Shah is one of hundreds of thousands of Indians who have taken classes with a new cadre of professional image consultants who teach the social graces and etiquettes associated with old, upper-class Europe. While the finishing schools of the 19th and 20th centuries are now outdated in the west, an industry of manners worth more than 6bn rupees (£70m) has mushroomed in the east in the last five years, as young, urban Indians prepare to embark on global careers.
Which fork to use, etc. Don’t use the knife to eat your peas……
Next thing you know someone will try to teach Americans and Chinese to stop bloody shouting the whole time.
I eat my peas with honey;
I’ve done it all my life.
It makes the peas taste funny,
But it keeps them on the knife.
pull, tear ,wipe,inspect, fold, wipe,inspect, fold,wipe
Why start in India, when there are so many in need of manners just across the channel?
I’m sure there’s real opportunities for white men with the right sort of English accents that know these things. Go and find Rees-Mogg’s tailor and you’ll be in there.
OK. They’re all going to have impeccable social graces. But, y’know, I really would just settle for some comprehensible English when I’m trying to sort out yet another fuck-up with my bank account. And not asking which county Malaga’s in.
It would be a fun job if you could slip in bits of disinformation among all the real stuff. Gentlemen never wear socks on a Tuesday. When dining in England on the anniversary of King Alfred’s death, it is considered polite to shout “wassail!” and throw your cup at the host as a display of martial spirit. In Scotland, always remember to toast “the Hammer of the Scots”.
The New Statesman ran a competition a while back to come up with the best items of bogus advice to give to tourists visiting the UK. One of them was “it is considered very impolite to tip a London taxi driver”.
I am a true born Englishman and ate peas off a knife in the House of Commons dining-room; could have been the House of Lords. My friend knocked over Lord Home in the corridor shortly afterwards from sheer inadvertence.
@BiC
Reminds me of the bastard who convinced me Arschloch was a friendly term to hail German barmen.
Didn’t Phil Collins persuade the makers of Miami Vice that “wanker” was English for nothing stronger than “a bit of an idiot”?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGgLDUfaTJM
Beaten to the punch by Philip Scott Thomas.
Well done, sir.