[SPHBHT: BT-NEWS-PAGES <BTS-026> [FIRST -26 ] ...

12/02/10] Author:KATMAN Date:12/02/10 Time:15:33

26 BOOKS/SHOPPING The Business Times, Friday, February 12, 2010

Mind your manners, says

Alexander McCall Smith in an
essay written exclusively for
BT – because those in the West
are in danger of losing theirs

Uncommon
‘Most readers
tell me they feel
courtesy
better by the

A
FEW days ago, I found myself in conversa-
end of my tion with an old friend now living in
Singapore. “Tell me,” I said, “what do
books. If that’s you like about living in this place?” That
question will usually elicit a variety of
the case, that’s answers, but it is often safety that comes at the top
fine with me of the list. There are other reasons, of course, why
people flock to Singapore – in an age when
philosophically. tax-gatherers are scratching their heads to find
new ways to relieve people of their money,
I’d be alarmed Singapore’s attractive tax regime is a real
attraction. But neither of these reasons was my
if they said they friend’s main response. He drew my attention to
felt worse.’ something far simpler. “Good manners,” he said.
In many Western countries, people are too
embarrassed these days to talk about manners. To
– Alexander McCall Smith go on about the importance of good manners is
(left) seen as somewhat old-fashioned – even
ARTHUR LEE reactionary. This is a result of a process that

Plotting a sunny landscape

started in the 1960s, when it was fashionable to
decry conventional conduct. We should liberate
ourselves, it was argued, from the constraints of
custom and bourgeois inhibition. So out went
formal ways of engagement with others. Hats had
already been abandoned, of course, but had they
still existed nobody would have dared suggest that
anybody should ever take them off to others.
This assault on manners was partly inspired by
Inspiration strikes Alexander McCall Smith at the Writers Bar as he starts scribbling down a desire to make dealings between people more
spontaneous, more natural. It was also connected
the future of his Botswana characters mid-interview, reports CLARISSA TAN with an ambition to liberate people from the

I
N BETWEEN sips of tea, Alexander McCall Smith
tells you he’s giving you a global scoop. Grace
Makutsi and Phuti Radiphuti, he divulges, will defi-
nitely head for the altar one day, despite the
long-standing machinations of an evil aunt and a
notorious husband-stealer. They will have a tradi-
tional Botswana wedding and, though having
bagged a rich husband, Mma Makutsi will continue
working for Precious Ramotswe at the No. 1 Ladies’ Detec-
tive Agency.
“They will get married,” he says, from a comfortable so-
fa at the Raffles Hotel’s Writers Bar, as you and he scoff
chocolate biscuits. “I think you can reveal that. That will
be a scoop. It’s the first time I’ve completely confirmed
that.”
We are now, you may gather, pretty far into the sunny,
light-hearted (some have said unrealistic) literary land-
scape of McCall Smith where, even though bad things can
happen, everything wraps up well. In his grey-on-white
pin-striped suit, the Zimbabwean-born Scottish author,
now 61, looks like he could have just stepped out of P G
Wodehouse’s breezy Blandings Castle himself.
McCall Smith is beloved with millions of readers world-
wide for creating the No. 1 series and its main heroine,
the good-hearted and fat – sorry, “traditionally built” –
Mma Ramotswe (“Mma” is a form of address for women
in Botswana). So popular has the series proved that it’s
spawned a tour of the same name in Botswana and the
No. 1 Ladies’ Opera House, where the restaurant serves
special Mma Ramotswe teas. There’s now a No. 1 HBO TV
series, starring Jill Scott and Anika Noni Rose.
But it’s not all play for McCall Smith, who’s known to
many of his readers simply as Sandy. He says he takes his
work “very seriously” as his books can strike something
deep in the hearts of his readers, to even his own sur-
prise. “I get a lot of mail, and I get very nice letters from
my readers in Singapore. They’re usually about Mma
Ramotswe. She appears to help people, which I find fasci-
nating. I wouldn’t have known that people could get that
from a fictional character. I have very moving meetings
with people who say things like ‘Mma Ramotswe has
helped me through a very difficult time in my life’.
“I suppose it has to do with the fact that Mma Ramots-
we is a universal type. It seems that people from all cul-
tures recognise her, that sort of aunty figure. She’s a very
kind woman. I think people feel that they can adopt her as
a friend.
“It’s very gratifying and I take it very seriously. Often
people who’ve been depressed say that Mma Ramotswe
has helped them. And indeed, there’s a psychiatrist in the
US who prescribes the books to his depressed patients.”
McCall Smith laughs a lot; indeed, he giggles, cackles
and guffaws. It’s rather refreshing to see an author who’s
not drawing from the trembling well of melancholy and
solitude.
“I don’t dwell on problems and there’s a reason for
that. If I wrote books on Africa that dwelt on problems, it
would just be the same as a whole lot of other books about
Africa. I deliberately don’t want to write tragedies. Most
readers tell me they feel better by the end of my books. If
that’s the case, that’s fine with me philosophically. I’d be
alarmed if they said they felt worse.
“It’s perfectly defensible” – he adds somewhat defen-
sively – “to write in a vein that’s more positive.”
McCall Smith is at his most gleeful when, halfway
through the interview, when asked about the develop-
ment of his Botswana characters, ideas start popping into
his head.
“That dreadful Violet Sepotho, she’s so awful!” he chor-
tles, referring to the notorious husband-stealer who keeps
foiling Mma Ramotswe’s and Mma Makutsi’s best-laid
plans. “We could have something really nice happen to
her. She could meet a really nice man. It could be some-
thing that changes her. Yes, yes, yes! Maybe she has tea
with Mme Ramotswe and suddenly she starts to cry ...
And then she changes.
“But then, after a while, she reverts to type. I don’t
think we can do much for her, I’m afraid. Also, I don’t
want to have to invent another villain.
“Actually, have you got a scrap of paper? I need to
write this down. My goodness me.”
You tear a page from your notebook and he scribbles
on it with a handsome Mont Blanc. Besides a greater spot-
light on the husband-stealer, one of the characters might -
though none of these events are set in stone - emerge to
challenge Mma Makutsi’s legendary 97 per cent in a writ-
ten examination, much to her horror.
It’s perhaps a measure of the generosity of the writer
that he asks you if you have any ideas for his stories, for
which he thanks you profusely, although you’re not really
helping that much. In fact, this back-and-forth relation-
ship with his audience is also reflected in McCall Smith’s
ongoing Corduroy Mansions series with the UK’s Tele-
graph, where he writes a new chapter online every week-
day for 13 weeks, with an extra chapter appearing on Sat-
urday. “The interesting thing about writing online is that
you get an immediate worldwide readership, so people
would come up with comments and suggestions. I can’t fol-
low them all obviously, but I look at them all.”
Besides No. 1 and Corduroy Mansions, McCall Smith’s
other well-known series include The Sunday Philosophy
Club and 44 Scotland Street.
The conversation is not all about cotton-candy sub-
jects. It meanders toward political systems and the cur-
rent state of Western Europe and South-east Asia.
“I like the optimism in Singapore, in the region. The
rest of the world is really down. It was a really bad year
for people last year. In Scotland we had a terrible time be-
cause of two of the very big banks.
“I think South-east Asia is still generally in an optimis-
tic frame of mind. People seem to have a strong sense of
future. This country is doing a great deal to attract and
make it easy for businesses, for people to do things. The
message is very clear.
“Western Europe in general is struggling to keep alive
its social model, and that’s quite a battle. We have serious
issues where we are faced with some aspects of social
breakdown.”
McCall Smith is very much for politeness and the social
niceties of life, as evidenced by the essay on good man-
ners he has written for BT. (A man of impeccable man-
ners himself, he wrote it based on a gentleman’s agree-
ment while juggling a jam-packed world tour that sand-
wiched Singapore between India and Australia.)
Still, nothing overtly political will make its way into his
books. “The most political my books get,” he had said ear-
lier in the interview, “is Mma Ramotswe and Mma Makut-
si arguing about who gets the bigger teapot.”
Then there’s that chortle again.
deadening hand of social and class barriers and
from authority in general. It was, people thought,
all about freedom.
What we did not realise, though, was that the
disappearance of manners would threaten the
fundamental attitudes that make life in society
possible. It took some time, of course, but it
happened. As parents and schools stopped
teaching children manners, youngsters became
wilder and wilder. Of course they would! Anybody
should have been able to predict that, and indeed
some did, only to be shouted down as
died-in-the-wool traditionalists.
Now the result is very evident for anybody to
see. A whole generation has lost a sense of those
social practices that make social interaction
between people a smooth rather than a difficult
and distressing business. Little things – the small
courtesies – are, in fact, the building blocks of the
big things – respect for others and for their rights.
Stop teaching those little things and what you end
up with is what many British politicians are now
openly describing as the broken society. It is
broken because people have not been taught to
care for one another, to respect one another, and
not to be selfish. Such a society rapidly becomes a
nightmare. Imagine living in an area where the
streets are dominated by youths who have no
compunction in making the lives of their
neighbours a misery through violence, noise, and
vandalism. Well, that is the lot of a large number
of people in societies where manners have been
disparaged and decried.
I agreed with my friend. Yes, people in
Singapore may not notice it themselves – one often
fails to notice things about one’s own society – but
it is very clear to the visitor. People here have
good manners. It just shows. And that is an
extraordinarily valuable social asset. Please, never
lose sight of that. Carry on teaching children
manners. And perhaps we will learn from you
before it is too late. I hope we shall.

Luxury brands turn to Asia for salvation

[SINGAPORE] Wang Jing was all
smiles as she strolled out of a Cartier
boutique in Singapore after blowing
close to US$5,000 on a watch and a
ring.
“It’s something I have always want-
ed, and besides, the economy isn’t
looking too bad at the moment,” the
Chinese tourist in her early 30s, who
is in Singapore for a four-day spree,
said.
“There’s no reason for me to hold
back,” she said with a laugh that is
music to the ears of the global luxury
goods industry.
From diamonds to designer tea,
high-end retailers battered by finan-
cial turmoil in the United States, Eu-
rope and Japan are now looking to
China, India and other developing
Asian nations for salvation.
“Apart from Japan, the Asia-Pac
countries have seen positive growth
and many luxury brands are now
looking to the region as a means of
gaining revenue and keeping afloat
during these difficult times,” said
Fflur Roberts, a global luxury goods
manager with marketing research
firm Euromonitor International.
Swiss group Richemont, whose
brands include Cartier and watchmak-
er Vacheron-Constantin, reported in
January that December quarter sales
rose 2.0 per cent to 1.6 billion euros
(S$3.1 billion), thanks largely to Asia.
Richemont’s revenue from Asia
grew 25 per cent while key markets
in the Americas, Japan and Europe
contracted during the October-Decem-
ber period.
London-based Euromonitor esti-
mates that spending on luxury goods
in Asia will grow 3.5 per cent to
US$54 billion this year, compared to
just 2.2 per cent globally.
Individual Asian markets such as
China and India are expected to post
double-digit sales growth as demand
for fine leather goods, watches and
jewellery mounts.
Analysts from research firm Bos-
ton Consulting Group are especially
bullish on China and tip it to become
the biggest consumer of luxury goods
in the next five to seven years.
In South Korea, government statis-
tics showed luxury goods sales at ma-
jor department stores – Hyundai,
Shinsegae and Lotte – increased 15.7
per cent year-on-year in 2009.
“We don’t have to fight over an ex-
isting pie as new pies are popping up
endlessly,” a spokesman for Hyundai
Department Store told AFP.
Even tea, a humble Asian
mass-market beverage, is getting a
makeover from entrepreneurs tap-
ping affluent Asians’ love affair with
luxury branding.
Singapore-based TWG Tea, estab-
lished in 2007, has experienced stel-
lar growth after launching a range of
designer blends and setting up a Euro-
pean-style salon in Singapore’s new-
est luxury mall.
Co-founder and chairman Manoj
Murjani said revenue exceeded
US$30 million in 2009 from sales of
over 700 tonnes of tea.
“This year’s sales will triple, at a
minimum,” added Mr Murjani.
In China, top European luxury la-
bels are pouring in resources to forti-
fy their presence in the economy, fore-
cast by the International Monetary
Fund (IMF) to grow 10 per cent in
2010.
Chanel opened a new flagship bou-
tique on Shanghai’s riverfront Bund
in December.
Cartier held a jewellery exhibition
in Beijing’s Palace Museum in Septem-
ber while Hermes announced in Janu-
ary it would open a Chinese subsidi-
ary that will sell furniture, clothes
and household goods.
China’s consumption of LVMH
goods rose by 15 per cent in 2009 and
now represents 6 per cent of all com-
pany sales, according to the firm.
For two of LVMH’s leading
brands, the figures are more striking
– China is now the world’s top con-
sumer of Hennessy cognac and the
second-biggest Louis Vuitton buyer.
Hermes’ sales jumped 32 per cent
in Asia in 2009, excluding Japan, and
it will open four new shops in China
in 2010.
Louis Vuitton plans to open five in-
cluding two in Shanghai, host city for
the 2010 World Expo from May to Oc-
AFP
tober.
For the moment, some Chinese
shoppers like Ms Wang prefer to ven- London-based Euromonitor estimates that spending
ture overseas to check out the full
range of Western luxury goods. on luxury goods in Asia will grow 3.5 per cent to US$54
“The quality and style justify the
price tag,” she said. – AFP billion this year, compared to just 2.2 per cent globally.