Text 3 british ways

Did you know that in Britain:

• strangers usually don't talk to each other on trains?

• it is polite to queue for everything: buses, theatre tickets, in shops, etc.?

• people say 'thank you' when they give money to a shop assistant?

• people open presents in front of people they receive them from?

• people don't take their shoes off when they enter a house?

• people wash in their own bath water?

British people are said to be good listeners. In other words, it is not considered polite to interrupt the person who is just speaking. Do you?

Understatement is another character trait of the British. It is a very complex concept. George Mikes, a Hungarian by birth, knows a lot about it. Read this funny passage, which he wrote more than forty years ago.

Foreigners have souls; the English haven't.

On the Continent if you find any amount of people who sigh deeply for no conspicuous reason, yearn, suffer and look in the air extremely sadly. This is soul.

The English have no soul; they have the understatement instead.

If a continental youth wants to declare his love to a girl, he kneels down, tells her that she is the sweetest, the most charming and ravishing person in the world, that she has something in her, something peculiar and individual which only a few hundred thousand other women have and that he would be unable to live one more minute without her. Often, to give a little more emphasis to the statement, he shoots himself on the spot. This is a normal, week-day declaration of love in the more temperamental continental countries. In England the boy pats his adored one on the back and says softly: 'I don't object to you, you know.' If he is quite mad with passion, he may add: 'I rather fancy you, in fact.'

In Britain, a twenty-first birthday party traditionally marks 'the coming of age'. Today, this tradition is less important because young people get so many rights before they are twenty-one. For example, in Britain young people have the right to vote at the age of eighteen. Now, the eighteenth birthday is becoming as important as the twenty-first.

There are six and a half million dogs and six to eight million cats in Britain. This means that approximately one in ten people own a dog or cat. Every year the British spend over 1,5 billion pounds on pet food such as tinned dog food. They also support over 380 charities and societies which aim to protect animals. These include donkey sanctuaries, horses' rest homes, and dog and cat sanctuaries. The RSPCA (The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals) is the largest animal welfare society in Britain. It provides practical help to animals in homes, hospitals and clinics. However, it also campaigns against animal cruelty. It has over 250 inspectors who make sure nobody breaks the laws which protect animals.

In Britain, people give help and money to charity in different ways, and for different reasons.

It is quite common for people to arrive on the doorstep of a favourite charity with a valued possession. For example, someone gave the British Heart Foundation his late father's watch.

Some people give money for a special purpose. For example, The RSPCA got £1.7 million from an animal lover to help them prosecute people who were guilty of cruelty. But gifts of money for specific items can be a problem. For example, a man gave thousands of pounds so that the children who were in hospital at Christmas could get presents. As most of the children go home, a few children got some very expensive presents.

Many charities get letters from people enclosing fifty pence or a pound. There is usually a note saying, 'This is all I can give.'