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Guest · Posted: Sun May 25, 2003 11:02 am Post subject: Eurovision

For anyone who watched last night (opinions also welcome if you didn't see it), what is your opinion on the voting. UK gave a pretty dire performance and got no points. Eurovision has a reputation for political voting regardless of the song, but the votes are now cast by viewers across Europe and not panels of judges. Does Europe really hate the UK because of the war in Iraq or was it simply because our performers couldn't hold the tune?

Canela · Joined: 23 Mar 2003 Posts: 6 Location: Great Britain

The voting's always political. Everyone always knows in advance that Greece will give the highest number of points to Cyprus and Cyprus will give them to Greece. Our song [i]was[/i] dreadful though. They were out of tune. The backing was off. She was visibly nervous. Mind you, if I could have been bothered to vote, I would have voted for Austria, just because their song was so diabolical! Or the Belgians singing in an imaginary language! I always thought the whole point was that you voted for the worst/silliest song. Smile

I do believe that post-Iraq backlash had something to do with it, but the judges were still justified in giving us zilch. There were worse songs than ours, but ours was the worst performance. I feel sorry for the singers, but actulally I'm secretly quite impressed with the fact that we didn't get a single vote, call me unpatriotic if you will. Although maybe I can be excused patriotism on technical grounds since my passport is actually German and not British, despite the fact that I've lived here for most of my life and consider myself (most of the time) to be English.

Mike_2003 · Joined: 27 Mar 2003 Posts: 344 Location: Bucharest, Romania

Now that the votes are made by phone, it comes down more to how many citizens a country has living abroad and whether they are nationalistic enough to bother wasting money on the phone call or not. The Turks won for this reason: large numbers living abroad and the fact they still think it is a serious competition. The representitive they sent is one of the more popular artists in the country, rather than an amusing, tone-deaf, talentless nobody in the style of most countrys' performer. It would be like the UK sending Sting, Elton or Robbie Williams.

Even without the anti-war protest vote (or rather lack of it) the UK's song would have struggled to get a point. Personally, the only song I think I could tolerate listening to again would be the Belgium entry. It should have won in my opinion, I think at least most people voted for it because it was half-tolerable instead of political/nationalistic reasons.

Guest · Posted: Sun May 25, 2003 11:10 pm Post subject:

I would have liked to see Norway win, because it's the first time they've ever had a reasonable entry.

Mike - thanks for your Turkey theory, that makes a lot of sense and I'd never thought of it.

Canela - Austria? What can I say? Just proves that we really don't take the eurovision seriously. I loved the interview he gave afterwards though.
I'm so disappointed Surprised

Me!!

Sixth??

Me??

I'm really disappointed Surprised

fluffi bunni · Joined: 19 May 2003 Posts: 4

Mike, you're absolutely right about the way Turkey receives its votes - a phenomenon I have been observing for a number of years. Turkey always seems to get a huge vote from the Turkish Gastarbeiter in Bermany. Having said that I think that Turkey's entry for this year was one of the best songs even if it was pushed over the edge by the expatriate vote. If I'm not mistaken Russian still employs a panel's judgement rather than a popular vote.

I'm disappointed that so many entries sing in English. Does anyone think it might be a good idea to use the contest as a teaching resource for an ESL class?

fluffi bunni · Joined: 19 May 2003 Posts: 4

Mike, you're absolutely right about the way Turkey receives its votes - a phenomenon I have been observing for a number of years. Turkey always seems to get a huge vote from the Turkish Gastarbeiter in Bermany. Having said that I think that Turkey's entry for this year was one of the best songs even if it was pushed over the edge by the expatriate vote. If I'm not mistaken Russian still employs a panel's judgement rather than a popular vote.

I'm disappointed that so many entries sing in English. Does anyone think it might be a good idea to use the contest as a teaching resource for an ESL class?

scot47 · Joined: 10 Jan 2003 Posts: 15343

I thought only the brain-dead watched this !?

Guest · Posted: Mon May 26, 2003 9:02 am Post subject:

scot47 · Joined: 10 Jan 2003 Posts: 15343

Come on. It was a wind-up. I know people who have doctorates in Theoretical Small Particle Physics who watch the Eurovision Song Contest. I wonder if our North American friends are following this ? Do they know about the Eurovision Song Contest ? What is the American equivalent ?

Guest · Posted: Mon May 26, 2003 11:07 am Post subject:

Phew

I thought I was getting flamed there, though to be honest, I half expected it.

I doubt Eurovision has any kind of following outside Europe judging by the responses (or lack of) on the General forum.

Scot - Who were you rooting for?

SueH · Joined: 01 Feb 2003 Posts: 1022 Location: Northern Italy

Unfortunately (or is that fortunately) I don't have a telly and so missed the annual toe-curling event yet again.

Mind you, I have to admit watching with a group of friends a few years ago when Dana International was competing. We even voted (!) just to wind-up the right wing bigots and it was to our great delight that she won.

scot47 · Joined: 10 Jan 2003 Posts: 15343

No telly here ! I will wait until the summer and then feast on BBC Prime back home in Bulgaria !

schminken · Posted: Mon May 26, 2003 2:08 pm Post subject:

Eurovision. I love Eurovision and I'm not ashamed to admit it. We don't have anything like it in the States and I always get a big kick out of it. Much better than the Miss America pagent. Yes, I'm buying the CD. Didn't you just love Austrian Alf? I had no idea what Eurovision was before moving to Europe but now every year I sit down with my Milka chocolate and popcorn and eagerly anticipate the words, "Hello, This is _________ calling." The GB song wasn't a bad song, but the girl was totally out of tune the whole time. And I didn't think TATUs performace was that great. Good times.