Weekend Financial Times agony uncle Sir David Tang has been dumped into the furore swirling around the recent comments of Su Birch, CEO of SA Wine Export marketers WOSA, that China, an important SA wine export destination, is not a country she would like to visit on holiday. Sir David had some pithy things to say about the affair earlier this month. A follow-up letter to Sir David in this weekend’s FT starts off by questioning if the original communication was a real one or a plant:

Sir David Tang

“Greetings from Hong Kong, David, and no: I am not a fan! But I do read your FT column, because it is fun – and I have no clue if you invent the questions yourself to show your flavour of the week reading/education or not!”

before going on to trash current wine drinking habits in the Middle Kingdom:

“You are completely corked on your comment on the South African wine body’s comments on China. As long as mainlanders mix their Great Wall brand with reject Chilean red to make it more or less palatable, and island consumers mix French red with Coca-Cola in Hong Kong restaurants because they just do not like wine, but drink it since it is “the thing to do” the superior South African wines should be spared your somewhat outdated comments.”

Sir David delivers a resounding bitchslap in return:

“There is a British television programme called Who Do You Think You Are?, which is actually a witty reference to the tracing of one’s ancestry. But in your case, I would suggest that its unambiguous meaning should be applied to you. How arrogant are you to believe that we Chinese can’t properly appreciate good vino? Who do you think you are?”

Meanwhile SA wannabe exporters to China must be rolling their eyes and cringing. Not the kind of coverage SA wine needs at the minute although the identity of the latest correspondent will no doubt be a subject of much speculation in Stellenbosch.

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