jawnbc | Eurovision wrap-up

What a night! Despite being an avid ESC fanatic for a number of years, I was wholly unprepared for attending it live.

I was on my own, so I entered the venue (I knew it well after 3 full dress rehearsals in 2 days), drained the bladder (3 hour show), and positioned myself coquettishly agains a cement wall. Lamely did my best "I'm totally comfortable being on my own, but would chat to someone is a kewl, devil-may-care manner" look. Yeah, right, exactly. Eventually someone from a gaggle of queens shouted something to me. Since I had on my Irish rugby world cup jersey on--and he had an Irish flag wrapped around him--I figured it was something about being Irish. So I approached and chatted with a lovely gang of Irish and British EuroQueens.

What is it with homothexthuals and turning all sorts of events into circuit parties of some sort? There was all the hugging, blathering and grinning you'd expect at a rave--with much much shorter songs and a strong flavour of nationalism tossed in. All very innocuously I should say--I didn't see any animosity or mean spiritedness. In fact it was all a "share da luv" vibe. On crack. As the gang went to their seats (they were in town for a fortnight, attended pretty much every rehearsal and the semi-final and final and sound checks and...), I went to find mine.

Picture an arena that seats about 5k people. veritably swarming with every sort of nationalist paraphenalia. A seething, writhing mass of energy, happy energy. TV just doesn't do it justice. I was stunned for several minutes, as huge flags, tiny caps, flag-painted faces, hats galore and anything else that ostensibly conveys a cultural or national affiliation was swung, waved or tossed in the air. And, it turns out, many folks where the attire for their favourite singer this year--not necessarily their home country. Flavour du jour for gay guys? Cyprus, hands down.

I took my seat between 2 strangers. On my left 2 turkish businessmen, who looked rather disdainful (at first)of the whole thing. One of them eventually lightened up and jumped right in with the rest of us. On my right--and it turns out, in the rows above and below me--were some Flemish Belgians there to support Xandee. I chatted a fair bit with these guys, who seemd to prefer speaking English over French.

Every ESC has it's way gay moment, and this year it was Bosnia's Deen. He pretty much slithered through his song "In the Disco" [I'm lying, I'm late, I'm losing my weight. Because I want to dance all night. In the Disco!]. Pink t-shirt, Dolce and Gabbana jeans (D and G on each ass cheek). A very good singer and he loved what he was doing. I overheard him later say, quite genuinely, that he was pleased with how he did.

Ukraine's win wasn't surprising but I was disappointed. They campaigned very aggressively here in Istanbul and I find that off-putting. She's very talented and it was a great performance. Greece must be heartbroken, but Sakis isn't a strong singer. Serbia actually beat Ukraine in the qualifier, but France, Poland and Russia didn't show the qualifier--and points from both countries made the difference. At the afterparty Serbia seemed quite happy--symbolically this year's return to Eurovision after 12 years represents an end to being held at arm's length from the rest of Europe.

Speaking of the afterparty: great venue, but wholly impractical. The show ended at 01h00 local time; after the final press conference and all the nattering, no one got there until 02h00. It was outside, about 11C and the adrenaline drop made my bubble burst by 03h30. In bed for 04h00.

I was pulling for Cyprus to win, but Lisa Andraes has nothing to be ashamed of. She sang well, with heart, and put the only ballad in the top 5. I was disappointed for Malta--their performance came across great in the arena (and on the monitors). Bring back Ira Losco.

Off to sightsee . . .