Saturday, May 14, 2011

Eurovision 2011

I CALLED IT! I'm about 95% sure that when I first heard Azerbaijan's Eurovision 2011 entry "Running Scared," I told someone that we would win. AND WE DID! WOOOOOO YEAH TAKE THAT OTHER COUNTRIES IN THE EUROVISION CONTEST! In the rare chance that you have no idea what I'm talking about and haven't heard the song, here it is:



You may be asking yourself, 'But Jessica, WTF is Eurovision?' Well, it is a song contest held annually in which participating European countries send their 'best' (usually internationally unknown) song/artists. Each country's selection gets to sing their song on live TV, at which point viewers in all the participating nations must vote for their favorite (citizens cannot vote for their own country). Apparently the contest has launched a few unknowns into stardom, including ABBA, who won in 1974 for Sweden, and Celine Dion, who won in 1988 for Switzerland. If for some reason you want a more in-depth history/description of the contest wikipedia's got you covered.

This year's contest was held last weekend in Germany, and aired in Azerbaijan in the middle of the night because of the time difference. The country that wins the contest each year gets to host the competition the following year. Last year's winner was Germany's Lena who sang "Satellites," hence why the 2011 contest was held in Dusseldorf. Here's last year's winner:



Since Azerbaijan won this year this means that next year's contest will be held in BAKU! I am both excited and angered by this news. Why? Because I'll be leaving in December which means I won't get to be here for all the Eurovision festivities next year. It'd be like living in South Africa for 2+ years and then moving a few months BEFORE the World Cup. It's going to be EPIC! I want to go! So if anyone reading this would like to sponsor me for a return visit to Azerbaijan next May it'd be greatly appreciated... ... ... no? no takers? Oh well I tried....

And on that note I will leave you with one of the best Eurovision songs Azerbaijan has ever submitted:

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