What do you with a Problem Like Vuvuzela?

When you think of the ongoing World Cup, what comes to your mind? The French team’s strike? The pathetic referee’ing, like when Kaka got a red card? The abuse hurled at the Jabulani football in use? Portugal’s goal feast against North Korea? Or your favourite team’s performances so far?

If you said Yes to any of the above, you’d be in a microscopic minority! Most people only think (or is it hear?) of the sound of a million angry bees swarming. In other words, the instrument known as the vuvuzela.

Yeah, yeah, I know. It is a part of South African culture. We should be tolerant. But come on. It drowns the sound of the fans cheering. Ever wondered what’s a World Cup without the sound of Brazilian music and drums? Well, now you know. It’s not as if this horrible instrument is played only when the play is interesting. Or boring. Or when a goal is scored. They blow on it for all 90 minutes. Of every game. Given these South Africans’ lack of knowledge or interest in what’s worth cheering for, they’d be blowing on it even if there was no football match being played!

There are many sites posting tips on how to filter out that buzz from your TV. For the Germans, the vuvuzela creates a moral problem since banning it would imply contempt for another culture. The South Koreans have adopted a Take-It-Easy policy: don’t get worked up, they say, the games will be over in three weeks. Sadly, the three week window doesn’t apply for the British. Why? Their supermarkets are ordering tens of thousands of these instruments. Guess where those will eventually get used? In the English Premier League. But you’ve got to hand it to the French for what they’ve done with the vuvuzela. They’ve started using it as a synonym for (I assume, nay, I hope) cacophony! The French newspaper Libération criticized an art performance as "vuvuzelas de l'art contemporain" (vuvuzelas of contemporary art). You’ve got to love the French: they’ll absorb any word into their language…just as long as it isn’t English!

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