Chitty Chitty Bang Bang’s not so pretty origins

# Children and teenagers

# Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

# George Osborne

# Ian Fleming

# Leeds Playhouse

# Theatre

# UK weather

# Working Title

Letters: Soldiers in the Far East had to ask for a permission slip, a chitty, to leave the barracks and visit the local brothels

Your review of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (18 December) reminded me of how Ian Fleming came up with the name. Soldiers in the Far East had to ask for a permission slip, a chitty, to leave the barracks and visit the local brothels. You can work out the rest for yourselves.
Geraldine Blake
Worthing, West Sussex

• £98,000 for a new haircut (Osborne’s image-maker beats pay freeze with 42% rise, 18 December)? That’s what I call a fringe benefit.
Alasdair McKee
Lancaster

• Never mind flowers in bloom in December (Letters, passim). Yesterday I got bitten by midge-like insects on the North Yorkshire coast. My fault I suppose for working in a T-shirt.
Janice Gwilliam
Norton, North Yorkshire

• Join the debate – email guardian.letters@theguardian.com

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