Decoding English: bullies and condoms

A quick smoke before leaving Dunkirk

Travelling back to England I stop by the duty free to try to find a specific present for a friend. ‘We don’t stock that range, sir’.
I linger by the racks of popular best sellers: Alan Sugar, Gordon Ramsay, Hester Bloemental and Jeremy Clarkson feature prominently. What is it about Brits that makes us elevate sociopathic bullies to the status of superstars? I find that worrying and disturbing. These guys should be in therapy, learning communication skills – not given air time and treated like role models

Three days later we go shopping in a mega Tesco store. Condoms are one item on the shopping list. We spend fifteen minutes walking around the pharmacy dept: old enough not to be embarrassed about asking – but there are no employees visible. We wonder around and finally find them – under the sign that says ‘aches and pains.’ Isn’t that so British? Sex as pain? My (non-British) companion on this search pointed out – ‘it took a Brit to decipher that one’. Ex-pat maybe - but not completely divorced from my culture.