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Cape Town - Yes, becoming a member of the royal family sounds pretty amazing – after all you get to live in a real-life palace, ride in gold carriages and rub shoulders with the likes of the Queen of England!
But as Meghan – now the Duchess of Sussex – recently discovered, it also comes with a whole bunch of rules, especially pertaining to etiquette.
Australia’s etiquette expert Treska Roden – who runs The Duchess Effect workshops in Sydney – appeared on the Today show where she shared five rules to help anyone get started.
SEE THE 5 TOP ETIQUETTE RULES HERE:
1. Perfect posture
Remember when your mom told you, “don’t slouch” and “walk up straight”? Well, that’s exactly what you need to do – keep your chin up, shoulders back, engage your core and keep your back straight.
2. Royal greeting
Forget brisk handshakes, it’s all about the subtle pump. “You do two to three pumps from the elbow. Hands are perpendicular to the ground,” Treska says.
3. The Duchess slant
Meghan is already proving a pro with the “Duchess slant” – sitting with your knees and ankles kept firmly together and at a slight angle. “You can have your hands on your lap or just to your side,” Treska says.
According to Beaumont Etiquette founder Myka Meier the slant is used when a lady has to sit for an extended amount of time while keeping poise and posture. “It’s perfect for when a camera is shooting directly in front of you. It protects your modesty.”
4. Table manners
When eating, the knife is usually held in the right hand and the fork in the left with the tines down. “Your elbows must be locked into your sides,” she adds. During pauses, you should place your cutlery in the “resting position” – knife and fork crossed in the centre of the plate.
When eating soup, you must “scoop the soup outwards, away from your body before you tip it into your mouth,” she says. To eat neatly, you must run the bottom of the spoon along the edge from the inside of the bowl so you don't get any dribbles.
Between eating and drinking you should “dab the sides of your mouth so you don’t get any food scraps onto your glass”.
5. Drink tea like the queen
A golden rule: Never put your finger through the handle of a tea cup. “You keep your pinky in and you pinch the handle,” she says.
Milk must also only be added after the tea has been poured, adds Grant Harrold, a former royal butler. And when it comes to stirring your tea, you want to do it in a back-and-forth motion rather than a circular one, he says.
Sources: dailymail.co.uk, people.com, lifehacker.com
