1. As I was walking all a lone, I had no time to stand and stare for who should I meet but a Montenegran.
2. In truth I spoke English to the chap who collected me to get Isaac from Kindergarten. He told me that Montenegrans were lazy and not hardworking. I asked if this was true and his reply was 'in part'.
3. I asked if Montenegrans rode bicycles. His reply was that Montenegrans only liked machines with engines.
4. He told me of a well-known joke here in Montenegro. A person when asked what they would like to be on their return to Earth. The reply was a snake. Why a snake: Why surely you must know that all a snake has to do is slither and rest.
5. He said that the Montenegran economy was built on fragile glass, but the people were proud to have their own country. That was the extent of the conversation - quite spontaneous;
6. For the rest Italian is progressing, the Elizabeth Gaskill novel is capturing and the sun continues to shine. Thursday will be a day for two year olds.
from life inside the compound
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2 comments:
1 Mubarak, Cameron, the Duke of York. And so I'll begin my comment on your tale of the Montenegran. Mubarak, I read, is out of touch with the people of Egypt. How, Muriel asked me, can Cameron understand what it is like to be poor? The Duke of York, the one who had the stammer, encountered common people every day but they were dressed in uncommon clothes and probably thought of themselves as a cut above the street-cleaning classes.
2 So what, I wondered, as I read your tale does it take to comprehend, to become knowledgeable about a country. And her I go again. Different people, I have said, know different things. So what things, what inventory of knowledge will be sufficient to underpin a set of generalisations about the people who live within a national territory?
3 Suppose someone is knowledgeable about Tutor England. No opportunity to talk to anyone who was alive then. No direct knowledge. Instead, a (wide) knowledge of the secondary sources: the accounts of daily living, the movements of prices, the price of fish, the State papers, and so on.
4 Travelling through France in the Bike-club bubble, living in the laager in Sharjah or on Masirah island, or living in an expatriate compound in Anywhereland. Or living in East Grinstead and working in Canary Wharf. Or using the RAF Club for some 50 years yet having no contact with the staff there other than for transactional matters.
5 I don't suppose there is a British Council office in Montenegro? Nearest one in .... Belgrade?
Thoughts?
Secondary person
1 Continuous personal development - that's the practice at the Hall. This comment is being keyed on a laptop to which is attached a dongle.
2 Ashley is here for a Friday-evening meal and conversation.
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