I’ve never been an anglophile and frankly always gone a little out of my way to make the point.  When the opportunity to have dinner at the House of Lords with Lord Wei came up in our trip planning for London I was the first one to say “That’s not the kind of thing we want to do for dinner.”  What’s the attraction of having dinner with someone just because they have a title? My assumption has always been titles have been handed out for the same reasons major donors to successful Presidential political campaigns are awarded positions as ambassadors.  It’s patronage pure and simple. 

As well the word “peer” means something totally different in our two countries.  For me it means someone of equal standing and by whom I am willing to be judged should I go to court. For our UK friends it means a member of one of the ranks of nobility.  We are more than an ocean apart on that one! 

However I was in the minority so I tagged along with the rest of the group.  

In the course of the evening I changed my mind about dinner with Lord Wei and learned a lesson in the process.  Years ago a woman named Gert Behanna was a popular speaker.  She was raised in the Waldorf-Astoria hotel as the irresponsible child of a wealthy and dysfunctional family.  She was brought up to be a snob.  After her remarkable conversion from “alcoholism and boredom” she would tell people “I’m a snob above snobs because I look down upon people who look down upon people.”  

While I was not raised at the Waldorf I recognize the painful truth of Gert’s comment.  It’s easy to make assumptions about people and to fit them into simple categories.  It’s easy to look down on people who we believe look down on people. The only snob I met that night was me.  

I’m going to say more about our dinner and conversation with Nat Wei in the next blog.  He was not at all what I was expecting.