Are you enjoying your food?
None
11/01/06
Tags : languages, Italy, religion, France, United Kingdom, Jacques Chirac,
0votes plus 0 votes moins
Have you ever wondered why, whilst the French wish fellow eaters bon appétit, the Germans a hearty guten Appetit and the Italians an impassioned buon appetito, English speakers say nothing, or perhaps just mumble a clumsy “enjoy your food” before tucking in? It’s not that they don’t relish their food or hope that others won’t either (well, perhaps Mr Chirac wouldn’t!). It is simply because Puritanism considered food as merely something to keep one alive so as to then serve God. To take pleasure in food and eating was to detract from one’s, and food’s, quite simple purpose. And so, by accident of history and quirk of religion, the English language does not have its own saying. Perhaps that’s not so important in today’s world of international cuisine - we’ll just use someone else’s!
- You can also read
Vote for this article 0votes plus 0 votes moins
Advertising
Tags
On homepage
-
focus
St. Patrick’s: Poitín, world’s strongest alcohol
-
overview
European indie film: ‘Sundance’ in Paris
-
interview
Interviewing Turkish Armenian author Agop Hacikyan
-
pictures
‘8 kilometres’ of illegal immigration
-
review
Guide to visiting Ghana
-
interview
The lowdown on what Europarl TV is
-
testimony
UK to Poland via France: hitch-hiking Europe
-
portrait
Czech actor Krystof Hadek on languages
Are we all nuclear again?
opinions & debates on the same topic
- The pizza maker and his passport : the mission of the E-migrant on eurogeneration
- An hesitating Hillary reminds Ségolène Royal and Walter Veltroni on eurogeneration
- Italians abroad: eurogeneration or simple immigrants? on eurogeneration
- Finding Việt N(y)am in Hungary on budapest
- Happy holidays with… on linea
- Call for articles Ñam nyam on coffeefactory

reverse the order of comments Refresh comments Join the discussion
Got anything to say? Do it here!
Already a babelian? Log-in. Or sign up!