Eurovision 2009

I hope everyone in the States is enjoying their 3-day Memorial Day weekend! And congratulations to Jon (a good friend since sophomore French class) and Yvette for getting married today! Sorry I couldn't be there to celebrate your big day with you! Consider my planning your honeymoon as gift enough!
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On Saturday, May 16th, I had the incredible experience of attending a Eurovision song contest party. For those who have not heard of Eurovision, it's a yearly song contest where each European country (plus other countries in the somewhat surrounding area) submits a song to compete against all the other countries. The final competition is held in the country that won the previous year. Each country performs their song and after all the performances, all the countries vote by giving points. The country with the most points after the voting wins the contest. The contest is wildly popular for some reason even though the songs are notoriously cheesy. It was a blast to watch it though.

The party was mainly foreign expats living in Istanbul so we were all rooting for Turkey. After each performance we would make notes on the song and performance. As the songs and performances usually entailed pretty awful music and costumes, it was fun to share comments with one another. This was probably what made watching Eurovision so fun. Otherwise, it may have just been a form of torture.

When the winner was announced at the end of the night, I have to admit, I was a bit mortified. I was in complete disbelief that Norway won with this song. It's so bad!!! Check out the dancers in the background.

All in all, I had a fun time watching Eurovision in Istanbul and I'm sure I'd be up for another Eurovision song contest party if I'm in Europe the next time it's on. On the other hand, if this happens to be the ONLY Eurovision song contest I ever get to experience, I'm okay with that too.

© Connie Hum 2009