I’m not usually privy to the goings-on of Youtube because the internet service at Berkeley is run by communists who block service to sites that have heavy demand (instead of upgrading their infrastructure) and also because Youtube is easily the ass of the internet if the internet were a person.

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE.
No longer from head to foot than from hip to hip: she is
spherical, like a globe: I could find out websites in her.

ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE.
In what part of her body stands Youtube?

DROMIO OF SYRACUSE.
Marry, sir, in her buttocks; I found it out by the bogs.

Shakespeare, The Comedy of Errors.

But I found a chap called Buffalax funny. He takes foreign songs and subtitles them with English words that mimic the foreign sounds. The formal word to describe it is either “mondegreen” or “soramimi.” Both have interesting bits on wiki. When I first viewed his videos, it was 2 AM and I was not really in the right mentality to judge what things are funny to me, but I still think they have some merit, which is why I’m writing about him.

http://www.youtube.com/user/buffalax

I first saw the “Benny Lava” one, but “Tunak Tunak Tun” has a Sikh guy with funny dance moves. Just based on the merits of the song, I think that Tunak Tunak Tun is better. Anyway, part of my interest in this is that he has references to Star Trek and other stuff, and so I can really relate. Also, his username “Buffalax” comes from Final Fantasy VI, which I also enjoyed for a few years during my youth.

http://www.cavesofnarshe.com/ff6/w_enemy.php?enemy=Buffalax

One final tidbit. If you can understand the language that they’re singing in, you can look at the subtitles and hear them, but also if you don’t look at them, you can hear the original. Or at least I can. It depends on how fluent you are in the languages, I suppose. (I am no linguist.)

After an absence of more than three months, it is time for another installment of Monday Morning Madness.

The idea of “translating” another language into your own, by assuming that words that sound the same as words in your language are the same, is not a surprising one — the results can be disastrous, or comical. Christopher Columbus apparently believed that fundamentally there was one universal, natural human language, and that if he tried hard enough he could understand Taíno words by listening for similarities. Taíno mentions of what he heard as “Caniba” (later the basis for the word “cannibal”) was first interpreted by Columbus to mean “the people of the Great Khan.” He was so convinced that he could grasp the native language that he had never heard before, that he was reputed to have placed his hands on the mouths of Taíno speakers, to help them better shape their words to sound like Spanish words.

The two videos below do not advance themselves as formal attempts to translate the Hindi heard in Bollywood music videos, but the core of their “joke” is that they notice that some Hindi words, or parts of them, sound like English words — different words with different meanings, but similar sound units. This is either purely an accident, or some phonological echo of what numerous travelers, explorers, missionaries, and then philologists found: the linguistic strands that constitute the Indo-European family of languages.

The results of these particular video episodes of cross-cultural encounters and cross-cultural communication are often hilarious. The first video, titled “Crazy Indian Video” was subtitled by Buffalax in YouTube, someone from Dayton, Ohio, who seems to have made an art of subtitling Indian videos. As far as Internet celebrity status goes, Buffalax is either a star or close to one: this one video alone has been viewed nearly 12 million times over the past two years, and is rated as “awesome” by nearly 40,000 people who bothered to rate it. Almost 36,000 comments have been posted on the video, which inspired the beginnings of a new YouTube genre. “Benny Lava” now appears as a new word in the “Urban Dictionary.” And, someone decided to bring “Benny Lava” to life and turned him into a 33 year-old male in Washington DC, with his own MySpace page. Some are now speaking of a “Benny Lava Phenomenon” seeing that the video has been internationalized, remade, reworked, and reenacted by Brazilians, by Croatian college students, and turned into the basis for another spoof of John McCain and Sarah Palin.

A few months later, Ben174, from Modesto, California, subtitled the second video below, and retitled it, “May He Poop on My Knee.” It has been viewed over two million times so far. This appears to be one of the more popular videos in the Benny Lava Genre, rivaled perhaps by the “Indian Nipple Song.”

The cultural idiocy of globalization?

No longer remembering who the original critic was who made this argument, I recall reading an unforgiving critique of such phenomena, as signs of the cultural idiocy accompanying, facilitating, or inspired by globalization processes — no content, no meaning, just sounds and gestures remade to fit whatever framework. Actually, the target of the attack was a relatively mute figure, that of Mr. Bean, who I first “met” in Trinidad & Tobago, seeing him again in Australia, and finding him back in Canada, as well as on multiple long haul flights just before the featured film was shown, his appearance timed to go together with the free soda and peanuts. People of all sorts of nationalities and language backgrounds could and did laugh at him — he eluded the challenge of cross-cultural translation by basically never speaking, just making funny little gurgles and moans, and over-expressing himself with his face.  His overdone facial contortions resembled those of an adult trying to charm a baby in a crib. Do these two videos follow the same principle? To some extent, yes, in that they still render the object virtually mute, lest anything should hinder the supremacy of our individual agency, which the shopping mall ideology of cultural and neo-liberal globalization had us believe should tower above all obstacles to consumption. More than that, both Mr. Bean and the Benny Lava genre — good natured, humorous, to be sure — point to the shallowness of cross-cultural understanding in what was heralded as this wonderful new age of globalized consciousness and global self-awareness (if one listened to Anthony Giddens elegize the topic). A transformation in social ties there may have been, but a transformation in cross-cultural understanding is much more dubious (and I choose my words deliberately in speaking of globalization in the past tense). Instead we were treated to fare such as these, reduced to gestures, tunes, noises, laughing at others, and thanks to the neo-cons, a renewed fear of others. The globalization of electronic communication made hits of “lol cats” and viral videos of dancing teens — in a time of multiple genocides. One wonders then if in place of communication across cultures, what we have instead is heightened cultural dementia on a planetary scale.

Others might find the charm in these videos to be in their simple, child-like humour prompted by difference and lack of understanding, harmless and happy. It certainly did remind me of cases where, for example, a certain relative who heard that the two main Amerindian language groups in the Andes are the Quechua and Aymara, shouted: “Quechua later! Aymara here!” Or that little fellow Italian-Canadian friend of mine from when we were six, who had something rudely taken from him by another boy in the schoolyard, and who in his “broken” English threatened: “Antonio my mother on you!” (In case anyone does not get these examples: the first sounds like “Catch you later, I’m outta here,” and the second was intended by the boy to mean, “I’m tellin’ my mother on you.”)

Still others might say this is harmless stuff, and if anything one way to bridge a divide. Buffalax certainly devoted considerable time to finding this video, watching it repeatedly, listening, imagining, then subtitling. It does not show a complete lack of interest, for certain.

People don’t often post their thoughts here, usually because by this point I have bored them to death. So, after the video, if it is faster and easier than commenting, perhaps you can enter your vote in the poll that follows — not a scientific poll to be sure, but the precision and objectivity of the questions more than make up for any methodological deficit, not to mention the allowance for repeat votes by the same person, which takes into account the recursiveness of social life.

Benny Lava

May he poop on my knee

Your opinions matter!
(Which is I went to the trouble of forming some of them in advance for you):

Speciaal omdat ik aan het samenvatten ben voor het vak Media en Diversiteit (heerlijk toch, zo een tekst over de dreiging van de Islam en hoe deze door de media bericht  wordt en hoe deze dreiging eigenlijk geen dreiging is want ze is niet homogeen en blablablabla)

Speciaal omdat ik mij nog eens een kriek wil lachen en jullie ook een kriek wil doen lachen.

Serious LOL stuff.  
A Russian folk with mallu subtitles, inspired by Buffalax.  

Wired article about Buffalax.
Collection of Buffalaxed videos here.

Haven’t laughed so hard in recent times. Tooooooo Good.

For Malayalis: Watch with headphones/speakers. You WILL love it.

Captioned by Buffalax

Funny videos with reverse english

Possibly NSFW subtitles!

Captioned by Buffalax

Foreign music videos subtitled as if they were speaking English

This is by no means new, but it still cracks me up.

~4.5 minutes.

Need I say more? AMAZING.

Here’s one to add to the strange music series. Buffalax seems to make a habit of adding English sub-titles to non-English music videos. And they are screamingly funny.
Keep up the good work. Some of this is priceless. I don’t know who Benny Lava is but he looks a bit like George Michaels.

In an unlikely situation, which even in your wildest dreams would you imagine this!! ShortKut: the former 10 time TSWC champion and Chunky a former 11 time TSWC champion, teamed up to go head on against Bacon and Buffalax!

What a match up it was, and I’ve said it a 100000000 times and I’ll say it again…ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN in the TSWC!

The crowd went nuts, when Chunky and ShortKut walked out together for a common goal! In the ring, they’re two greatest superstars to ever grace the TSWC roster and the two of them teaming up was nothing short of Spectacular!!

As the match started, Chunky and ShortKut, were the obvious favorites and it came as no surprise, when they swept the floor with Buffalax and Bacon! 3 straight games in a row and 2 of them they went blind even, just to give Bacon and Buffalax the edge. But in the end the crowd, the fans all over the world and the millions watching on television, were not disappointed!

What were the odds? cumulative 21 time world champions vs 12 time world champions!

What’s odd however, is that Chunky, ShortKut and ChickaBow are not really eyeing the TSWC title. Will that change? Stay tuned to know more!

So the last 4 months have been mayhem here at the TSWC! I’ll take you step by step in this very post an brief you as to what happened!

January 2008:

We entered 2008 with a stunning situation: Bacon and Chunky as the new Tag Champs and with NO TSWC CHAMPION! A first time situation here at TSWC and you couldn’t ask for more drama!

Jan Week 1:

TSWC title: Chunky defeated ShortKut, Chicka Bow and Bacon to become the 8th time TSWC champion of the world!

TSWC tag titles: ShortKut and ChickaBow def. Bacon and Chunky – 3rd Title reign

Harts  Title: Chunky def. Bacon and ShortKut – Retains title

Jan Week 2:

TSWC title: ShortKut def. Chunky and Bacon – 9 time world Champion

TSWC tag titles: ShortKut and ChickaBow def. Bacon and Chunky – Retain titles

Harts  Title: Chunky def. Bacon and ShortKut – Retains title

Jan week 3:

TSWC title: Bacon Def. Chunky and ShortKut – 6 time world Champion

TSWC tag titles: ShortKut and ChickaBow def. Bacon and Chunky – Retain titles

Harts  Title: Bacon Def. Chunky and ShortKut – 1st ever Harts title reign. 2nd Triple crown winner

Jan week 4

TSWC title: Chunky Def. Bacon and ShortKut – 9 time world Champion

TSWC tag titles: ShortKut and ChickaBow def. Bacon and Chunky – Retain titles

Harts  Title: Bacon Def. Chunky and ShortKut – 1st ever Harts title reign. 2nd Triple crown winner

February 2008

Week 1

TSWC title: ChickaBow Def. Chunky, Bacon and ShortKut – 4 time world Champion

TSWC tag titles: ShortKut and ChickaBow def. Bacon and Chunky – Retain titles

Harts  Title: ShortKut Def. Chunky and Bacon – 1st ever Harts title reign. 3rd Triple crown winner

Week 2

TSWC title: Chunky Def. ChickaBow, Bacon and ShortKut – 10 time world Champion

TSWC tag titles: ShortKut and ChickaBow def. Bacon and Chunky – Retain titles

Harts  Title: Chunky Def. ShortKut and Bacon – 2 time Harts Champion

Week 3

TSWC title: Chunky Def. ChickaBow, Bacon  – Retains Title

TSWC tag titles: ShortKut temporarily out due to injury. Titles not vacated.

Harts  Title: Chunky Def. Buffalax and Bacon – retains title

Week 4

TSWC title: Chunky Def. Buffalax, Bacon  – Retains Title

TSWC tag titles: ShortKut temporarily out due to injury. Titles not vacated.

Harts  Title: Chunky Def. Buffalax and Bacon – retains title

March 2008

Week 1

TSWC title: Chunky Def. Buffalax, Bacon  – Retains Title

TSWC tag titles: ShortKut temporarily out due to injury. Titles not vacated.

Harts  Title: Chunky Def. Buffalax and Bacon – retains title

Week 2

TSWC title: Chunky Def. Buffalax, Bacon  – Retains Title

TSWC tag titles: ShortKut temporarily out due to injury. Titles not vacated.

Harts  Title: Chunky Def. Buffalax and Bacon – retains title

Week 3: (ShortKut Returns!)

TSWC title: ShortKut Def. Chunky, Bacon  – 10 time world champion

TSWC tag titles: ShortKut and ChickaBow def. Bacon and Chunky – Retain titles

Harts  Title: Chunky Def. ShortKut and Bacon – retains title

Week 4:

TSWC title: Chunky  Def. ShortKut, Bacon  – 11 time world champion

TSWC tag titles: Bacon and Chunky Def. ShortKut and ChickaBow – 7 time world champions

TSWC tag titles: ShortKut and ChickaBow def. Bacon and Chunky – 4 time world champions

Harts  Title: Bacon Def. Buffalax and Bacon – 2 time Harts champion

April 2008

Week 1:

TSWC title: Buffalax  Def. Chunky, Bacon  – 5 time world champion

TSWC tag titles: Bacon and Chunky Def. ShortKut and ChickaBow – 8 time world champions

TSWC tag titles: ShortKut and ChickaBow def. Bacon and Chunky – 5 time world champions

Harts  Title: Bacon Def. Buffalax and Bacon – Retains title

Week 2:

TSWC title: Buffalax  Def. Chunky, Bacon  – Retains title

TSWC tag titles: ShortKut and ChickaBow def. Bacon and Chunky – Retain titles

Harts  Title: Buffalax Def. Chunky and Bacon -1st time Harts Champion!

There u have it folks:

Bottom line:

Buffalax is the current TSWC world champion and the Harts Champion while, ChickaBow and ShortKut are the TSWC world tag team champions!

I love a good music video, especially when it makes me laugh. I’m not posting these to poke fun at Indian musicians and artists, but more to share a laugh with all of you readers out there. So before you say, “Hey J Soul, that’s not nice! Those guys work hard to produce those videos”… relax, I’m not here to bash anyone. Just try not to laugh too hard!

Nipples, anyone?

Benny Lava needs a bun to bite…

Watch out for that odd and chunky Ferengi man!

De allernieuwste trend om een concurrent uit te kakken: een creatieve ondertiteling voor de uitbarsting van Hitler “Der Untergang”. Achtereenvolgens: HD-DVD versus Blu-Ray…

… iets met Microsoft en gehackte spelconsoles…

… en een conflict in Second Life (via), blijkbaar geproduceerd door mensen die aan een open source versie van Second Life werken (bron)…

… en dan nog iets met auto’s en een autogame (denk ik!).

Een beetje zoals de rage van de hilarische videoclips een tijdje geleden :

Dat allemaal omdat voor die Amerikanen Duits zowat als Chinees moet klinken… (of Hindi of Urdu , maar daar heb ik niets te lachen, wegens zelf er ook niks van snappen ).

I don’t believe I have ever posted a media link in my blog, but I just can’t resist sharing this really remarkable video, sent to me by Josh.

I would love to know what the actual translation is, if any of my Hindi-speaking readers would care to enlighten me.  I am also curious whether the video is deliberately campy and funny, or whether it’s just … strange.

And by the way, for those of you who have been asking for an update — Josh’s partner’s tumor did turn out to have malignant cells, but it is wholly contained, and surgery should take care of it completely. He will have radiation treatments to reduce the size of the tumor prior to surgery,and some very mild chemotherapy. As it turns out, the Dutch health system will cover the medical costs, which is a huge relief. They happen to be located within driving distance of one of the best surgeons in France for this type of operation … so while it would of course have been far better if this had never happened, it looks as though the outlook is very positive, and they are hugely confident about the level of care Jurriaan will be receiving. Thanks to all of you who have sent your good wishes to Josh.

The past few months have been hectic here at the TSWC, lots of upgrades and records being brought in order. In all the chaos that has ensued in the last few months, Chunky became the 7 time TSWC world champ. In the absence of the future hall of famer ShortKut and legend killer Chicka Bow, It was easy pickings for Chunky. BACON had a great opportunity to capitalize in their absence and get another championship reign, but fate as it seems was without a sense of irony.

This match also saw the return of the legend Munish “Buffalax” Bidappa. Buffalax and Chunky we’re the initial dominating forces in TSWC and a lot of credit goes to them for building this legacy. Watch out for Buffalax’s bio soon.

Well it looks like we’re coming to the end of another year and trust me TSWC is coming back with a bang!! Stay tuned for this year’s ending MAIN EVENT!!!

This is up there for the craziest videos ever. I don’t think anyone even knows the name. It’s just “The Crazy Indian Video.” To make it even better, this is an english subtitles version. It isn’t a translation, but what subtitle author, buffalax, thinks it sounds like. Definitely worth your time.  Not only is there bad dancing, but the ninja made a movement!

So, it’s technically still Friday here in California, but as I sit in my hotel room on my last night here, I figured I’d post up my top 5 Clips tonight. After a great week in Cali, getting my training done, certified, and just eating a shitload of food, I’m about to head back to Maryland around 8:30PST. Unfortunately I did not have time to get the Top 5 MVs of the week done for this week, but don’t fret, as they will be back this Monday. Ok, enough about me, NOW FOR SOME LULZ!!!! Up first is a Music Video by an Indian artist that has been Buffalaxed! Which basically means this guy subbed the video based on what the words sound like and not a true translation, and it works! You’ll be LOL’ing for hour after this one.

And secondly I have a video of a poor cheerleader who should have just let things be, but instead faces the consequences.

Up now is a hilarious video out of Japan called Karakuri Funniest English. Basically this guy goes out on the streets of Japan and asks people to tell him a story, and then after they’re done, makes them tell it in English. In which they fail badly! Major lulz on this one.

BTW, if you didn’t know yet…..it’s no longer Saturday folks, for it is now CATURDAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And finally, to end this week’s Top 5 Clips, I have another long video for you guys. This one tops College Saga that I posted last week, but what could I find that’s longer than the 40+ min CS ran? AMV Hell 3: The Motion Picture!! Someone actually took the entire movie and compressed it for YouTube and here it is for your viewing pleasure. I have watched this many times over on the DVD copy I have, and for those who enjoy it and want to actually download a better copy for themselves, check out http://amvhell.com/.

I just recently purchased Flyleaf’s debut album, and Nellie McKay’s latest CD, “Obligatory Villagers”. So I should have the reviews up for those CDs in the next couple weeks. I especially want to get Nellie McKay’s review up, as I am going to see her in Concert on December 2nd. Well, I look forward to Top 5 MVs of the Week this Monday, and I hope you guys enjoyed the top 5 clips this week. PEACE