All day I’ve been avoiding a certain story. I’m sure you know the one by now. It involves shoppers at a certain Cardiff supermarket being asked not to wear their pyjamas in store.
I’ve avoided covering this story as it makes the Welsh look stupid and would make me look like a ‘snob’. As editor of this site, I’ve been asked for confirmation and quotations on the issue from many international media organisations. Until now I’ve refused to comment.
I always used to joke (privately to our staff) that most people in Cardiff thought that the “Fourth Estate” was somewhere near St Mellons. The final straw was when I saw that the respected site ‘The Huffington Post” had covered the story along side their Davos coverage (for any of you reading this in St Mellons, Davos was not the creator of the Daleks*).
I’m quite used to seeing people in South Wales with no idea how to dress. In fact it was only a week or two ago I saw a chap wandering around Tremorfa in flip-flops when there was a good few inches of snow on the ground.
For those of you who missed the story:-
A Tesco’s supermarket in St Mellons (yes, it’s a real place), a suburb to the east of Cardiff put up a sign saying:
To avoid causing embarrassment to others we ask that our customers are appropriately dressed when visiting our store (footwear must be worn at all times and no nightwear is permitted).
The BBC has been running the story all day and now most of the rest of the world’s media has picked up on it.
Journalists have been queuing up to get ‘vox pop’ quotes from the indigenous population and these have included:
she been “popping in for a pack of fags,” but if she had been doing a full shop “then we obviously would have gone in clothed”
“I’ve got lovely pairs of pyjamas, with bears and penguins on them. I’ve worn my best ones today, just so I look tidy.”
Can I just remind you all that when it comes to Wales (a part of the UK, roughly the size of Wales) that we do not all play up to that stereotype: Have a look at out main site at www.welshicons.org and you will see many of the contributions Wales has made to the world.
I’m sure I’m going to get accused of playing the race card here, but hey, I’m ethnic. How are they going to tell the difference between PJ’s and ethnic garb? – Bears and penguins?
