Q: Why do you hate us, Europe?

Being confronted with the kind of work load, I always wished to be buried under, blogging was light again lately. I should have blogged about Darfur, Angela "the Miracle" Merkel's visit to China, the 40th anniversary of the Cultural Revolution and yes, immigration again, but well...Maybe tomorrow. (If you've ever been to China, you are probably used to this phrase.)

But this story is just too weird to let it go unblogged:

Germans ask why Europe hates them after Eurovision

By Erik Kirschbaum

BERLIN (Reuters) - Germans asked themselves on Monday why everyone in Europe seems to hate them after their entry to the Eurovision Song Contest ended up a dismal 15th place and got zero points from most European countries.

"Why does everyone dislike us?" asked Bild newspaper, Germany's best-selling daily on Monday, summing up the mood after the country's unusually strong entry "Texas Lightning" went in with hopes of winning but landed near the bottom.

Yes, BILD is certainly the right paper to ask why everyone hates us, for the BILD people are expressing their eternal love for all the other nations (especially those from Eastern Europe) on a daily basis.

The Sueddeutsche Zeitung, center-left hotbed of sophisticated erudity, comes up with a very convincing explanation:

"It seems a good song is a hindrance to winning," wrote the Sueddeutsche Zeitung on Monday. "The typical Grand Prix song these days is a song that is so bad it's actually good again. So 'Texas Lightning' was simply too good, too intellectual."

Reuters UK has it's own take:

More than 60 years after World War Two ended, there is a sense among Germans that the country is still being penalised for the misdeeds of previous generations.

Noooo, not that kind of sinister piffle again. Imagine a soothsayer on, say, August 30, 1939, after a long chrystal ball session would've said: "Don't invade Poland! Just don't! Thing is, if you do, you will never ever win the Eurovision Contest. Oh, wait ... correction ... you will never ever win the Eurovision Contest apart from 1982." ... Wouldn't that have been a very good reason not to start WWII? (Okay, there were other good reasons, but hey, you never know, maybe this one would have turned out to be the most convincing one).

And the closing cliché:

The loud, aggressive behaviour that some intoxicated German tourists display when abroad has contributed to the European image of the "ugly German".

Says who? Reuters UK. UK! Ha!

Seriously, I am not convinced. I mean, c'mon, Europe let us down to vote for aggressive, obviously intoxicated monsters instead? I don't buy that.

To be honest, I missed the whole Eurovision thing completely until I was forced to watch the voting procedure at a birthday party. But Andrew seems to be a fan of the Eurovision show, so if you're interested, see his LiveBlogging over at German Joys: I, II, III, IV and V - and his final conclusion:

"That Eurovision contest was fun. I'm putting it on my calendar for the rest of my life."

For more background information, see this post at Atlantic Review and Mad Minerva's contest coverage.

Even she prefers the monsters. What a desaster for Germany! As for the corpus delicti: How on earth can someone expect to get any votes by singing "No, no never"? Or, in Mad Minerva's words

Singing a song called "No, no never" seems to be asking for defeat, doesn't it?

Exactly. Next year, we'll go for victory with a remake of "It ain't me, babe". Accidently, I found the vid on youtube, so here it is. Enjoy!