Hi
I know I can't judge a society from my perspective as my British world is very little, it is only my work environtment.
I have very few English friends,almost all my friends are foreigns like me so I wanted to ask you if you think British Society likes gossip .
At my work they gossip a lot and when I say a lot means A LOT. In Spain they (we?) do too at work but I thought British people were too polite to speak about other people.
Yesterday night they were talking about everybody's life. I was there reading my notes but I couldn't not to hear. They spoke about co-workers personal lives, they judged them (are they not afraid somebody tell to them?) and they gossip about other people's lives like royal family. Who cares about them?
Lukily I learn always new words.
I'm quite surprised to hear this, actually. I have never been in a situation where people have openly criticised their colleagues or made faces as soon as their backs are turned. Please don't think that we all behave like this in Britain!
Maybe I've just been lucky. Or maybe it was always me they were gossiping about.....
I'm surprised to hear you find this is surprising Su.Ki. Of course to generalise everyone in the UK as being like this is unfair, the same any generalisation is, but I have encountered what Elena describes more than a few times.
Ah, I see, you're a nurse.. that explains why you work at night. And you are probably right about the kind of people you are working with. If they don't have much else happening in their lives, then it's not surprising that they resort to gossiping about their colleagues.
Do you work mainly with women? Because yes, British people, especially women like to gossip. It's quite common in smalltalk to speak about things like this.
Anyway I would say a lot of the British illusion of politeness is exactly that, an illusion. By that I mean people will be polite to you in person, but it's not necessarily the case behind someone's back.
