Danish diplomacy

A Scandinavian associate, Inge, recently attended her country's expat Christmas bash. She went with a large group of friends, many of whom were smokers. Seeing lots of children there, they deliberately chose a separate, empty table away from the youngsters, and lit up their cigarettes while waiting for two final friends to arrive.

Up comes a couple towards the empty slots: husband, small child, and heavily pregnant wife.

"We're very sorry but we've reserved these seats for our friends stuck in traffic," Inge tells them politely.

"Tough luck," comes the curt reply, and the hell-couple sit down.

After a few moments, the hell-wife starts a fake "coughing" performance. "You know, smoking is very bad for me in my condition," she announces, clearly expecting everyone to extinguish. Because she and her hell-husband have been so rude, no one does.

"Look," Inge suggests after some awkward moments pass. "There are many other spaces free. We really wanted to have all our friends together for an adults-only table - why don't you find a non-smoking table?"

At this, hell-husband goes off. He starts ranting and raving and shouting in anger at the dozen adults already sitting on the table. His performance is so loud and embarrassing that the Ambassador is called over to save the day.

"He was very diplomatic. He said to them - look, there are lots of double spaces free - and managed to move them away. Our friends arrived, and we all had a great night," Inge relates. The irony is that Inge and her friends aren't fag-monsters. "We would have happily stopped smoking if they had even attempted to be polite, And if they had been there first, none of us would have even lit up."

Smoking may be an unhealthy, unpleasant habit. But when smokers attempt to segregate themselves and show consideration - rare behaviour among most Dubaian fag-addicts - there's no point kicking them in the teeth.