Last word on the vuvuzela: think more Rio Carnival, less Trooping the Colour!
There has been such a noise made by those who won’t hear of the vuvuzela that the debate over whether the host country should be allowed to blow its own trumpet threatens to drown out news of what’s happening on the pitch during this World Cup.
As a proudly diagnosed “SA-positive” South African blogger – and one which, please see above, is not shy to use my country’s choice of “cultural weapon” – It behoves me to educate foreign sceptics about the “vuvu”.
In order for you to get your head – and lips – around the use of our cheap, plastic trumpet, I need you to understand why South African soccer fans just love to create a wall of noise at football matches.
I want you to think more Rio Carnival and less Trooping the Colour.
We are African. We don’t stand on ceremony. We like to express ourselves. And, if that means deafening the opposition on the field into submission, so much the better.
That’s just not football, you cry! How uncivilised, grumble purists of the Beautiful Game.
Quite. But whoever ruled that 70,000 bagpipers couldn’t blow the Scots to an unlikely victory at Hampden Park? Nobody. It’s just that the canny clan have been so busy thinking up rude chants about the English that it never dawned on them to use their most potent “twelfth man”!
So, now that I’ve converted you to thinking that the vuvuzela should be given a fair hearing, let’s listen to how it can used in the right hands…
There. I bet that’s won you over, eh? Right. So, now that you’re rushing off to buy one in your national team’s colours, you have no excuse for producing a one-note drone. I exhort you to get practising on your national anthem. And, if you can’t master that, then simply fall back on playing the South African one. Any way you like. Improvise. Express yourself. Blow it like be-bop, baby!
As I’ve been trying to tell you all along, Bafana Bafana (our South African team) needs all the help it can get. That’s why we’ll do our damndest to blow them to victory. Paaaarp!
* I have joined the London Guardian’s World Cup Fans Network for the duration of the World Cup finals. It is a phenomenal concept, one which uses Twitter to bring the voices (or tweets) of fans of all 32 competing countries together on one forum for the tournament. Visit The World Cup Fans\' Network and follow how fans around the world are viewing the fortunes of their nations at our beautiful World Cup. And, if you would like to see what I’m saying about Bafana Bafana and the impact on South Africa of the biggest sporting event to ever be staged in our beloved country, follow my tweets by following me on Twitter! If Facebook is more your social media thang, go to my Facebook profile and request to be a friend or simply join the \"Fred Hatman\" group for updates on my latest blogposts… which are not only about the World Cup!