Watch your manners!

 

Well, I came across this article on Yahoo talking about how a mother-in-law to be wrote an e-mail to her future daughter-in-law of her lack of manners when the girl went to her boyfriend’s family house. This is what the old woman wrote.

from: Carolyn Bourne
to: Heidi withers
subject: your lack of manners

Here are a few examples of your lack of manners:
When you are a guest in another's house, you do not declare what you will and will not eat - unless you are positively allergic to something.
You do not remark that you do not have enough food.

You do not start before everyone else.
You do not take additional helpings without being invited to by your host.

When a guest in another's house, you do not lie in bed until late morning in households that rise early - you fall in line with house norms.

You should never ever insult the family you are about to join at any time and most definitely not in public. I gather you passed this off as a joke but the reaction in the pub was one of shock, not laughter.

You regularly draw attention to yourself. Perhaps you should ask yourself why. No one gets married in a castle unless they own it. It is brash, celebrity style behaviour.

I understand your parents are unable to contribute very much towards the cost of your wedding. (There is nothing wrong with that except that convention is such that one might presume they would have saved over the years for their daughters' marriages.)

If this is the case, it would be most ladylike and gracious to lower your sights and have a modest wedding as befits both your incomes.

One could be accused of thinking that Heidi Withers must be patting herself on the back for having caught a most eligible young man. I pity Freddie

Hurm.. How do you really feel when you got yourself this email from your future mother in law? =.=”

I believe that I have to agree to some points made out in this letter. Well, I was brought up  in a family where food is to be treasured or at least be respectful towards them. It is barakah, it is “rezeki” from Allah, it’s either you take it or leave it. You don't say unfavourable remark towards them, unless you got it yourself. If people give you out something appreciate it, even if you don't like it, at least show your manners, by saying “thank you” to show your gratitude and appreciation. It’s something you learnt since your adolescent years, the old plain, “Thank you”. Simple yet significant.

On to the next point, ‘you don’t start before anyone else’. Well, if you are at your own house, it is OK to dig into all the food in front you, but when you are at someone else’s house, it is plain rude to start before your host on the dinner table. You are a guest, act like one, and especially if the elders were present respect them! Mind your manners. Oh, and if you are staying at someone else’s house where parents involved, I cant agree more to this statement “When a guest in another's house, you do not lie in bed until late morning in households that rise early - you fall in line with house norms.”  Especially to women out there. What do you expect waking up late at someone else’s house? wake up and be served with breakfast shove to your face?: you are neither in a hotel nor a princess my dear, even if you don't help them with breakfast in the morning, at least wake up and do a little talk with the host. I believe it is a sign of respect to your host, you don’t want to be called a slouchy or a brat would you?

But did you know that the author of this email, not only send this remarks to her future daughter in law, but also forwarded it to her other friends too? And eventually the email were spread to other people too! Imagine how embarrassing it would be to the poor girl?

Well, in Islam, we were be taught not to put or even find people’s disgrace. You don't want to elaborate on people’s misbehaving and belittle them. Who are you to judge? And by making remarks to others, don’t you think that you actually break someone’s heart? And do remember wishes or pray of those who were persecuted are granted, people. And don’t you think those mishaps are actually consequences of your own doings? Well, the topic of human relationship is hard and unfathomable of course, but with some dignity, respect and of course common sense, it is retractable or at least manageable and preserve.

Enough of this babbling. Happy July!