Boris Johnson, You Got it Wrong with The Song!
Why you shouldn’t take Boris Johnson’s pandemic advice.
Did you agree with the British Prime Minister’s choice of the song Happy Birthday to teach his Nation how to wash its hands during the COVID pandemic?
Boris suggested singing two verses of the song written by two Kentuckian Sisters in 1893 to act as a timer for the 20 seconds needed to properly wash our hands. He even gave us a demonstration on TV.
The ‘Happy Birthday’ song advice is echoed on the Center of Disease Control’s website and also recommended by The World Health Organisation.
Did Boris miss a golden opportunity?
Do any of us actually sing Happy Birthday while we soap up?
OK, so it might be suitable for young kids to use a song they know to give them a sense of timing but what about us proper music fans?
We know it’s never been more important to wash our hands as during this pandemic. The message is clear: HAND-WASHING is one of the most effective ways to protect ourselves and our families from contracting COVID 19. Boris told us what to do and showed us how to do it.
But don’t you think he missed giving us a valuable insight or reason to be happy to wash our hands during the endless lock-downs and social distancing rules of the past two years.
Horrible History
Have you ever wondered what hand-washing might have been like in past-times, for example during the Spanish Flu pandemic in the early 1900's?
Now with hotels and guest houses worldwide mercifully open after the long Covid lock-down restrictions, consider the plight of English dinner guests in hostelries in the early Victorian era. Washing hands in those days was an elaborate and expensive process. Described vividly in Albert Smith’s darkly comic treatise ‘The English Hotel Nuisance’ [1858] the procedure went as follows:
Before dining, you wish to wash your hands. You enter into the coffee-room. You must ring the bell to summon the waiter to whom you covey your wish. The waiter disappears and you must ring again to remind him of your need. He brings you to the foot of the staircase and fetches the chambermaid who brings you
up some stairs, and down others, and along passages on different levels, and round corners, and at last introduces you to a bedroom.
The chambermaid then draws the curtains and the blinds and leaves you alone with a bowl of such hard water that it is impossible to dissolve the soap and you
might as well wash with a bit of chalk as with the singularly hard white cake in the soap-dish
You won’t find much drying satisfaction either in one stiff towel that resembles ‘embossed paste-board’. You do the best you can with the aids and emerge to find the chambermaid waiting for her fee at the door.
Albert Smith’s essay lamented the Victorian-era custom for inns and hotels charging for every basic service like the overpriced candles, useless bars of soap, post-stiff hand towels to such an extent that when D’Oyly Carte opened his new Savoy Hotel London in 1889 he took out a full-page newspaper advertisement:
‘NO CHARGE FOR BATHS, LIGHTS, or ATTENDANCE’
Be happy AND grateful!
Don’t know about you, but I tend to thank my lucky stars when dining out for the ease at which I can walk to a nearby wash-basin, liberate some sweet-smelling glycerin soap from the dispenser (usually with my elbow these days) and lather surgical-scrub-style for as long as it takes to sing Happy….(Yes Boris that song is now embedded in my mind thank you)
As for drying my hands, well! Step up to the ubiquitous Dyson Airblade with its infrared time-of-flight sensors and HEPA-purified air and have a real Star Trek experience!
Choose Dido over Boris!
So, Prime Minister, don’t just flippantly throw at us an 1893 tune for something as life-saving as washing our hands in the pandemic. Be creative with us. Follow the example of some of our really talented musicians and inspire us to be GRATEFUL as well as safe.
And folks, don’t wait for Thanksgiving in November to take note of your blessings & privileges. Each time you wash your hands (and especially during this pandemic) forget Boris Johnson’s advice to sing Happy Birthday twice and sing a THANK YOU verse or two for the warm soapy water you can access at the touch of a tap. It doesn’t have to be Dido’s version.
You have the choice of artists who brought out THANK YOU songs depending on your generation: Earth Wind & Fire, Alanis Morrisette, Bon Jovi, Sly & The Family Stone for example.
Check out Billboards list of the best 15 Thank You Songs About Being Grateful.
Time for Boris Johnson to change his tune!
What is your favorite gratitude song? I’d love your suggestions!
