “Please leave this place as you will like to find it” or “Please wash your hands”.

I would like to see in the men’s urinals notices that say, “Please do not spit your chewing gum into the urinal, ureic acid does not dissolve chewing gum, and furthermore, chewing gum is not biodegradable.” Men reading this will fully understand what I mean. I don’t chew gum.

Just clean up after you

Now, I cannot say why toilet bowls are white in most cases, but white is an implicit revelation of otherness when some things are not done. Especially when there is the option to flush the toilet and a toilet brush to help, “Please leave this place as you will like to find it” – I guess this notice implicitly suggests anyone visiting a toilet expects to find it clean, no matter how many other visitors have been before, if they all clean up after use.

I swore under my breath when the revelation on white was so unmissable, the earlier user could only have been so uncultured to have taken his anti-social skills back to the day of the Palaeolithic man. Whilst someone is paid to clean up after our mess, I do not think this was the kind of mess they were engaged to clean up.

That I can promptly lose respect for those who cannot look back in anger and ensure the next person looks in with a smile is my way of putting a four-letter word into a blog.

Please, always look back in anger when you have done your thing and “Please leave this place as you will like to find it. Thank you.”