Manners

One thing that, like languages, changes from country to country is the concept of good manners. In civilized Europe farting, belching, yawning out loud, spitting and slurping your food & drinks are considered "bad" manners. In China (and northern Laos) spitting is an art form, the Vietnamese down their noodle soup with the gusto of a giant inhaling cobra with serious spittle problems, the Laotions love a good loud yawn (all they ever do is eat and sleep anyway) and the Thais & Cambodians can fart & belch like centurions. But then again, as everyone does it, it is hardly bad manners. Bringing us with a mind-blowing swiftness to the crux of the matter - who defined good manners?

Naturally the original idea of manners is to fine tune social interaction and basically things like farts don't really smell that nice (especially not mine lately) but I can really see no reason for things like yawning loudly or slurping your milky tea to be considered "bad". It doesn't hurt or endanger anyone and by God don't we all really love a good, honest, loud yawn out loud?

Oh shag it, just read what Jonathan Swift said about it all...