I think I love Finland
Trip Start
Apr 16, 2006
1
32
39
Trip End
Jun 07, 2006
Floating somewhere between Corfu and Venice, Italy
Sunday, May 21, 2006
Mind you, it would've probably been more pleasant if halfway through the ship's television lounge hadn't been inundated by chain-smoking, incredibly pushy, geriatric Greek ladies who tried to push my chair and table aside to get the best view of the television. I was relaxing there and watching the show for an hour, but when they showed up it was as though nobody else existed so I ended up with them yelling through me to eachother and puffing cigarette smoke in my face. I discovered that it's hard to watch tv when my eyes are rolling completely into the back of my head in an attempt to keep myself from slapping old ladies around. I kept wishing they spoke english so I could stand up and scream, "Enough, people! Do you realize that there are other people on this boat? Damn! Quit pushing my chair, quit screaming in my ear, quit being obnoxious and let me watch this stupid television show that I don't care about, will you!?" Ah, but instead I sat quietly.
So a lot of the songs last night were in English. I actually preferred the ones that weren't because they showed more of their own cultures. Sometimes, when someone from Denmark writes a song in English, it's like if I wrote a song in German. It's not their native tongue so they keep the lyrics simple... and, by default, often stupid. If I wrote a song in German, it would probably say things like "Hello. I would like a coffee with milk and sugar. Yes, that is my suitcase. I would like a room please. I love you."
Anyhow, the Danish song was about a guy who can't do the twist. Yes, as in Chubby Checker circa 1960s. So enough said... not really cutting edge lyrics. Lithuania cracked me up because they chose to submit a song to Eurovision with lyrics that went "We are the winners of Eurovision!"... very cheeky there, Lithuania. And Germany TOTALLY surprised me with their entry, Texas Lightning... which was a Dixie Chicks meets Bob Wills kind of catchy country thing. The last thing I expected from the Germans was American country, and I was shocked. They were really quite good, and I did not hear a single hint of oompa band in the whole tune. I would've NEVER guessed they were from Germany had I not known.
But of all of the overproduced, sappy tunes about love bringing people together, mostly sung by overly pretty people... the winner was Finland. And the thing is... they deserved it. Because their representative, Lordi, dressed up like freaky monsters who are one step from devouring the entire Kiss Army alive... and they sang a catchy heavy metal ditty called Hard Rock Hallelujah. To quote Lordi himself, "Mr. Lordi is the monster of monsters. He leads a group of five monsters from different ages and different dimensions. We have an alien, we have an Egyptian mummy. On the musical side, we are a rock band, a heavy rock band, playing melodic 80s hard rock." So there ya go.
In comparison, most of the other Eurovision contestants were just users of a great deal of hair gel.
Honestly, their performance made me laugh out loud, I was actually quite impressed (and I'm not a big fan of 80s hard rock!). Add this to Finland's recent adoption of Conan O'Brien as their native son, I have now completely become enamored with Finland's sense of the absurd. I really have to admire that kind of wackiness. I think I have to go to Finland someday.
On the flip side, while I am not sure exactly where Moldova is... judging from what I saw last night, the people there kind of scare me. Yes, even the pretty ones. There is just something kind of wrong with them, but I am not sure what. I don't think I'll be going to Moldava. Especially since I don't know where it is. (Yes I know I could google search it, but I don't want to. So there.)
