I had a little weekend getaway recently. It wasn’t exactly a relaxing one, but still, it showed me something rather interesting.

I had often heard about the great British Spirit during the wars, but hadn’t really thought about it much more than that. Well what a difference between over there, and over here, in this recession.

Here, we seem to be moaning, head in sand, complaining about it and in many respects ignoring the reality of what is happening. We rant and rave, rightly, against a rudderless Irish Government and corrupt, greedy businesses. But in the London Commuter towns they are, if anything, embracing it. I noticed the advertising was very much geared towards recession. Restaurant staff were wearing tee shirts proclaiming the establishment’s intention to “beat the credit crunch”. People you talked to all said, that yes things were bad, but it was time to grin and bear it and get on with things. Interestingly, advertising, and clients, reacted to the recession, while we seem to have flailed around for a year, though finally, and thankfully, that seems to be sorting itself out.
I wonder if we are too busy feeling sorry for ourselves and thinking about who and what is to blame, instead of stealing a little of that good old British Spirit and using it ourselves.

And on that note, here is a spot we’ll have all seen, but that illustrates perfectly what I mean in terms of the difference of approach of two nations. It uses the track from that legendary duo, Morecambe and Wise, ‘Positive Thinking’ from the last recession, ( some of us are old enough to remember that one, and we all survived!).