Apropos very little, here’s a useless piece of information with which to baffle your friends, colleagues and family members. You’ve possibly heard of people being described of as ‘posh’, meaning that they were somewhat upper-class or in many situations, that for some unfathomable reason, they think they are. Did you ever wonder where the word comes from? Well, the answer is, it’s an acronym for ‘port out, starboard home’, which is a reference to the days of the British empire when the ladies – the real ladies – who were sailing out to India would stay on the port side of the ship whilst they would stick to starboard on the way back. Why? Because they didn’t want their perfect milk white skin tainted by any hint of having been in the sun! Imagine that, going to all that effort to avoid even the merest tinge of facial redness because it was considered low-class, something that only the common hoi-poloi would ever be subjected to or even contemplate! How times change.
From the mid-1990’s onwards, most people couldn’t wait to get away from it all so they could disrobe on the beach before subjecting their body to the seemingly warming, calming ministrations of a blazing sun in a clear blue sky.
