Fair Play

Today was the day for reuniting with all sorts of people. First I met up with a bunch of teachers from Sarah Bonnell at a pub near the school. Sadly for them, they had to start work today. It was great to see them again, but it did feel a bit weird when they started chatting about the various students and who not to sit together, etc. My friend Janine then met up with me and we headed out to another pub for dinner. After that we joined up with my old flatmate and a couple of her friends in central London for drinks. A nice relaxing night.

I just finished a book called "Watching the English: The Hidden Rules of English Behaviour". I may have mentioned it in a previous post.. can't remember. Anyway, it summarizes Englishness as a having a core characteristic called "social dis-ease" along with three other categories of characteristics (reflexes, values and outlooks). Reflexes include humour, moderation, and hypocrisy. Values include fair play, courtesy, and modesty. And outlooks include empiricism, eeyorishness (like the Winnie-the-Pooh character), and class-consciousness. Whether you agree with it or not, I found the book amusing and I also think I have a much better understanding of English behaviour. The bad part is, I now find myself analyzing behaviour in terms of what I learned from the book! When I was at the pub waiting to order, one of the bartenders asked, "Who's next?" Ordinarily, I wouldn't think anything about that. Now I found myself thinking, "aha, he doesn't know who is next (as most bar staff usually do), so he is asking to ensure he is abiding by the fair play rule".