whinging

[john sutton]

Whinging has always been a by product of being english.
I live in spain and there is always "letter to the editor" whinging about all sorts of things.With this in mind I decided to do some research on the history of whinging with the attached

While surfing the internet I happened on a piece about the Romans in relation to the history of whinging. It appears that in roman times there were men called uuingious
Who people took their complaints to. These complaints were written on the uuingious, s slate and posted in the market place for all to see. This was called uuinging and slating and it would appear that the words to whinge and to slate derive from this practice and it is one of the earliest records of the practice of whinging. Apart from a mention of the Egyptians who had a similar practice many years earlier but discontinued it as they used hieroglyphics on stone which obviously took much time and work. It appears that it was outlawed after a long whinge about someone building a pyramid in front of a persons dwelling and it took so long to carve that the pyramid was finished before the letter.
Some of the text was found early in the 20th century and you can now see it as part of a very well known hotel near the pyramids.
Back to the Romans. Somewhere in the British museum the is an item that has been saved of a uuing involving a freeman from Britannia who moved to Rome with His master .It goes roughly as follows.
When my master demanded that I move with him on his return to Rome I was quite excited at the thought of all that sun and cheap wine so it was a shock to me on my arrival to find that all was not what I expected..
None of them can speak my language, if you are not Roman you are looked down upon, the Romans drive around in their chariots with no consideration for pedestrians usually with a minstrel playing his instrument as loud as possible
The food here is terrible. It is impossible to get a piece of sheep as all the shepherds have been recruited into the army because of their skill with slingshots ,which means the sheep herds have been decimated by wolves, the main meat is peacock or larks tongues, hardly decent meal after a hard days work.Oh for a lump of sheep and a turnip.
The building work that is going on is ridiculous and its people like me that have to do it, for very little reward and on a diet of larks tongues and figs. Nobody here has any idea how to build, its all lumps of marble piled on top of each other. It will never last. There is not a trace of wattle and daub anywhere. I reckon in 50yrs Rome will be a pile of rubble.
My master has the contract to maintain the coliseum and when I tell you that I’m fed up with cleaning up the droppings from lions and tigers and it’s not just that. We have to pick up bits of Christians that the animals leave.
I’ve been to one of their games and quite frankly I don’t see why they are so popular. You know the outcome; the animals are always going to win. Even the latest game is starting to pall .Its been imported from the colony of Hispannia.This involves a man fighting a bull ,he uses his cloak to fool the bull and sometimes he can last as long as half an hour before being gored. I don’t see the excitement in this game and it will probably disappear as a sport in a few months.
All in all this country has been a disappointment and talking to other brits, both free men and slaves we are of the opinion that Rome would be in a mess without us.
Another thing, these people are absolutely without any feelings to their fellow humans. Apart from being a nation of slave owners they are cruel. For example, last week I heard about a topless beach on the coast just outside Rome so I took a trip just to see what it was. Imagine my horror when I came across this beach full of headless bodies being set upon by carrion. Apparently the Romans crucify their criminals then chop off their heads to put on poles above the city walls and the bodies are disposed of on the “topless” beach for the crabs and other carrion to dispose of

Over the past few weeks I have criticized brits living in Spain for the constant whinging in the letters columns of various papers and it was only on a recent visit to London that I realised that it is part of our tradition. I was in a museum that was dedicated to the British colonial days and I spotted a copy of the Bombay Times (in English) I had the opportunity to look at the letters column and the following letter caught my eye.
Dear Editor walla
I feel I should write to you about the terrible state of affairs in this country and its people.
Firstly there are just too many people living here, the streets are full of locals jabbering away in some foreign tongue and very few of them have bothered to learn our language in spite of all the good we have brought here.
There are cattle roaming round the streets leaving their waste product around and none of the locals have the wit to start a rhubarb farm and collect it for manure. Only the other day while riding in a jitney I was splashed with this as the jitney Walla ran through it deliberately and when I complained he ignored me. What.
The food is disgusting. Full of that damned garlic stuff and if I am unfortunate enough to have to partake of some of this then Memsahib insists that I sleep in the spare room, which is a bind as there is no punka walla in that room.
On the subject of food, having been brought up in the best tradition of our country I do enjoy a good roast on Sundays and I see no reason why living in a foreign country should make me deviate from my traditional Sunday lunch. Imagine my horror on ordering roast beef one Sunday in a local hotel when I was asked to leave and never return.What.To add insult to injury there was a bovine wandering around the reception of the place...
If this country wants to make anything of itself it should get its act together. The people should learn to speak a civilised language and as there is massive overcrowding some of them should be shipped of to other places, even to England, no doubt they could do something useful over there even if its only shop keeping. At least that would release some of our men to join the army and civilise more places. What.
There you are. Maybe you could use your influence to persuade the locals to behave more like civilised English people and everyone would be a lot happier. What.
Yours truly, Col J G G Orpington-Bassett

So you see, writing to newspapers is part of our heritage

John Sutton

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[Captain Kong]

Hi John I thought the Col. was talking about his stay in Bolton. the description of the locations, habits and people are very familiar.
नमस्कार, namaskār
Brian
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PS This is not a whinge.नमस्कार, namaskār

[Les Woodard]

You should come out here to Oz where they leave us way behind in the whingeing stakes. Mind you some of the best laughs have been their sayings. Like the Great Aussie dream? Two thousand poms swimming home with a *** under each arm. Once that was said to me I just knew that I would settle here.

[happy daze john in oz]

The other one very popular with the locals who calim the British who arrive here are the worlds biggest whiners, though the average Ausiie can do his share.
How do you know when a plane load of Poms has landed? There is still whining after the engines are turned off.

[Captain Kong]

I was in a taxi in Sydney four months ago, the Taxi Driver said,"You Poms?? I said Yes , He said `We could do with a lot more of you fellas out here, the Bloody W*** ARE TAKING OVER.
Nice to be appreciated after all these years .
Brian/.

[happy daze john in oz]

Brian, how did you manage to get a taxi driver thta speaks English? I met one in Singapore and thought what a good idea, an English speaking taxi driver, must suggest the idea back in Oz.