On about the fourth day of the trip to America, we went to see an 'ice hockey' match, between the home team known as "The Boson Bruins" (FUN FACT: a bruin is a type of bear), which had a stadium full of fans and which, the commentary implied, were a force for good and a shining beacon of civilisation over the 'ice hockey' world, and the 'Calgary somethings' (Can't remember) who had about two fans, wore cowboy hats and were, the commentary implied, evil.
I was a bit annoyed as I walked into the hockey arena, for two distinct reasons. The first was that, on the coach ride to the rink, we watched the remake of Godzilla, and I was really annoyed at the ending. Yeah well done Mattew Broderick and Maria Pitillo, you killed all of this creature's children, then when it got (quite justly) annoyed at you, you ran away and got your mate with a helicopter to blow it up. Wow you heroes. I mean Godzilla didn't even TRY start a fight on you. It didn't eat meat it posed no actual threat to the people other than the fact that it was big and a bit clumsy with its tail. And we were meant to feel happy when they killed it at the end. Fuck that I hope they all get AIDs and die.
The other reason that I was annoyed was that I had just been given a free tshirt. Now usually this is a cause for jubilation and celebration - free things are always good, free tshirts 100 times more so. But firstly the tshirt was made of what I can assume was paper. It was also XL size, and we're not talking British 'Slightly Podgy' XL sizes, we're talking American "I drink a bucket of bacon fat every day for breakfast" XL here, thus the shirt was easily big enough to fit over my head and the four layers of clothing I was wearing. However what really annoyed me was the logo printed on the shirt, which proclaimed that I was now "Property of the Hub of Hockey". HOW CAN YOU BE PROPERTY OF A HUB. It made no sense and it annoyed me. But whatever I still wore the shirt because, to be honest, it was free and anyway I soon forgot my annoyance when I walked into the main rink area itself.
I mean, wow. It's hard to find a decent simile to describe this rink. I suppose if you're American you have probably been in an "ice hockey" rink at some point so I suppose you know what I'm talking about here, but we are British and the most extreme our sporting arenas get are perhaps having some Mozart piped over the rugger at half time or having - on really wild days - a performance from the Queen's bagpipe regiment. But we have NOTHING like this arena. Christ man, it was like being trapped inside a giant pinball table. A giant japanese pinball table. A giant japanese pinball table inside a huge commercial break.
I had already intuited that America is a country that runs on advertisements, flags, and being generally over the top, but fucking hell... literally every seat, every barrier, every player, every surface, EVERY NOUN YOU CARE TO MENTION was covered in huge LCD screens advertising beer bank accounts mobile (sorry, 'cell') phones mcdonalds kfc dunkin' donuts tv stations radio shows more beer coca cola upcoming games applebees pepsi ice cream. Interestingly, I noticed that there were few, if any, adverts for "Get A Life", the latest novel from Nobel-Prize-winning South American author Nadine Gordimer. My ears were bombarded with a thousand different (and equally tacky noises) - adverts blaring, children crying, ten-second snatches of hip-hop flashing, virgins dancing, hard-rock blasting, electro blooping... it was like one of those films when the main character gets the ability to hear people's thoughts and then there's invariably a scene when he's in Time Square and he suddenly hears EVERYONE'S THOUGHTS AT THE SAME TIME and he's like "Stop it stop it" because it's just a dinnish cacaphony of sound pollution and then he starts crying and he puts his hands to his ears BUT THATS NO GOOD because the sound is INSIDE his mind. Like that. And this was even before the players skated on. This was like the warm up noise.
When the players came on, I was rewarded with yet another interesting glimpse into the psyche of the American people (about three seconds in I decided to take an anthrologist's view of events) - they have literally no concept of fair play. I mean, they don't even pretend to be impartial. The home team each came on seperately, each greeted by a personal introduction, their own soundbite, a little fanfare, and raucous fan applause. They got to skate about a bit. The commentator was basically orgasming over them.
Then the opposition came on. All at once, with no introduction, to the gusty booing of the assembled fans. But I mean, I was a little confused. I didn't even know that they were the opposition. I mean, how was I to know? There was no hint. I wish that they'd, like, signposted it more. I dunno, they could have played the Imperial Death March from Star Wars when they came on. Or, like, made the entire rink go ominously red and flashed skulls on the huge video screen? That would have simplified the entire procedure up and really showed me who to cheer for. OH WAIT THEY DID. It was so ridiculously biased.
This interesting one-sidedness continued into the play itself. Every time the Bruins piloted the puck into the back of the net, all the lights in the stadium flashed on and off repeatedly, the American Flag appeared on the video screen, and the commentator screamed "BOSTON SCORE! WOO!" (NB: he actually said woo. It was a properly excited woo. WOO) However, whenever Calgary blasted a puck into the back of the net, all the lights sort of went sad - not sure how lights can go sad but trust me they did - and our commenter was like "Calgary - sigh - score" as those he had to announce that his mother had just been raped by a cactus.
(Sorry I just have to pause here. I'm typing this in the library and a guy wearing a huge mustard yellow and ketchup red checked scarf just walked past me. He looks like such a fucking mug)
It was actually hilarious. Because I consider my political ideology to be 'contrarian' and because I felt so damn sorry for them, I started to cheer for Calgary halfway through. The yank sitting in front of me actually turned round and glared at me as though cheering for the opposite team was a display of bad sportsmanship. He was pretty hefty looking and looked like he could take me in a fight (who am I kidding Dale Winton could probably take me in a fight), so I shut up. Luckily, at that point the game also stopped, so it didn't really look like I had backed down on my contrarian principles. When it restarted again, after like fifteen minutes of adverts, I cheered under my breath (Go Calgary) and nobody noticed.
Oh yeah I forgot to mention; the game consisted, as far as I can tell, of three twenty minute long thirds. We were in that rink for literally two and a half hours. You know how in football when there's a red card or something, they pause the game for a few seconds to sort it out then get right back into it again? Because they know that people come to football matches to watch other (better paid) people play football, yeah? It seems to me that people go to 'Ice Hockey' matches just to watch adverts. They would play hockey for ten minutes, then all the lights would flash and an advert would pop up on the big screen while people ran around the rink with brooms. These ads were so weird - they basically consisted of display the company's logo on the screen next to crowd footage. They pretended that they were just free fan giveaways - "Papa Joe's Pizza wants to award a free seat upgrade to THIS PERSON *show video footage*" and everyone just lapped it up, but I knew better. I. Knew. Better.
This doesn't sound too bad, but turst me: it reached preposterous limits; about halfway through the second third, the lights came up and an advert for, like "KFC's Special Fan" or something came on. "Jimmy Squashinger" boomed the commentator (can't remember the actual name) "Is tonight's KFC special fan: Jimmy has a rare terminal neurological disease that has crippled him and has limited his life severely... SO IN CONJUNCTION WITH KFC WE ARE GIVING HIM FREE TICKETS!!!"
Then the screen showed a shot of Jimmy and his family just hangin' in their seats. They all waved enthusiasically. Well, Jimmy didn't, because he was just some fat slug-boy in a wheelchair. He was pretty much staring into space. SO HIS MOTHER GRABBED HIS ARM AND MADE HIM WAVE AT THE CAMERA TOO.
Everybody in the audience cheered.
I wanted to cry.
I still do. But mainly because I'm hungry. But on the other hand, I made up a new slogan for America.
"America: we go beyond self parody."
Thursday, November 9, 2006
Wednesday, November 8, 2006
Wednesday, November 1, 2006
Ameriblog (Part 1)
This is the blog that the world - nay - the UNIVERSE - has been waiting for. It will answer one of the ultimate questions of our time. What did I think of America? I bet you are all DYING to know. I bet you're just WAITING for me to skewer this awesome iron giant with the white hot slithers of intellectual shrapnel whizzing away from the cataclysmic detonation of my white-hot wit. You're not? Well tough fuck off then you gays.
But I can't be bothered to write a good introduction to this blog. What does it matter anyway anyway you people only read this hoping I'll make a spleling mistake so you can point it out on the comments and feel smart. So just imagine the three-hundred word description of the fact that I went on a rowing trip to America, got searched a million times, managed to piss off the VISA inspector man and got my name typed into a computer, did some rowing, toured the USA and came home again. Now I'll get to the meat of the post.
I just don't know how American people do it. I just don't. I don't know how they can manage to all stay so happy and jolly and generally legendish when they live in that country. In the whole two-week trip I came into contact with millions of Americans and they were all jolly and smiling and generous. For example my chum Fudge (so called because his second name is Packer, natch), tried to buy something at a shop. He HAD the money and was getting out of his pocket, when the dear old cashier said "Don't worry son" or something and pressed a button on his till. A LITTLE DRAWER POPPED OUT OF THE DESK AND MONEY CAME OUT WHICH THE CASHIER GAVE TO FUDGE TO PAY FOR HIS SWEETS. I mean dude wtf. We all just gazed at the cashier and our faces were like :o. And he gazed back and gave a little wink. I felt like crying "Jeepers!". But I didn't. That's just an example of the level of safeness that we're dealing with here; Back in England the cashier would probably wink at you but then you realise that it's just her miserable NHS-prescription glass eye collapsing under the weight of the misery of her pathetic minimum wage rainy-day existence. Sheesh.
I would say that in the entire week, I came into contact with, like, 30 safe Americans and about four twattish ones. But fair do's I guess; all bar one of the twattish ones were shopkeepers who were unamused when we asked how much of their stuff was for free. The other twat was a rower who tried to punch our coxswain. This was while they were both sitting in different boats. Following our mid-race crash in which both of our boats had stopped dead and our stroke man had punched the aforementioned rower in the face with his oar. So yeah I guess perhaps the twattishness was warranted.
Wait, that means that there were literally ZERO non-nice Americans in the entire of the USA!!!!!!!!!!!!! Well, the bits I saw - Boston, Philly and EN-WHYYY. Which surprises me hardcore because, in my opinon, America is literally the most polluted country EVAR. Now I don't mean environmentally polluted - although seriously guys not every single one of you needs a 4x4 you LIVE IN NEW ENGLAND NOT THE MOON - I'm talking more on a moral, cultural and ethical basis.
I just don't understand how they can stay so CHIPPER when they live in such a cultural wasteland. I'm sorry but America has no culture whatsoever. Unless 'The American Flag' is a culture. Because they sure like their American flags. An awful lot. I wouldn't be surprised if all of America had sex with their flags just before they go to bed at night. Either that or the flags are actually sentient beings who are slowly invading the world, starting at the major superpower. Perhaps they sprount from the ground. No shit; we were driving along and I saw this flowerbed. Except it wasn't planted with flowers. Oh no. Oh NOOOOO. It was planted with - get this - GET THIS - YOU'LL NEVER GUESS WHAT - American flags!!!!! No shit. Just a flowerbed filled with minature American flags. I saw this and buried my head in my hands. When I unearthed it I was just in time to see the petrol station with literally twenty mini-flags mounted on the top. I mean shit, why go for one BIG flag when you can really break the bank and wang out LOTS OF LITTLE ONES? I can picture it now in my brain. Actually, shit, no I can't. I think I've forgotten what the American flag looks like now without my minutely reminder. Oh wait there's one:
Wicked. But seriously I mean, ok, we get it lads, you are a country with a flag now for the love of GOD please stop reminding yourselves. Seriously, what would England be like if everyone stuck
Union Jacks up wherever they wanted? I'll tell you what it'd be IT WOULD BE A HELL. We English are plenty patriotic enough anyway we don't need a (to be honest, pretty goofy-looking) piece of cloth to remind us that we have been chosen to live on some big rock in the middle of the sea. I mean, check out our football (sorry, 'soccer') hooligans! We totally reamed those Spanish Resteraunt Owners during Euro 2000! Go England! Throwing plastic chairs at Germans and breaking windows; that is my idea of real patriotism - not some dumb flag which is just another example of the quasi-patriotism in the fake shell of the American ideal in what is essentially a total quasi-shell of a quasi-country. I don't even know what the last sentence meant but boy it did sound deep and prophetic, didn't it? I believe I'll leave it as is and if anybody asks me what it means I will just nod wisely and stroke my beard. My beard is blonde and like two milimetres long. I am going to let it grow and see if I end up looking like a Man. But I digress. I think I could probably sum up the
previous few paragraphs in fourteen words: America is totally phony. That's only like four words. Ok, NOW it's fourteen.
I'm pretty sure that I didn't see one authentic shop in the entire fucking country. The small shops all had weird exotic names that implied that the owners were Native Americans, Martians, or Irish (no shit I saw a pub called Finnigan's Wake... with a leprechaun painted on the door!). Although, I was amused by the "Wok King" diner placed directly next to "Dairy Queen". THEY COULD GET MARRIED. I see the humour in everyday situations. I am a true comic.
In the meanwhile, the big shops either had names like "Mom & Pop's Cornershop" (not owned by anyone's MUM or DAD) "The General Store" (not true you could not buy generals there), "The Village Bakery" (I don't know what sort of bakeries you have in your village but I have yet to see a bakery that is like four stories tall) or "The Fishing Shack" (not a shack). They were all TOTALLY FAKE I actually felt my soul being sucked out from under my feet at the sight of the Store Associates cheerily handing out Free-Samples-Of-Lite-Non-Trans-Fat-Liteweight-Turkey-American-Cheez-Wotsit-Slice-Bites-Plastik while waving the American flag and listening to The Star Spangled Banner muzak being piped through the intercom at a low-level drone.
At least back in England they give their stores depressing names and get on with it. You go to Budgens, you know you're not in for fun. But you go into BEST BUY, there's an implication that you might just have the best buying experience of your entire life!! Not true. They didn't even have Bonkers 11: Forevolution in the CD place. NO BONKERS.
So in conclusion, Budgens = British Sense of Acceptance of Place and the Essential Misery of Life.
Best Buy = American Fake Piped Optimism In A Jar.
I mean, seriously, would you be able to trust a country that produced THIS as a serious NON-IRONIC piece of art?
Ok I can't be bothered to write any more that's it for part 1 of the Ameriblog. In the next installment, I'll probably discuss how shit America is some more, featuring a hockey match, a terminally ill young boy, America's complete lack of grasp of the concept of irony, and my face going like :o. Hope to see you there!!!!!!!!!
OH FUCK THE FLAGS ARE ATTACKING
we will exterminate you
all hail bezalaroth, king of the flag people
noooooooooo
But I can't be bothered to write a good introduction to this blog. What does it matter anyway anyway you people only read this hoping I'll make a spleling mistake so you can point it out on the comments and feel smart. So just imagine the three-hundred word description of the fact that I went on a rowing trip to America, got searched a million times, managed to piss off the VISA inspector man and got my name typed into a computer, did some rowing, toured the USA and came home again. Now I'll get to the meat of the post.
I just don't know how American people do it. I just don't. I don't know how they can manage to all stay so happy and jolly and generally legendish when they live in that country. In the whole two-week trip I came into contact with millions of Americans and they were all jolly and smiling and generous. For example my chum Fudge (so called because his second name is Packer, natch), tried to buy something at a shop. He HAD the money and was getting out of his pocket, when the dear old cashier said "Don't worry son" or something and pressed a button on his till. A LITTLE DRAWER POPPED OUT OF THE DESK AND MONEY CAME OUT WHICH THE CASHIER GAVE TO FUDGE TO PAY FOR HIS SWEETS. I mean dude wtf. We all just gazed at the cashier and our faces were like :o. And he gazed back and gave a little wink. I felt like crying "Jeepers!". But I didn't. That's just an example of the level of safeness that we're dealing with here; Back in England the cashier would probably wink at you but then you realise that it's just her miserable NHS-prescription glass eye collapsing under the weight of the misery of her pathetic minimum wage rainy-day existence. Sheesh.
I would say that in the entire week, I came into contact with, like, 30 safe Americans and about four twattish ones. But fair do's I guess; all bar one of the twattish ones were shopkeepers who were unamused when we asked how much of their stuff was for free. The other twat was a rower who tried to punch our coxswain. This was while they were both sitting in different boats. Following our mid-race crash in which both of our boats had stopped dead and our stroke man had punched the aforementioned rower in the face with his oar. So yeah I guess perhaps the twattishness was warranted.
Wait, that means that there were literally ZERO non-nice Americans in the entire of the USA!!!!!!!!!!!!! Well, the bits I saw - Boston, Philly and EN-WHYYY. Which surprises me hardcore because, in my opinon, America is literally the most polluted country EVAR. Now I don't mean environmentally polluted - although seriously guys not every single one of you needs a 4x4 you LIVE IN NEW ENGLAND NOT THE MOON - I'm talking more on a moral, cultural and ethical basis.
I just don't understand how they can stay so CHIPPER when they live in such a cultural wasteland. I'm sorry but America has no culture whatsoever. Unless 'The American Flag' is a culture. Because they sure like their American flags. An awful lot. I wouldn't be surprised if all of America had sex with their flags just before they go to bed at night. Either that or the flags are actually sentient beings who are slowly invading the world, starting at the major superpower. Perhaps they sprount from the ground. No shit; we were driving along and I saw this flowerbed. Except it wasn't planted with flowers. Oh no. Oh NOOOOO. It was planted with - get this - GET THIS - YOU'LL NEVER GUESS WHAT - American flags!!!!! No shit. Just a flowerbed filled with minature American flags. I saw this and buried my head in my hands. When I unearthed it I was just in time to see the petrol station with literally twenty mini-flags mounted on the top. I mean shit, why go for one BIG flag when you can really break the bank and wang out LOTS OF LITTLE ONES? I can picture it now in my brain. Actually, shit, no I can't. I think I've forgotten what the American flag looks like now without my minutely reminder. Oh wait there's one:
Wicked. But seriously I mean, ok, we get it lads, you are a country with a flag now for the love of GOD please stop reminding yourselves. Seriously, what would England be like if everyone stuck
Union Jacks up wherever they wanted? I'll tell you what it'd be IT WOULD BE A HELL. We English are plenty patriotic enough anyway we don't need a (to be honest, pretty goofy-looking) piece of cloth to remind us that we have been chosen to live on some big rock in the middle of the sea. I mean, check out our football (sorry, 'soccer') hooligans! We totally reamed those Spanish Resteraunt Owners during Euro 2000! Go England! Throwing plastic chairs at Germans and breaking windows; that is my idea of real patriotism - not some dumb flag which is just another example of the quasi-patriotism in the fake shell of the American ideal in what is essentially a total quasi-shell of a quasi-country. I don't even know what the last sentence meant but boy it did sound deep and prophetic, didn't it? I believe I'll leave it as is and if anybody asks me what it means I will just nod wisely and stroke my beard. My beard is blonde and like two milimetres long. I am going to let it grow and see if I end up looking like a Man. But I digress. I think I could probably sum up the
previous few paragraphs in fourteen words: America is totally phony. That's only like four words. Ok, NOW it's fourteen.
I'm pretty sure that I didn't see one authentic shop in the entire fucking country. The small shops all had weird exotic names that implied that the owners were Native Americans, Martians, or Irish (no shit I saw a pub called Finnigan's Wake... with a leprechaun painted on the door!). Although, I was amused by the "Wok King" diner placed directly next to "Dairy Queen". THEY COULD GET MARRIED. I see the humour in everyday situations. I am a true comic.
In the meanwhile, the big shops either had names like "Mom & Pop's Cornershop" (not owned by anyone's MUM or DAD) "The General Store" (not true you could not buy generals there), "The Village Bakery" (I don't know what sort of bakeries you have in your village but I have yet to see a bakery that is like four stories tall) or "The Fishing Shack" (not a shack). They were all TOTALLY FAKE I actually felt my soul being sucked out from under my feet at the sight of the Store Associates cheerily handing out Free-Samples-Of-Lite-Non-Trans-Fat-Liteweight-Turkey-American-Cheez-Wotsit-Slice-Bites-Plastik while waving the American flag and listening to The Star Spangled Banner muzak being piped through the intercom at a low-level drone.
At least back in England they give their stores depressing names and get on with it. You go to Budgens, you know you're not in for fun. But you go into BEST BUY, there's an implication that you might just have the best buying experience of your entire life!! Not true. They didn't even have Bonkers 11: Forevolution in the CD place. NO BONKERS.
So in conclusion, Budgens = British Sense of Acceptance of Place and the Essential Misery of Life.
Best Buy = American Fake Piped Optimism In A Jar.
I mean, seriously, would you be able to trust a country that produced THIS as a serious NON-IRONIC piece of art?
Ok I can't be bothered to write any more that's it for part 1 of the Ameriblog. In the next installment, I'll probably discuss how shit America is some more, featuring a hockey match, a terminally ill young boy, America's complete lack of grasp of the concept of irony, and my face going like :o. Hope to see you there!!!!!!!!!
OH FUCK THE FLAGS ARE ATTACKING
we will exterminate you
all hail bezalaroth, king of the flag people
noooooooooo
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