GIANT EPIC EUROVISION YOUTUBE POST FOR THE POOR AMERICANS WHO ARE MISSING OUT

Before I begin my epic post on the epic event that is the Eurovision Song Contest, here is a quick update:

I miraculously completed every single one of my 7 courses despite having been an epic wreck the later half of the semester. I got good grades, which is even more miraculous than having completed them all. I am clearly a magician.

I came back home to Reykjavík early Monday morning and have since then been taking it easy; reading, eating, driving around and swimming in my wonderful local pool which looks like this:



In an attempt to expand on my taking-it-easy I turned on the TV this morning, to discover that I have only one channel (the icelandic national broadcasting service). The last time I was here, we at least had two channels. Now we have one. Can you imagine that, american readers? having only one channel on your TV? No you probably can't. Not being able to channel surf when something boring comes on? unthinkable.

Luckily for me this morning a rerun of the 1st part of eurovision was on. The Eurovision Song Contest is a big televised event where each European country taking part sends in a song to be performed live on stage. Everyone votes and the song that gets the most points wins. The country that wins usually hosts the contest the following year. The contest has been held since 1956 and since then 49 countries have taken part at least once (the continent of Europe contains approximately 50 countries at the moment). I don't know of any other event that unites a whole continent in front of their television screens simultaneously to watch the same live event, so this is pretty special. In the past few years though, since those "eccentric" eastern-european countries started taking part, the contest has become too big for just one long show so now we have all these semi-finals and shit, making the whole thing far less exciting since poor Iceland never gets through to the finals due to lack of "friend-countries" (political voting is kind of big in this game). Thanks a lot eastern-europe mafia.

I grew up waiting anxiously for that Saturday night in May when my family would gather around the TV with snacks and my own homemade scoreboards to watch sparkly people sing in various kinds of gibberish on stage.

It was later that I found out that the music is mostly terrible eurotrash and almost no one who takes part is actually famous, which answered my question "why doesn't Björk just take part because she would obviously win".

I have however accepted these truths (and there are always a couple of exceptions to them anyway) and will proudly watch the semi-final tomorrow night and then the final this weekend. Except I'll be feeling proud to be european rather than Icelandic; our song sucks. It sucks so much that I'm too embarrassed to post it. Instead, here is my favorite song this year:

Sebastian Tellier for France, 2008


Following is my second favourite, although it takes a while to really start. But they have a chicken on stage. and farmers.

Bosnia & Herzegovina 2008


Some ofther notable 2008 entries are:

Spain


Belgium


Yeah I have no idea.


Iceland has been taking part whenever we could since our 1986 debut, Gleðibankinn:


My favorite of our contributiousn were the 1990 duet "eitt lag enn"
which got 4th place:


And when we sent Iceland's nr. 1 gay icon, Páll Óskar, to compete in 1997, way before being gay was trendy and before everyone accepted that eurovision is actually just a big homo fest. Eurovision still being in the closet back then, we got no points and 20th place.



Now, I just want to end with some notable Eurovision contest winners from the beginning:

France Gall for Luxembourg in 1965,
Serge Gainsbourg wrote her song:


ABBA with Waterloo for Sweden in 1974,
the second most famous act to ever compete:


Israel in 1978,
catchiest song ever, I could sing "A-ba-ni-bi" before I even knew what Israel was:


Johnny Logan for Ireland in 1980,
he went on to win eurovision 3 times. And he's hot:


Celine Dion for Switzerland in 1988,
the most famous person who ever competed:


Dana International for Israel in 1998,
THE FIRST TRANSSEXUAL TO WIN EUROVISION:


Ruslana for Ukraine in 2004,
mostly notable because me and my friends had our Eurovision party in a summer house and had to take shots every time the country we were rooting for got points. I was rooting for Serbia&Montenegro which came in 2nd place so I got very drunk. I always knew this song was better, I just didn't want to pass out before I knew who won:


And finally, Lordi for Finland in 2006,
FIRST BLACKMETAL BAND TO WIN EUROVISION:




I assume that by now every single one of my American readers is dying to be European. Yeah I would be too if I were you.

I'll let you know who wins this time around.