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Bargaining is a repulsive habit compromise is one of the highest human virtues - the difference between the two being that the first is practised on the Continent, the latter in Great Britain.

George Mikes

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George Mikes
Age: 75 †
Born: 1912
Born: February 15
Died: 1987
Died: August 30
Author
Biographer
Journalist
Writer
Siklos
First
Difference
Continents
Great
Differences
Virtues
Virtue
Britain
Funny
Latter
Practised
Two
Compromise
Repulsive
Firsts
Humorous
Bargaining
Human
Habit
Continent
Humans
Highest
Negotiation

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The man who is not afraid of danger is not a hero, but a psychopath.
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People on the Continent either tell you the truth or lie in England they hardly ever lie, but they would not dream of telling you the truth.
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Continental people have a sex life the English have hot-water bottles.
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Many Continentals think life is a game the English think cricket is a game.
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Tel-Aviv airport is still the only airport in the world where each passenger is met by ten relatives.
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If it is gay, ribald and lascivious night-life you are after, Israel is not the place for you. The night clubs you do find are nearer in spirit to a YMCA than to dens of iniquity.
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A great deal of the pupils time was spent going through, once again, the History of the Communist (Bolshevik) Party of the Soviet Union. He had learnt it at elementary school at secondary school at his sports club at the Komsomol at the university at a folk dancing course at the chess-club.
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You can keep a dog: but it is the cat who keeps people, because cats find humans useful domestic animals.
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Japan is, you often feel, an improved version of the United States.
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Jokes are better than war. Even the most aggressive jokes are better than the least aggressive wars. Even the longest jokes are better than the shortest wars.
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In Moscow they do not pay much attention to the living but keep their cemeteries in a splendid state.
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To be extravagant you need money. True. But you do not need your own money.
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Although the rudiments of snobbery are there, its finer developments are basically alien to the Australian soul - that is, if Australians have a soul many people believe that they are too matter-of-fact and down-to-earth to have such fancy commodities.
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When a wicked and unworthy subject annoyed the Sultan of Turkey or the Czar of Russia, he had his head cut of without much ceremony but when the same happened in England, the monarch declared : We are not amused.
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The Art of Conversation could not die in Australia it never lived. Television did not kill it there was nothing there to kill.
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It is often said that the Japanese are extremely clean at home, or inside any house or office, but dirty and untidy outside. 'Go and look at a railway station,' I was told, 'and you'll be horrified.' I went and was horrified horrified by the cleanliness of the place.
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Remember that those five hundred words an average Englishman uses are far from being the whole vocabulary of the language. You may learn another five hundred and another five thousand and yet another fifty thousand and still you may come across a further fifty thousand you have never heard of before, and nobody else either.
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The trouble with tea is that originally it was quite a good drink. So a group of the most eminent British scientists put their heads together and made complicated biological experiments to find a way of spoiling it. To the eternal glory of British science, their labour bore fruit.
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It is great fun dying in the United States of America. It is great fun first of all for the undertakers who make a wonderful living out of it but also for the deceased who suddenly becomes the centre of attention and fuss.
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'I don't say a Zionist must be insane,' said President Weizmann, 'but it helps if he is.'
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