Cocktails and Records

Ah, the Beijing Olympics are finally upon us. And considering my attitude to the Games (glorified sports day for weirdo sports) I’m taken back by how interested I am in the damn things this year… I think it’s the political side of things, the fact that China is considerably more interesting/contentious than Athens, Sydney or Atlanta could ever be. I am just dying to know how it will go and whether China will emerge from the end of Olympic juggernaut with the kudos it so desperately longs for.

What has really struck me so far is the complete lack of buzz in the UK about the core element of the Olympics - sport. There is little mention of sport, the hype is all around pollution and politics.

This is best exemplified by the fact that major news outlets (BBC news, Newsnight, Channel 4 news etc.) have had teams of reporters in Beijing all week updating us on protests, human rights, Tibet, censorship, pollution etc. but there is only minimal sports coverage planned for prime time. We get one hour of highlights each evening at 7pm on BBC1. They aren’t even showing a complete replay of the opening ceremony, the most expensive and most fretted about opening ceremony of all time.

In Australia, the Games would be clogging up the airwaves all night, every night across two channels. There would be no escape from relentless analysis about the swimming team’s swimsuits and the weightlifting team’s weight. But here, no one seems to particularly care.

God, I love this country.*

 
* Except when its airwaves are clogged with up European football tournaments that England and Scotland haven’t even qualified for.

What with being snowed under with work, it being miserable hayfever season and having bought way too much new music recently, I’ve been rather lax on the blogging front compared to usual.

But last night I saw ‘classic British film’ Brief Encounter (David Lean, 1945) and it has completely inspired me. I’d never seen Brief Encounter before and what a fantastic film it is! I was completely transfixed throughout.

The trusty film notes provided by BFI Southbank where I saw the film, tell me that Brief Encounter is ‘quintessentially British’ in its depiction of restraint. I really don’t understand this in the slightest. I know that the cliche says that ‘the British’ are the very epitome of restraint and are reserved and polite, stiff upper lip and all that (except on a hot day after a few pints of Stella), but really…?

I read the film, where two married people meet, fall in love and have a 4 week affair, as the classic struggle between individual desire and family obligation. Showing emotional restraint area in this area is hardly unique and particularly not in 1945. I was actually suprised that the couple were so unrestrained in seeing each other in public places - I’d constantly be terrified of being seen (as they indeed were).

No for me, the most moving (and British) thing about Brief Encounter was its combination of realism and romanticism. Two ordinary people, in ordinary relationships, doing ordinary things in an ordinary town suddenly find each other and fall in passionately in love. So I wasn’t struck by the infamous British ‘restraint’ but by the crushing reality of their boring lives and the fact that thousands and thousands of people have sat there watching this film since 1945 wishing to God that it could happen to them.

Some things never fail to put a smile on my face - Teenage Fanclub songs, Charlie Brooker’s Guardian columns, the theme tune to 70s sitcom Man about the House, ugg boots… Yes, ugg boots, the Australian ‘fashion footwear’, are absolutely guaranteed to make me smirk.

You see, where I grew up in the 80s, the sort of people who wore ugg boots were the sort of people who freely and shamelessly teamed said boots with skin tight black jeans, t-shirts advertising a particular variety of bourbon and a mullet hair cut. If you wanted to advertise yourself as the kind of bloke whose idea of a good time was driving repeatedly up and down the main street in a hotted up car with a slab of VB beer in the back, sharing your AC/DC records with the whole town, then you wore ugg boots.

So obviously when I saw some trendy 20-something women with Jennifer Anniston hairdos yesterday wearing ugg boots I just couldn’t stop myself from smiling.  Ah, cultural context is everything isn’t it?

It’s been lovely, sunny and warm here in London this week. And apart from the instant good cheer that the sun seems to bring out in people, I can revel in my ongoing amusement at the difference between British and Australian attitudes towards weather.

As soon as the thermostat hits 20 degrees, people in the UK start stripping their clothes off, wearing strappy footwear to work, drinking al fresco and saying that they’re roasting. Even when it’s cloudy and there is a gale blowing. I will never forget my boss in Glasgow who used to start wearing sandals to work at the first sign of summer sun because that meant that it was officially hot.  

In comparison, people in the perpetually mild city of Sydney start throwing on their hats, gloves and scarves the minute it gets around 12 - 15 degrees. A handful of days under 10 degrees constitutes a cold snap and leads to discussion about just how freezing cold it is. I will never forget a colleague in Sydney who was always prepared for the worst and carried a cardigan with her all summer - just in case the temperature dipped below 30.

Thankfully though, I am comparatively immune to this and manage to wear much the same clothes all year round in both countries. I’ve rarely worn a winter coat in Sydney and I’ve rarely worn a summer dress in the UK. Perhaps this year?