Thaum1el
04-13-06, 08:56PM
This is something along the lines of even the worst tragedies can create fun situations, afterwards.
Last winter, there was a tsunami in SE Asia, killing alot of people, very many people. A few of those were Swedish. Quite a few. There's not, afaik, another country that has as many tourists in Thailand as Sweden does. Thus, Sweden was the country, outside the region itself, that suffered most from this tragedy.
It also created a major political scandal, I think I've touched this on NCT before. The government didn't manage to do much - in fact, it took a few days before they did anything at all. It was Christmas time, many people were on vacation, and so on.
In the end, the travelling agencies became hereos, simply because they managed to do more to get people home safe than the government seemed to do. (In retrospect, this is a media image of the situation, and I can't swear on it's perfect accuracy, but this is how the Swedish public has seen it.)
A few months back, a commission came out with a report on how govermnent and authorities handled the situation, and it more or less stated, with the clearest possible points, that it didn't handle it at all.
This has led to a big confidence crises for the government in question. And the practical result was that the other week, the minister of foreign affairs, Laila Freivalds, resigned from her post, a reasonable and mature decision in my book, respect to her for doing that.
Now, one of the major things in this process was the excuses that officials bave made, trying to push responsibility for the mess on to others or different circumstances. One of the excuses that was most harshly taken by the public was in a news show where Freivalds were asked shy she didn't understand the seriousness of the tsunami, concidering 30 000 Swedes go to Phuket, Thailand, every year.
She said, "I didn't know at the time where Phuket is."
Now, over to the thing that made it fun:
Me and a friend were watching the show Lost. In an episode, Sawyer and Jack are playing poker, and Jack wins. Sawyer asks him where he learned to play poker, and Jack says "Phuket."
Saqyer: "WHen were you in Thailand?"
Jack. *looks at him*
Sawyer: "What? You didn't think I knew where Phuket is, just because I dropped out in the ninth grade."
Two seconds later, me and my friend blurted out, simultanously:
"Make him minister of foreign affairs."
Then we laughed so much I thought we'd suffocate. I still suffer from stomach aches, and that's not a figure of speech.
*** Disclaimer ***
We are not laughing at the tsunami in SE Asia, at all. It was a catastrophy that we as Swedish citizens has a very strong understanding of, concidering we both know people who lost close ones in the waves.
But we do laugh at how a popular TV show can summarize up the outright stupidity of a minister who first fucks up and then can't even make a serious excuse for herself.
The timing were just so perfect.
Last winter, there was a tsunami in SE Asia, killing alot of people, very many people. A few of those were Swedish. Quite a few. There's not, afaik, another country that has as many tourists in Thailand as Sweden does. Thus, Sweden was the country, outside the region itself, that suffered most from this tragedy.
It also created a major political scandal, I think I've touched this on NCT before. The government didn't manage to do much - in fact, it took a few days before they did anything at all. It was Christmas time, many people were on vacation, and so on.
In the end, the travelling agencies became hereos, simply because they managed to do more to get people home safe than the government seemed to do. (In retrospect, this is a media image of the situation, and I can't swear on it's perfect accuracy, but this is how the Swedish public has seen it.)
A few months back, a commission came out with a report on how govermnent and authorities handled the situation, and it more or less stated, with the clearest possible points, that it didn't handle it at all.
This has led to a big confidence crises for the government in question. And the practical result was that the other week, the minister of foreign affairs, Laila Freivalds, resigned from her post, a reasonable and mature decision in my book, respect to her for doing that.
Now, one of the major things in this process was the excuses that officials bave made, trying to push responsibility for the mess on to others or different circumstances. One of the excuses that was most harshly taken by the public was in a news show where Freivalds were asked shy she didn't understand the seriousness of the tsunami, concidering 30 000 Swedes go to Phuket, Thailand, every year.
She said, "I didn't know at the time where Phuket is."
Now, over to the thing that made it fun:
Me and a friend were watching the show Lost. In an episode, Sawyer and Jack are playing poker, and Jack wins. Sawyer asks him where he learned to play poker, and Jack says "Phuket."
Saqyer: "WHen were you in Thailand?"
Jack. *looks at him*
Sawyer: "What? You didn't think I knew where Phuket is, just because I dropped out in the ninth grade."
Two seconds later, me and my friend blurted out, simultanously:
"Make him minister of foreign affairs."
Then we laughed so much I thought we'd suffocate. I still suffer from stomach aches, and that's not a figure of speech.
*** Disclaimer ***
We are not laughing at the tsunami in SE Asia, at all. It was a catastrophy that we as Swedish citizens has a very strong understanding of, concidering we both know people who lost close ones in the waves.
But we do laugh at how a popular TV show can summarize up the outright stupidity of a minister who first fucks up and then can't even make a serious excuse for herself.
The timing were just so perfect.