Aren't foreigners funny?

Will Sawney says comedy's the best way to understand a culture

Truth be told, foreigners are a funny bunch. Found in places worldwide, they smell odd, get all emotional and talk complete jibberish.

Comedians can be funny too. Often finding inspiration near to home, they find humour in smells, strange social abnormalities and wordplay.

Foreign comedy, however, is perhaps a step too far. There are language barriers, cultural barriers, geographical barriers to consider. Plus, while foreigners seem funny to us, they cannot necessarily recognise what is funny about each other. Far better to stand back and laugh from afar, rather than make sense of local humour.

But actually, comedy can be an ideal cultural entry point. Just as home-grown comedy finds humour in home-grown normality, foreign comedy draws humour from their own domestic normalities. Comedy, then, can help us form greater understandings of seemingly alien cultures.

Next time you’re away from home, forget the museums, sightseeing and tourist trailing; delve into the local comedy scene.  When I travel, comedy remains top of my hit-list, even if questing for it can be hard. Unlike museums, restaurants and sightseeing, comedy gigs aren’t generally targeted at foreign travellers and can be difficult to find. Often the search requires expansion into TV, street performance or film. But finding the comedy in foreign countries provides and unbeatable entry point into culture.

Three examples:

Number one. Thailand, Bangkok. I attended both nights of Bangkok’s 2010 Theatre Festival. Four separate stages erected beside the Chao Phraya river, shared by performers and mosquitos alike. Dance, drama, music and other bizzare performances I lack the vocabulary to name. Despite understanding absolutely no Thai, my grinning and guffawing barely ceased all festival.

Mime, clearly, works without language, but somehow even the slapstick act I watched felt classically Thai. Comic drama, too, conveyed humour without language, exaggerated gestures and simple situations telling stories in themselves. But even the stand-up comedy of the festival comperes proved delightful to watch; their radiance and timing shone talent despite my ignorance of meaning.

What did I gain from the experience? I learned that Thai people have lots to laugh about. Among countless other small observations, I discovered that personal appearance clearly carries high importance, since the comedy I saw often derived from ugly or unusual faces and masks. Yet more than such individual findings, I felt closer to Thailand through sharing in Thai humour.

Number two. Japanese TV. Outside of Japan, though Japanese TV makes little sense, it’s considered hilarious. Takeshi’s Castle, for instance, is a twisted game-show baffled and delighted foreign viewers worldwide.

In Japan, initially, Japanese TV seems to make even less sense. The wild colours, hysterical laughter and general mania jar completely with every evident Japanese characteristic: quiet; organised; restrained. In fact, these opposites thrive precisely because of each other.

Japan’s notoriously impenetrable culture, often occluded by silence, can be accessed both successfully and enjoyably through its boisterously noisy comedy.

Finally, number three. India, Bollywood. Last Eid festival, the Indian public (practically all of them) encountered Dabangg, a notably tongue-in-cheek slant on standard Bollywood affair. I watched Dabangg alongside thousands of eager movie-goers at the highly revered Raj Mandir movie theatre in Jaipur.

Dabangg had me in stitches, again despite my ignorance, this time of Hindi. The packed auditorium positively boiled with sweaty laughter at cheesy one-liners and unlikely interruptions. It was clear, though, that Dabangg was also a comedy in the renaissance sense, telling the warped fairytale of a corrupt cop bending legal systems to his advantage, while falling foul of family values in pursuing love. Dabangg is not merely ‘funny’ but also a fable of the transition from social chaos to familial harmony; a classically Indian ideal.

Dabangg, more than any temple or thali, brought me closer to India. Whoever I met, mentioning Dabangg would surely impress. And if I were to attempt a recreation of the hero’s grotesquely macho dance routine, laughter would always follow!

Every culture has its comedy. Understanding foreign comedy can be daunting and difficult. But then, so can understanding the culture itself. One kind of comedy comes from looking at what is strangely foreign and saying ‘look how strange and foreign that is’.

But, like eventually appreciating the taste of seaweed after first shunning it, there’s further joy to be found abroad; appreciating the native humour of another culture. By searching for foreign humour open-mindedly, you gain the chance to explore foreign cultures in an enjoyable and meaningful way. 

Published: 11 May 2011

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