I frequently write formal letters in the course of my work. I have never undertaken any formal training as far as business writings are concerned. However, I suspect the majority of the local business people are not well-trained in business writing either; I fancy that they are therefore unable to spot the mistakes if they see any.
In the English language, we have a well-established system for titles of respect for people, i.e. Your Honour, Sir, Mr, Mrs and Miss, to name a few. These titles of respect are very specific and they're mostly used for people of a specific group (s) only. For example, adopting "Mrs" for a man is wrong.
11) Sounds like the Greek strongman's woman?
Not a very tough question and I am convinced that many teams must have solved it. Even if they failed to spot the required signboard, I'm sure they must have had a very good idea what to look for.
I am a bit embarrassed to have considered Samson as the Greek Strongman. But it was of no consequence because my team members quickly came up with Hercules, which is of course the correct name.
OK, so now that we know that we're talking about Hercules, how do we proceed with this question? The automatic thing to do—if you don't already know the answer—is to google up the information from the internet. And then you will probably end up with plenty of conflicting information, thus getting confused who exactly was his woman!
It turned out that it didn't matter what's the name of his woman, because within that sector there was a signboard containing:
A11) MS HERKULES SDN BHD @ PEJABAT URUSAN HERKULES
The wrong spelling of the name is covered by the "Sounds like..." at the beginning of the clue. The "MS" in the answer is covered by "strongman's woman". Or is it? Let us explore this issue a bit further.
Now I have a wife and a daughter. Their names are Euphemia Thien and Jamie Koh respectively. If I were to apply titles of respect for them, which are the suitable ones to adopt?
Let me deal with my wife first. We can address her as Mrs Koh. In this case, she has adopted my surname. People would then know that she is married to a Mr Koh.
An alternative way to address her is Madam Euphemia Thien. She is still adopting her own surname here. The title Madam has been used even for unmarried women in some countries, but in Malaysia it is commonly used for married women only; or for women holding high positions.
Another way to address her is simply Ms Euphemia Thien. Apparently this is also becoming fashionable in recent years. It is used when women do not wish to reveal whether they are married or not. The Ms is used in front of the woman's name, but adopting her own family name.
In the case of my daughter Jamie Koh, we can address her as either Miss Jamie Koh or Ms Jamie Koh. Miss tells us that Jamie is unmarried; whereas Ms tells us that she could be both married or unmarried. But she must still adopt her own family name.
NOW when people are talking about my wife and daughter, but referring through me, how should they address them?
Would you say it is correct for me to refer to my wife as my woman? I am sure you would say "yes". Therefore, it follows that "Cornelius' woman" should be Mrs Koh (or if you like Mrs Cornelius).
Would you say it is correct for me to refer to my daughter as my woman? Somehow it doesn't sound correct to me. I would probably introduce Jamie as my daughter and not my woman.
If you can agree with me, then you can see why the answer to "Sounds like the Greek strongman's woman" should be "Mrs Herkules" and not "Ms Herkules".
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