Chai, chai, chai

Ofra Haza, from http://www.haza.co.il

I’ve spent this evening listening to Ofra Haza’s “Chai” on repeat, at least two-dozen times now, and I wish to declare her my second “Eurovision crush”. Here she is performing “Chai” at the 1983 contest, where she represented Israel to come second:

“Chai, chai, chai – Ken, ani od chai!”

(Alive, alive, alive – Yes, I’m still alive!)

I learnt of Haza a few years ago through indulging my inner sociopath – playing Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories – her anthemic “Im Nin’alu” is part of the game’s soundtrack. At the time, despite my burgeoning Philosemitism and eventual love of all things Israeli, I didn’t know that Haza was born in Israel, Jewish and a Eurovision contestant to boot. Could there be three greater things? I’ve since discovered that the lyrics to “Im Nin’alu” are based on a Hebrew poem written in the 17th century:

Im nin’alu daltei n’divim daltei marom lo nin’alu

Even if the gates of the rich are closed, the gates of heaven will never be closed.

– Rabbi Shalom Shabazi

How much better would the Occupy movement have been if that was the mantra?

The song, originally released in 1984, was eventually remixed and tweaked and ended up in the Top 10 of various European countries, peaking at no. 1 in West Germany in 1988. The original version was released on the album Yemenite Songs, also known as Fifty Gates of Wisdom – without listening it puts Fifty Shades of Grey in the shade, doesn’t it?

A brief look-up of Ofra Haza reveals heaps of good things – including this interesting snippet from Haza’s official website: in 1986, Margaret Thatcher was a guest of the Israeli parliament and met Haza, who gave Thatcher a brief lesson in Yemenite dancing. Apparently Thatcher was given two of Haza’s albums and wrote to her afterwards, “I listen to your albums with great pleasure.” How awesome is that? For all the bashing you hear of Thatcher and her policies, to think the PM could have been singing and dancing (like me as I write this) around Downing Street to an Ofra Haza song is a wonderful thought. Don’t ruin it for me by saying it was just a PA or the tea-lady forging Mrs T’s signature.

Ofra Haza and Margaret Thatcher, from http://www.haza.co.il

And as for the “Eurovision crush” title – well, I’ve been watching the Eurovision Song Contest since I was about 13 or 14, when here in Australia we get a delayed telecast of the proceedings with commentary from our own Des Mangan; if you think Terry Wogan was an ace commentator, then you’ve never heard Des do it. Unfortunately, I can’t find any footage of Des and Eurovision through the usual channels (read: YouTube), but to give you an idea, here’s one of Des’s intros from one of SBS’s Saturday night “cult films”. See what I mean?

My favourite Eurovision year has been 2010, when Lena Meyer-Landrut won for Germany with “Satellite” – one of the best pop songs made since 1998, in fact, it could have sat easily on the charts back then, with its flirty lyrics and easy to learn chorus – and I was able to pick first, second and third of the contest, which has made me want to bet on the competition every year since.

I like Eurovision for the blatant theatrics and camp so obvious it’s more a farce. I’ve also wanted to do the drinking game for it too – a shot of whatever you fancy whenever a “reveal” occurs, or a song changes key, languages or has some form of “special effects”; an easy and fun way to get hammered, basically drink whenever anything happens – but have always missed out due to having no funds when the contest is on. I shan’t do a Withnail and slug down vanilla essence, the closest I’ve got to proper booze.

And here’s another of my favourite Eurovision entries: in 2007, Israel was represented by a mob called Teapacks with the song “Push the Button” (the complete opposite from the Sugababes same-titled tune), a rock meets hip-hop/dub-step of English, French and Hebrew (they even rap in it). Apparently “controversial” because it featured references to Iran and nuclear war (the eponymous pushing of the button to launch missiles) – controversial to whom? Don’t tell me that even the Eurovision Song Contest isn’t safe from anti-Semitism? If a British entry – atrocious as they are – made references to bombs and mass-destruction (Why not get Faithless next year?), would it be considered “controversial”? Would it be seen as a dig against a fascist regime, the likes of which haven’t made such a presence in Eurovision since Spain’s General Franco ordered the namby-pamby “La La La” to trump Cliff Richard’s equally naff “Congratulations” in 1968; or would it simply be listened to as another song in the same treacle-laden vein as John Lennon’s “Happy Xmas (War is Over)”?

The defence rests, m’lud.

Related articles

• Sounds Israeli: Ofra Haza (jewishpress.com)

My brush with the loony left

People can talk of “skeletons in the closet”, whether they are personal or familial indiscretions. My shameful act was to join the Socialist Alliance a few years ago. Wanting to join a political party (lefty that I am) I naturally plumped for the ALP, but being skint (unemployed) I chose to join the S.A. because membership was cheaper for the jobless. I wasn’t sure I’d last long anyway, being a pro-Israel and Philosemite. It’s obligatory to barrack for Palestine in all matters as a lefty, no matter the circumstances.

Proof of my shame.

Invited to the first meeting of the Melbourne branch for 2011, I went into town one Saturday afternoon, pushed out of home by a friend who encouraged me to go out and meet people instead of sitting on my arse watching box-sets of Weeds. The most memorable part of the day wasn’t meeting all my new upper-case-s Socialist friends, but the train into town – as I sat in my seat with sunglasses on and headphones pumping out a playlist of Deborah Conway’s “Consider This” and the Huxton Creepers’ “My Cherie Amour” (my “Melbourne music”), watching the suburbs along the Frankston line fly by, a girl a few seats away kept staring at me and as soon as I noticed would instantly look away, as if caught doing something untoward; which by all accounts it is untoward and unusual if someone casts an eye in my direction – I’ve no delusions. Before I disembarked the girl made a call and asked, “Have you ever had that weird thing happen when someone keeps staring at you on a train?” WELL, YOU STARTED IT! (“I have no issues. Really, I’m fine … I’m fine … don’t touch me!”)

Anyway, I made my way to the so-called “Resistance Centre” at the top end of Swanston Street opposite RMIT. A few floors up the branch meeting had just finished and, wallflower that I am, pretended to browse over books about Unionism in Eastern Europe in the 18^th Century, Communist tomes and of course, the essential Marx and Engels, etc. Finally introducing myself, we all walked up to Carlton to a pub – this brightened my mood no end, friends and beer! Well, I was hoping I would make some friends after already committing a political faux-pas when asked what my thoughts were on socialism, “I’m a bit green at all this.” Cue lefties recoiling in horror at the name of another (and a damn-sight more organised and popular) political party. Thankfully the beer flowed and I did end up enjoying myself despite a few O.P. (other people’s) smokers – I aimed to please with my mercy dash to the nearest corner shop on a Saturday evening.

A week later I was asked to participate in a march to support Wikileaks, this being the summer of diplomatic discontent, and rocked up outside the State Library to find hundreds of people there of all different lefty backgrounds. There was a guy in a grey wig – to symbolise Julian Assange although he looked like Mrs Doubtfire – making speeches and was probably the organiser. Whilst milling at the edge of the crowd, lo and behold – another attractive girl came right up to me in her lovely purple ‘I SUPPORT GAY MARRIAGE’ t-shirt and tried to sign me up to another group, the Socialist Alternative. (I bet you all just said “alternative to what?”)  So we got talking and as the march set off down tourist-filled Swanston Street on a warm Sunday afternoon, I quickly got into the screaming of
“FREE BRADLEY MANNING!” and endless rhymes starting with “2-4-6-8!” Equality Girl and I talked of my reasons for coming, my support of lefty things (“I just do it because I hate Tony Abbott”) and becoming political through reading the works of Frank Hardy – strangely, she hadn’t heard of him – how can you call yourself “political”, much less a “socialist” and live in Melbourne without knowing of Frank Hardy? Odd, I thought as we marched on complete with police escorts and blocking tram access to Flinders Street. I even ended up in the very front row too, but of course sod’s law came into play and I didn’t get my mug in any papers at all. So embarrassing.

We suddenly turned off Swanston into Collins Street and came to a stop outside the British Consulate. Why? I don’t know – surely it would have made much more sense to picket the Yanks instead? And that’s when the lefties tried to cram every single one of their causes into the afternoon by having an Aboriginal smoke-ceremony, the (only way to say it) “token Indigenous” person, everyone’s favourite lefty fool, Stephen Jolly from Yarra City Council and other larks that had nothing to do with Wikileaks at all. One of the marchers had grabbed a megaphone and started singing “Burn, baby burn!” Yes, hell is a socialist disco.

I bunked off with Equality Girl after an invitation to attend Trades Hall, where the Alternative’s set-up. I managed to stay for an hour despite not getting a single lefty joke – something about Condoleezza Rice or Donald Rumsfeld or some Bushite that was neither topical nor funny – and praise heaped on the beginning of the Arab Spring – I think Tunisia had just come through it and Egypt was about to kick off. When I got to Trades Hall I was met someone and said I’d just been on my first march, only to be asked, “Do you feel like a radical now?” Um no, I lived in Parkdale. Come on, like one bullshit march makes you a revolutionary leader. If true then a cake walk would be called a show of solidarity and consciousness-raising exercise. And why are the words “consciousness” and “collective” bandied about by hardcore lefties so much? They’re a worse cult than the Brethren! At least that time my mention of Frank Hardy was understood, before the motion was passed that to celebrate the Arab Spring they’d spit-roast a goat. Yeah, to celebrate the oppressed getting rid of their oppressors, they were going to cook a goat in a backyard in Fawkner. It’s like when they want to show solidarity with refugees locked up in detention centres – I don’t see the protesters sewing their lips and self-harming in protest.

A week later I returned to the Trades Hall mob for a free six-week course on learning all about socialism. Needing (and still) to know a lot more, I enthusiastically went along, only to be given a lecture on communism (which I can differentiate) and more “consciousness” and “collectives” being said. Me being me I started to take the piss but my barbs went unnoticed. So what more was there to do then just stop going? I’m glad I did – I’d have happily broken rank to condemn the BDS groupies and shame them for the anti-Semitic thugs they are. And so many middle-class members too – take this any way you want, but why try to change things on the other side of the world when there’s tonnes to do here – but of course, they’d be NIMBYs wouldn’t they? NOT IN MY BACKYARD! And I “love” NIMBYs. They’re the people who hate to see a block of housing-commission flats in their own street (“don’t want any riff-raff to come in”) but will happily snap up “investment” properties left, right and centre, charge exorbitant rents and thus create homelessness in the first place.

Like the Occupy movement, especially in Melbourne – what did the participants do for a living? They wouldn’t get the dole because they’d refuse to leave their pile of tents and squalor to attend appointments at Centrelink. I believe any hardcore and brainwashed member of a two-bit political group will always have a trust-fund or ready cash from Mummy and Daddy, especially if Pater works in the mines. How great to protest about minerals and natural resources being sent overseas when you’re living off the money your father gets for raping and pillaging the land and exporting said resources. It’s got to be true – when was the last time you saw a member of a political group other than the big four (Labor, Liberal, National and Greens) work from nine-to-five?

As much as I identify as a “lefty” (I believe in equality, free healthcare, education and public transport and less privatisation), I’m not a real one because I support Israel – and if I choose to support people who are holistically attractive instead of the other side with their tea-towels, hankies and policies of torture and abuse – then all the more fun for me!

Related articles

• Why I hate the BDS movement (thejoshholley.wordpress.com)