Popular? Sure. So was prohibition. For a while. South Africans love their vuvuzelas. Everyone else is ambivalent. At best.
After months spent defending the native horn, Danny Jordaan, the head of the World Cup braintrust, said Sunday that he is willing to consider a ban on vuvuzelas in stadiums. Their steroidal, bee-like drone has become the defining feature of this first World Cup in Africa. Can’t hear me? I SAID, IT’S BECOME THE DEFINING FEATURE OF THIS FIRST WORLD CUP IN AFRICA.
“We did say that if any land on the pitch in anger we will take action. We’ve tried to get some order. We have asked for no vuvuzelas during national anthems or stadium announcements. It’s difficult, but we’re trying to manage the best we can,” Jordaan told the BBC. “We’ve had some broadcasters and individuals (complaining) and it’s something we are evaluating on an on-going basis.”
He’s right there. The vuvuzelas have uniformly stopped once — during the playing of the South African national anthem during the home team’s opener. Other than that, they start as soon as the stadium opens, and go on until long, loooooong after it has closed.
People of South Africa, I’m not a man of violence. But for the love of God, start chucking your vuvuzelas onto the pitch. Play over the Star Spangled Banner. Better yet, attack someone with your vuvuzela. Make it someone bad. Don’t hurt them too much. Just give Danny Jordaan the excuse he clearly needs.
Vuvuzelas are, quite literally, everywhere in this country. But mostly they are at stadiums. At the outset, several major soccer stars and team managers urged a ban on the instruments. Here’s a current emblematic example from France defender Patrice Evra: “We can’t hear one another out on the pitch because of them,” Evra said after his team’s first game against Uruguay. “We can’t sleep at night because of the vuvuzelas. People start playing them at 6 a.m.”
6 a.m.? Can we come stay wherever you’re staying? There’s someone in our neighbourhood who kicks off with his vuvuzela at 5 or so. A demented milkman, maybe. It’s low and mournful, like a steer dying of heartbreak. Imagine Miles Davis on the vuvuzela, but without any talent. If I could find him, I would kill him with my bare hands.
Fair enough — vuvuzelas are an intrinsic part of South African soccer. Hear that, pal? Soccer. Not dawn in the suburbs.
They were harshly criticized during last summer’s Confederations Cup, the tournament that precedes the World Cup by a year in the host country. But far fewer people watch that event. Now that the once-every-four-years fan has hopped on the bandwagon, the negative press has ratcheted up several levels.
Strangely, when experienced in person, the vuvuzela isn’t that bad. It’s insistent, sure. But after a few minutes (and providing it isn’t so loud it’s painful, as it was at the opener), it recedes into the background. It becomes white noise.
On television, it’s entirely different. The counterpoint of the announcer’s voice against the jarring, never-ending buzz is completely distracting. Maddening. Impossible to watch.
In fairness to them, South Africa’s organizers never expected that South African fans would make up the vast majority of the spectators here. But the economic downturn coupled with hellacious warnings about crime in this country, combined to create a fan void that’s been filled by locals. And locals love their vuvuzelas.
(As an aside, just be glad that they’re prohibited from bringing their kuduzelas into the ground. That’s a vuvuzela on HGH (horn growth hormone.)
Jordaan’s sudden about face is a pretext, obviously. He has a home constituency to keep happy. And then he has the estimated 30 billion people who watch this thing to keep happy. And then he has Coca-Cola and McDonald’s and FIFA to keep happy. Guess which one he really cares about?
So tomorrow, bring your vuvuzela to lunch. If you blow just right, you can say, “Big Mac with fries,” through it. Then threaten to hit the server in the head. You’d be doing me and everyone else watching this thing a really big favour.
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