Don't Cry for Me, Vuvuzela

Mack Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com

Don’t Cry for Me, Vuvuzela

Vuvuzela is not a South American country, nor is it an obscure anatomical term; it is a long plastic horn first associated with South African football (we unsophisticated Americans call the game soccer).

Footballers don’t play the vuvuzela in a match because it’s not actually part of the game, and, indeed, in a crush a player could risk getting one shoved up his vuvuzela. The noisemaker, a meter long (we God-fearing folks would say that it’s somewhat over a yard; real Christians don’t do metric), is employed by the fans in order to make, well, noise. Purists say that this could ruin the traditional restrained, gentlemanly demeanor that has always obtained in the stands during soccer matches.

The vuvuzela is said to make a monotone racket, a sort of buzzing sound, and so when thousands of these are blown at the same time the effect is like a stadium assaulted by an apocalyptic horde of lust-crazed uberwasps from outer space, and if that’s not a reason for going to a footie match then what is? The vuvuzela is also said to ruin hearing, so perhaps it is a C.I.A. plot to sell millions of those $14.95 bionic hearing aids as advertised by the Six Million Geritol Man.

The classic South African vuvuzela strategy is to maintain a reasonable lung effort throughout the match but to save some energy for the last part of the game and then make a sustained and concerted racket to kill the spirits of the opposition. If both teams blow vuvuzelas, a match could end up like the finale of Hamlet with all those dead bodies littering the stage.

The vuvuzela must be really cool, because it’s used in soccer matches, and nothing says cool like a few thousand drunk Englishmen throwing up in the bleachers.

Some South African patriots claim that the vuvzela is an ancient African tradition. No doubt these made-in-China plastic horns were buried as priceless grave goods in the tombs of long-ago kings, or were traded north so that Moses and Pharaoh could marvel at the Chinese craftsmanship available from merchants beyond the Nile.

The two or three Americans actually interested in soccer / footer will no doubt transplant the idea here, and this fall we can expect Ye Olde American Cowbell and the traditional Tres Elegante’ Airhorn to be augmented at our real football games by the ancient Chinese-made African Vuvuzela, which can be ordered online.

Before ordering, one might want to consider that the thrifty Chinese make their novelty products, including the vuvuzela, from all sorts of recycled plastic and latex goods, including pre-owned condom(inium)s. As your mother always told you, don’t put some things in your mouth; you don’t know where they’ve been.

The vuvuzela gives fatuous failing footers fresh facesavings for fiascos. When France tied Uruguay last week, the French captain blamed the poor performance of his team on the racket of the vuvuzelas. Yeah, that’s what happened at Buena Vista and Camerone; the Mexicans charged across the blasted landscape with massed vuvuzelas, chasing the French away.

One hopes the vuvuzela doesn’t catch on here. Called me an old-fashioned flag-waver, but there’s nothing that captures the healthy, competitive spirit of American athletics like cheeseheads, Viking helmets, cowbells, platters of toxic nachos, giant foam fingers, air horns, and giant illuminated signs that suck up more electricity than the Taco Bell in Branson, Missouri on a Saturday night.

The United States Border Patrol must be put on alert for gangs trying to smuggle undocumented vuvuzelas across the border, and British Petroleum needs to clean up all those vuvuzelas polluting the Gulf of Mexico.

Let us true Americans always keep this in our hearts: there were no vuvuzelas at Plymouth Rock.

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