Competition | 27 June 2009

In Competition No. 2601 you were invited to submit snippets of misleading advice for tourists visiting Britain. You were at your cruel and mischievous best this week; the entry was a magnificent compendium of misinformation. There were a lot of like minds out there. J. Seery’s ‘In public toilets it is considered rude not to engage the man in the next urinal in jovial conversation’ was echoed by many. Equally popular were variations on D.A. Prince’s ‘On boarding a London Underground train it is customary to shake hands with every occupant before sitting’, while Mark Ambrose added a sadistic twist to the frequently proffered advice that it is insulting to tip black-cab drivers: ‘A driver of a black taxi will forego a tip from a minicab driver if you can provide a business card.’ Several of you sent unsuspecting visitors to Shakespeare’s Stratford via the Docklands Light Railway, and I liked the snippets which had a particularly irresistible plausibility, such as Bill Greenwell’s invitation to ‘visit the bird sanctuary at Canary Wharf’ and Mike Morrison’s helpful suggestion to ‘hang on to your sterling: eat and drink gratis at our splendid “free houses”’.