>Do say ‘How do you do?’ >Don’t say ‘Pleased to meet you.’>‘How do you do?’ is a rhetorical question and those who answer it will have fallen at the first hurdle. Instead, repeat it back at your interlocutor, together with your name. Thus, the ideal greeting will go like this: Mr Smith ‘Good morning, how do you do? John Smith.’ Mr Jones ‘George Jones, how do you do?’>‘Pleased to meet you’ should be avoided for two reasons. The first is that if you have never met them before, you do not know if you are pleased to meet them or not, and we can leave this sort of treacly insincerity to the Americans, who are all having nice days.>Traditionally, the British are very reserved about these things and are reluctant to show much, or indeed any, emotion to those they do not know very, very well. Typically, they only show affection to dogs or horses.>Small talk is much more than making comments about the weather. It’s about summing up the conversational skills of your opponent. Do they make you laugh, cry, sad or mad? If you like what you hear then you stay; if not, you leave. The language choices you must make if you wish to cut it with the cut-glass set will be addressed later, but there are certain topics that need to be handled with care or, preferably, not at all, for good conversation:>Avoid sex, money, health, politics and religion.>Discuss how one knows the hosts, the weather, horses, if one has travelled far.
