Sunny African disposition? not in Stroud, perhaps. (From Stroud News and Journal)

Sunny African disposition? not in Stroud, perhaps.

HELLO is there anybody out there? It seems not, if my smoking sojourns on the back step of the SNJ offices are anything to go by.

It is one of my few remaining positive life principles that passers-by should exchange greetings.

They put a smile on the face of the day and the person and cost precious little to give.

But if saying hello is an act of generosity to our fellow man then this sceptred, septic isle is a land of the selfish and irascible.

The ratios of my hellos responded to is woeful, depressing and wipes the smile from my day.

When I moved to this country from Zimbabwe as a fresh-faced colonial boy I came with the cultural habit of a warm grin and greeting for my fellow man.

On my arrival in my adopted homeland the cold drizzle of English reticence quickly extinguished the sunny African light of human interaction.

I will not accept the hackneyed local excuse of a cold, wet climate, bereft of sunlight as the cassus belli for this ill-tempered street belligerence.

The English are so suspicious, so cynical. We have evolved into a nation that regards even a friendly nod as an invitation to put 'em up. It is depressing.

For a people that prides itself on an etiquette the rest of the world regards as stultifyingly quaint we are remarkably bad mannered about acknowledging each other's presence.

So next time you're walking up the hill past the SNJ offices and a lanky, balding guy attempts a smile and a cheery greeting please humour him.

Meet the eyes of this stranger with an over-amicable bent and a funny accent, force a smile through your grimace and grunt some acknowledgement of a favourable kind. You'll make his day and, you never know you might make yours.