Keeping Perspective as Oscar Struts

Yesterday was a bit of a Luddite holiday for me. I purposely took only a glancing interest in either email or Facebook, barely looked at my usual news sites. Instead I watched movies much of the day, opting for the fictional world rather than the “real” one.

I used quotation marks around the word real because it seems to be that what we refer to these days as reality is, actually, a far cry from anything I’ve experienced as real life. In truth, each of us has a reality of our own, based on our particular and very specific perspective on life. I suppose it’s a device of self-protection that we choose to define reality uniquely. I understand and embrace that self-protection as long as it doesn’t turn into a means of subverting someone else’s perspective into something inferior rather than different.

Coming back to news of the rest of the world on this Sunday is an interesting choice of timing. The Academy Awards will be given out tonight, so today is all about things Oscar. Returning to the broader reality on a day that is centered in Hollywood could perhaps be compared to leaving a stint in rehab and going directly to Mardi Gras in New Orleans. The media focus on golden statues and red carpets, daring designer gowns and jewelry (and hype so grand that it requires a type face as large as the iconic Hollywood sign itself) is overwhelming.

We love our events. Recently released from the endless hours of Winter Olympics coverage that kept us up late, we’re on to the Oscars. The Super Bowl recedes into the near past on the calendar, but seems farther removed in our events psyche. These larger-than-life spectacles roll over us like giant waves and we remain wallowing in one before another washes us yet higher onto the beach.

Meanwhile, another world and other perspectives are a world away in New Zealand and Australia. As I was reminded this morning when I checked their websites, it’s already tomorrow there. I don’t think I’m going to have time during our three-week sojourn down under to absorb the next-day phenomenon. It simply defies my ability to grasp that it’s tomorrow there.  But they don’t know if NZ’s claim to fame as the place where much of Avatar was made will be rewarded with the Best Motion Picture statuette. They will know when we do except that, for them, it will be sometime tomorrow afternoon. Confusing and counter-intuitive, isn’t it?

Both the Sydney Morning Herald and the NZ Herald have coverage of the Oscars in their Monday, March 8, online editions. They don’t seem radically different in their placement of these items than US newspaper sites, treating them more as features than top stories. The US exception, of course, is the Los Angeles Times which has more coverage placed higher in importance. That’s understandable since it’s a company town for movies.

Aside from Oscar coverage, the Down Under sites didn’t disappoint in my effort to collect new words. On the SMH site, there’s a video of people in Cleveland achieving a Guinness Book record for the most people wearing snuggies in one place. The cutline below the video window says the crowd “are very daggy.” This, I find, can mean anything from “uncool, unfashionable, but comfortable” to “shabby or untidy” or even just “unconventional.” I suspect my own fashion statement might merit a “daggy” comment or two since I adhere to Gilda Radner’s concept of fashion as that which itches least.

The NZ Herald didn’t let me down for an illuminating word of the day either. Today’s headline that grabbed my attention was “Tourists Warned: No Jandals at Gallipoli.” It seems that many Kiwis tour Gallipoli in Turkey, where thousands of their countrymen landed and died in battle in 1915. These tours occur around Anzac Day, April 25. What then are jandals? They are what Kiwis call flip-flops. Why the warning for tourists? Because there are long walks and “sensible walking shoes” should be worn, according to a spokeswoman for Veterans Affairs New Zealand (VANZ).

It’s instructive to follow these words and find that a headline about flip-flops can lead to a very serious story of a moment in history remembered by both sides of the World War I conflict almost 100 years later. The story left me with a strong sense that VANZ was conveying a deeper message, less about footwear than decorum  There was a reminder that the Turkish people lost thousands, too, at Gallipoli. And so, we’re back to perspective.

When perspectives collide in war, when the combined losses on both sides are estimated at more than 120,000 men, that collision creates a horrific reality that resonates long past the actual timeframe of the battle itself. It’s reported that human bones still surface on the hills where that bloodbath occurred. One can only hope that those who visit the site today, whatever their heritage, can acknowledge that such killing fields might not be the best way to deal with differences.