"...what regretfully happened..."

[Dilbertian]

Colosseum: Tourist who carved on wall 'unaware of arena's age' www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-66121000

"I admit with profound embarrassment that only after what regretfully happened did I learn of the antiquity of the monument."

Really? It just 'happened'? You choose to permanently deface that wall, you entitled adult brat.

And he didn't know how old it was.

I think he deserves an extra five years for expecting people to fall for that.

He's only sorry he got caught.

His statement sounds like Boris Johnson wrote it.

Of course he knew, he's just shitting himself about the consequences. I mean, why would you go abroad and carve your initials on a common or garden wall? Of course you wouldn't.

He's using the past exonerative. Once pretty much confined to politicians and the like, part of 'political grammar'. The man is an absolute roaster

I don't know what his background is but it sounds like someone with English as a second language to me.

Would it matter how old the building is - at the end of the day he defaced what he knew to be a building of monumental importance to Italians (otherwise why was he even there?!) and thought that was okay. He deserves everything that gets thrown at him. He's mostly sorry he got caught.

It doesn't matter whether he knew it was old or not. He wrote his name on something he didn't own.

@Goldfoot I think he's Romanian or Bulgarian.

Is he expecting anyone to believe that a person with eyes looked and thought, oh yeah, thats not an old building

Hopefully he'll get a stiff sentence

What kind of idiot goes to visit the Colosseum with no idea how old it is?

OK so a thread has been started to critisise a foreigner's turn of phrase in English?

Obviously what he did outrageous, but that's not what the OP was about. I hope OP could express herself properly in Bulgarian.

I think he's lying as well

But I also think some people with money go to certain places for the sake of it. They have o interest in the history, it's just on some weird bucket list.

Has it though? You are assuming he didn't use that formulation intentionally.

The non apology is being elevated to an art.

If English is not his first language, then either his grasp of English is excellent or someone else composed that statement for him. It's a complex sentence.

Even I, with my O-level French, can tell the difference between 'ce qui c'est passé' and 'ce que j'ai fait' without having to look it up.

No, I'm not criticising a foreigner's turn of phrase in English. I'm criticising a visitor's appalling attitude.