Kissing Practice

[Spoonbill]

I just read Dawn French's autobiography Dear Fatty, in which she reminisces about how the girls at her single-sex boarding-school used to engage in 'kissing practice' with one another, so as to hone their skills in preparation for inflicting kisses on hypothetical boys at some as-yet undetermined point in the future.

Did this kind of stuff go on at CH Hertford? That's to say, was it just a weird West Country phenomenon or is it pretty widespread at girls-only academies?

I'm dead ignorant, me.

Dead fat, too.

[Doctor Smellcroft]

I once saw a bullfinch. Twelve feet long, it was.

On another occasion I posed as the Turkish Ambassador and opened a hydro-electric dam on the summit of Ben Nevis.

Hope this helps!

[anniexf]

I just read Dawn French's autobiography Dear Fatty, in which she reminisces about how the girls at her single-sex boarding-school used to engage in 'kissing practice' with one another, so as to hone their skills in preparation for inflicting kisses on hypothetical boys at some as-yet undetermined point in the future.

Did this kind of stuff go on at CH Hertford? That's to say, was it just a weird West Country phenomenon or is it pretty widespread at girls-only academies?

I'm dead ignorant, me.

Dead fat, too.

NO WAY!!!

Quite the reverse, in fact. In my Ward a girl threw herself out of the box-room (top floor) window after having been found by the Wardmistress alone in a room in "suspicious" circumstances with an older girl.
Any over-familiarity was immediately suppressed, crushes were frowned upon; it was believed apparently that frequent PE & games were the appropriate way to deal with teenage hormonal impulses.

[Mid A 15]

I just read Dawn French's autobiography Dear Fatty, in which she reminisces about how the girls at her single-sex boarding-school used to engage in 'kissing practice' with one another, so as to hone their skills in preparation for inflicting kisses on hypothetical boys at some as-yet undetermined point in the future.

Did this kind of stuff go on at CH Hertford? That's to say, was it just a weird West Country phenomenon or is it pretty widespread at girls-only academies?

I'm dead ignorant, me.

Dead fat, too.

NO WAY!!!

Quite the reverse, in fact. In my Ward a girl threw herself out of the box-room (top floor) window after having been found by the Wardmistress alone in a room in "suspicious" circumstances with an older girl.
Any over-familiarity was immediately suppressed, crushes were frowned upon; it was believed apparently that frequent PE & games were the appropriate way to deal with teenage hormonal impulses.

How awful!

Did the poor girl survive the fall?

[anniexf]

NO WAY!!!

Quite the reverse, in fact. In my Ward a girl threw herself out of the box-room (top floor) window after having been found by the Wardmistress alone in a room in "suspicious" circumstances with an older girl.
Any over-familiarity was immediately suppressed, crushes were frowned upon; it was believed apparently that frequent PE & games were the appropriate way to deal with teenage hormonal impulses.

How awful!

Did the poor girl survive the fall?

Amazingly, she did. After about 2/3 terms, she returned, with a rather gammy arm & walking a little awkwardly, but otherwise ok. I was so shocked to see her, but happy to see her alive, that I rushed up to say hallo, loudly & with a big smile. I was immediately "sssshhhh'd" by older girls because it wasn't the done thing even to suggest that anything had ever happened. Apparently I was being ill-mannered and tasteless.
The episode about the fall was mentioned in DR's book of one-eyed memoirs, Half to Remember, in a rather dismissive manner. A matter of immaturity, weakness of character, ISTR was her summary. Typical. Sadly.

[Spoonbill]

I should stress here that Dawn French herself emphasises in her book that there was nothing remotely Sapphic about kissing practice.

It was engaged in purely for educational and self-developmental purposes.

I can't easily envisage schoolboys doing it with each other, but girls? Well, hey, girls do tend to kiss and hug each other a bit, don't they, even when there are blokes, cats, dogs and other kissable entities present. Surely it's just one small step thence to kissing practice?

[anniexf]

Well, hey, girls do tend to kiss and hug each other a bit, don't they, even when there are blokes, cats, dogs and other kissable entities present. Surely it's just one small step thence to kissing practice?

Not in my day Spoonbill, but attitudes have changed so much that I imagine no-one would bat an eyelid about anything touchy-feely now.

[Angela Woodford]

Way back in my previous reminiscences, Spoonbill, I do remember a girl in our Junior House proposing an erotic encounter with another. I overheard them in the cloakroom!

But, at the time, being only eleven years old, I wasn't quite sure what was meant!

There was a terrible occasion of a girl throwing herself out of a window for the unreciprocated love of another girl . Nothing was said, nothing was done, nothing was understood or talked about.

Normal affection and demonstrativeness - it would not have been tolerated. Kissing practice? Never!

DR West would never have tolerated such experimential behaviour for "educational or self developmental purposes" even if we'd been so abandoned. And she would have known.

Fondness, playfulness, anticipation of sexuality, loving friendships... non-existent! Forbidden!

[midget]

I've just spent a happy 5 minutes trying to visualise the expression of Miss Norris discovering such a thing, and then DR, who would have to have been told.

[Chrissie Boy]

Given the choice (at gunpoint) between Chapel Practice and kissing practice (with dudes).....

Talk about a rock and a hard place.

But I think I'd have opted for the dreaded Chapel Practice, because like Vic Reeves I just can't get my head around the idea of two men kissing, not even if they've been hosed down with Dettol first. It's horses for courses and I'm simply not the right kind of horse.

Snog me at your peril, O company of hairy-arsed geezers.

And that includes JR.

[jhopgood]

Kissing is a curious practice, depending who you are with and where you are.
I have always kissed my sons, and also any woman, as a greeting, although the Brits and Irish have yet to work out whether they are comfortable with it. Always on the cheek, with the number of kisses varying from one cheek in Latin America, two in Spain and three in France. (I have a French daughter-in-law).
Some of the Brits get confused and think that full kissing on the lips is the correct thing to do, which causes a lot of confusion with the Spanish men.
In Argentina, and I would guess, maybe Italy, it is not unusual to see men greeting their good friends with a kiss on the cheek. First time is a bit unusual, although you soon get used to it, as it has no sexual connotation.
My worst was in fact from a Dutch footballing colleague, who gave me a kiss on the cheek after we were given a penalty. The problem was that he was unshaven.
Having watched the actions of footballers etc, I would imagine that things have changed at CH for same sex kissing, although I can honestly say that in my time at CH, kissing someone of the same sex never entered my thought process, and I saw no evidence of it with anyone else.

[Spoonbill]

In the Dawn French book, the fragrant young lacrosse-bat-wielding scholarettes at her school practised kissing on the mouth with one another.

How do Frenchmen get on with having you kiss them on the mouth with mucho tongue-action, Mr Hopgood? Does it go down a treat?

They're a funny lot, the French. They even eat white doggy-do, you know.

[sejintenej]

In the Dawn French book, the fragrant young lacrosse-bat-wielding scholarettes at her school practised kissing on the mouth with one another.

How do Frenchmen get on with having you kiss them on the mouth with mucho tongue-action, Mr Hopgood? Does it go down a treat?

They're a funny lot, the French. They even eat white doggy-do, you know.

Wrong country - he's in Spain. No tongue here in France - my last post never appeared so to repeat: meeting with women it is left cheek to left cheek, then right (and with good friends another left). With men it is bash right knuckles and then left cheek to very hairy left cheek; I wish my sandpaper was as abrasive. Certainly no tongue/lips in public unless she is your pillow dictionary.

[J.R.]

All I'm going to say on the subject, is that I spend quite a lot of time with a Ladies football team - All over 18.

NUFF SAID ????

[Angela Woodford]

All I'm going to say on the subject, is that I spend quite a lot of time with a Ladies football team - All over 18.

NUFF SAID ????

But Spoonbill's query is - did this kissing practice happen at Hertford?

Answer - as far as I am aware, no. Sorry, Spoonbill. Intimate contact between girls was generally non-existent. Personally, I admit that I thought it so unlikely that I would ever need to acquire such skills that I preferred to read romantic novels instead. How sad!