Prince Philip, 91 yeas old and husband of Queen Elizabeth since 1947, made his first engagement of 2013 on Wednesday, opening a unit at Luton and Dunstable Hospital and 'put his foot in it' and 'raised eyebrows' for the first time this year when he told a Filipino nurse that her country "must be half empty – you're all here running the National Health Service."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-beds-bucks-herts-21519917
The old Duke is renowned for making gaffes and in the past and all over the world said to :
* at a project to protect turtle doves in Anguilla in 1965 :
* British students during a 1986 state visit to China :
"If you stay here much longer, you'll all be slitty-eyed."
* a group of deaf youngsters and referring to a school's steel band :
"Deaf? If you are near there, no wonder you are deaf," .
* in Scotland to a driving instructor in 1995 :
"How do you keep the natives off the booze long enough to pass the test?"
* controversially in 1999 in Edinburgh when he saw an untidy fuse box during a tour of a factory :
"It looks as though it was put in by an Indian." and later backtracked with :
“I meant to say cowboys.”
* Olusegun Obasanjo, President of Nigeria, who was in national dress :
"You look like you're ready for bed."
* of Ethiopian art that it was :
"The kind of thing my daughter would bring back from school art lessons".
* to Simon Kelner, republican editor of 'The Independent', at Windsor Castle reception: “What are you doing here?”
“I was invited, sir.”
“Well, you didn’t have to come.”
“Are you running away from something?”
* after accepting a conservation award in Thailand in 1991:
“Your country is one of the most notorious centres of trading in endangered species.”
* to multi-ethnic 'Britain’s Got Talent' 2009 winners 'Diversity':
“Are you all one family?”
* about Beijing, during a visit there in 1986:
“Ghastly.”
* about on Stoke-on-Trent, during a visit in 1997:
“Ghastly.”
* at Hertfordshire University in 2003:
“During the Blitz, a lot of shops had their windows blown in and put up notices saying, ‘More open than usual’. I now declare this place more open than usual.”
* to a tourist in Budapest in 1993:
“You can’t have been here long, you haven’t got a pot belly.”
* to a British trekker in Papua New Guinea, 1998:
“You managed not to get eaten then?”
* to Lockerbie residents after plane bombing, 1993:
“People say after a fire it’s water damage that’s the worst. We’re still drying out Windsor Castle.”
* in Canada in 1976:
“We don’t come here for our health.”
* about his son, the Duke of York’s house in 1986:
“It looks like a tart’s bedroom.”
* in Germany while addressing the Chancellor Helmut Kohl in 1997, that he was the :
“Reichskanzler.”
.Lord Taylor of Warwick
* at a party in 2004:
“Bugger the table plan, give me my dinner!”
* to a woman solicitor, 1987:
“I thought it was against the law for a woman to solicit.”
* to a civil servant, 1970:
“You’re just a silly little Whitehall twit: you don’t trust me and I don’t trust you.”
* about the 1981 recession:
“A few years ago, everybody was saying we must have more leisure, everyone’s working too much. Now everybody’s got more leisure time they’re complaining they’re unemployed. People don’t seem to make up their minds what they want.”
“It’s a vast waste of space.”
* to the Aircraft Research Association in 2002:
“If you travel as much as we do, you appreciate the improvements in aircraft design of less noise and more comfort – provided you don’t travel in something called economy class, which sounds ghastly.”
* about stress counselling for servicemen in 1995:
“We didn’t have counsellors rushing around every time somebody let off a gun. You just got on with it!”
* about Tom Jones in 1969:
“It’s difficult to see how it’s possible to become immensely valuable by singing what are the most hideous songs.”
* on how difficult it is in Britain to get rich:
“What about Tom Jones? He’s made a million and he’s a bloody awful singer.”
* to then Paraguay dictator, General Stroessner:
“It’s a pleasure to be in a country that isn’t ruled by its people.”
“Aren’t most of you descended from pirates?”
* at a WF meeting in 1986:
“If it has four legs and it’s not a chair, if it’s got two wings and it flies but is not an aeroplane and if it swims and it’s not a submarine, the Cantonese will eat it.”
* when asked st a local airport : “What was your flight, like, Your Royal Highness?":::
said : “Have you ever flown in a plane?”
“Oh yes, sir, many times.”
“Well,” said Philip, “it was just like that.”
* to a fashion writer in 1993:
“You’re not wearing mink knickers,are you?”
* to Susan Edwards and her guide dog in 2002:
“They have eating dogs for the anorexic now.”
* when offered wine in Rome in 2000 :
“I don’t care what kind it is, just get me a beer!”
* in 1967 :
“I’d like to go to Russia very much – although the bastards murdered half my family.”
* to matron of Caribbean hospital, 1966 :
“You have mosquitoes. I have the Press.”
* at a Bangladeshi youth club in 2002:
“So who’s on drugs here?... HE looks as if he’s on drugs.”
* to a children’s band in Australia in 2002:
“You were playing your instruments? Or do you have tape recorders under your seats?”
* at Duke of Edinburgh Awards scheme, 2006 :
“Young people are the same as they always were. Just as ignorant.”
* to Elton John on his gold Aston Martin in 2001:
“Oh, it’s you that owns that ghastly car, is it?”
* at a Scottish fish farm:
“Oh! You’re the people ruining the rivers.”
* after a breakfast of bacon, eggs, smoked salmon, kedgeree, croissants and pain au chocolat from Gallic chef Regis Crépy, 2002:
“The French don’t know how to cook breakfast.”
* to black politician, Lord Taylor of Warwick, 1999:
“And what exotic part of the world do you come from?”
* to Andrew Adams age 13, in 1998:
“You could do with losing a little bit of weight.”
* to the US Ambassador in 1999, when presented with a hamper of goods :
“Where’s the Southern Comfort?”
* when turning down food, 2000:
“No, I’d probably end up spitting it out over everybody.”
* in 2000 :
“People think there’s a rigid class system here, but dukes have even been known to marry chorus girls. Some have even married Americans.”
No comments:
Post a Comment