shitty haircuts, and just plain shit
The Europeans tend to be a lot more avant garde than us Americans in a lot of
ways. Their taste in music and art makes most of us look like cavemen. So too
with fashion; I routinely see men my father's age wearing pants that I
wouldn't even consider wearing unless I were already, or were planning
to be, very, very drunk. And don't even get me started on the French and their
addiction to really pointy shoes. Seriously, it's Santa's fucking workshop on
the streets of Paris. But there is one place where the Euro's lag well behind
us: Hair styles.
I write today, to discuss a disturbing trend I've witnessed among European youth : The Euro-mullet. Yes, friends, you read correctly. Mullets. In Europe. I saw them in France. I've spotted them here in Austria. I saw multiple Spanish travellers sporting them. I even caught sight of a few in Luxemburg. Luxemburg, for fuck sake! These heinious things are everywhere!
Though I consider myself something of a mullet connoisseur, I have come across entirely new species of mullet that would shock and confound even the most avid American mullet hunter. Where in the USA, mullets are most likely to be found in the vicinity of NASCAR races, Molly Hatchet concerts, and anywhere that Pabst Blue Ribbon is served on tap, in Europe, they are spotted walking out of the trendiest of night clubs, the wearers complimenting their 10/90 with a pair of Dolce & Gabbana jeans and a far-too-tight shirt proudly explaining that the wearer owns a piece of Armani Couture [side rant] what the fuck is the deal with these guys who think they look good in a shirt that's bulging at the seams with their Gösserbauch, just cause the shirt has some Italian guy's name on it? Maybe instead of that designer shirt, your money would have been better spent on a gym membership? [/side rant].
Not only is the milieu of the euro-mullet far different from their American counterparts, the euro-mulleteers have developed their own unique ways of styling this hideous plumage. If you grew up around the time that I did, you probably remember how popular the 'rat-tail' look was with certain people, for whom you probably had your own slang terms. On the U-Bahn (subway to some, and metro to others), I spotted what I can only imagine to be a strong argument against genetic experimentation: a mullet composed of rat tails--no less than six (6) of them, and each one bleached Jenna Jameson blond, in stark contrast to the wearer's natural locks, a wavy chestnut affair.
In the gym I go to, I nearly dropped a rather large weight on myself (alright, it wasn't that heavy, but it would have fucked the shit out of my foot if I dropped it), as I struggled not to become overwhelmed with laughter at one of the most ridiculous (and thus one of my favorite euro-mullets: the faux-hawk-faux-afro-mullet. I'll wait while you digest that all. Recall the disgusting habit that had some popularity a few years back, for a gentleman to carve a mohawk into his hair but, rather than shaving completely the sides, he chose to leave it trimmed to a fairly short, but most definitely present length. Thus, faux-hawk. Now, imagine that in a tightly-curled perm--think Little Richard. Hence, faux-afro. Now, on top of those abortions of taste and decency, make it a mullet. Et voila! Trashy in a way that only the Europeans can do it.
One last anecdote: As I got off the streetcar on my way home from class several days ago, I spotted a fellow who--in addition to the basic faux-hawk mullet--had etched into the empty space between his ears and the gel-coiffed stack of crazy on top of his head, a series of designs that I'll be damned if they didn't look exactly like crop circles! Seriously, who the fuck walks into a salon and asks for something like this!?
What vexes me the most about this all, is how fucking cool they think they look. In America, mullets are seen wearing Wrangler brand jeans, work boots and, if not a T-shirt from a Lynyrd Skynyrd concert, then something flanel from the racks at the local Quality Farm & Fleet. In Europe, they wear designer jeans, smoke Davidoff cigarettes (though there's a weirdly large number of people who smoke Marlboro), and walk around in Prada shoes that probably cost more than my tuition here. But on their heads are the most ridiculous mullets I've seen since the Clearfield County Fair! I would mock them mercilously if so many of them didn't have biceps thicker than my thighs. This is, after all, the land of Schwarzenegger.
While we're on the subject of things that I don't understand about this place, I'd like to talk about shit. Specifically about it's removal from our bodies via systems of modern plumbing. I've used a wide variety of styles of toilets in my time, from high-class numbers with heated seats and adjacent bidet's, to holes in the ground behind and mossy tree stumps. And I've got to say, toilets in Austria are some of the most fucked up toilets on Earth. I didn't think it would be possible, but they have managed to spend countless man-hours designing and building a toilet that is actually a regression from the basic hole in the ground!
I first encountered these perversions of Biology in Vienna's Westbanhoff, after a 10-hour train ride from Luxemburg during which neither of the bathrooms in my car seemed to function properly, and even if they did, the room itself was so filthy I didn't dare attempt to void my bowels in there. Suffice it to say, then, that I had to shit something fierce by the time my train arrived. With clenched ass cheeks (fortunately, three years of studying ballet have rendered my hinterlands nigh-bulletproof), I stowed my luggage in a locker and made my way toward the "WC" signs. Down some stairs, around a few corners, a couple of coins in the hands of a zaftig woman in an apron, and I was finally...face to face with a toilet that appeared to have been installed backwards. And likely designed by an exceptionally smart monkey. In what I'll call a 'normal' toilet, in the sense that it's what I've encountered pretty much everywhere there are toilets, the bowl is generally just that--a bowl. A more or less hemispherical deal that leads, towards the rear, to the water that will carry your shit, piss, menstruation, etc. to somewhere you don't have to look at it. Not so, apparently, in Austria!
Here, the toilets place the water at the front of the bowl. Leading into the water is something that I'll call a shit-slide. A gently-sloping plateau for poop that is no more than six or seven inches below the rim! What's more, is that this miscarriage of engineering carries no water on it until flushed, thus forcing one to coil his loaf in the open air, a mere handsbreadth from his own ass! Apart from the obvious sanitary concerns this brings to the fore, it makes the (unventilated) bathroom smell like someone just took a shit on the floor, since that's more or less exactly what has happened! Surely in this modern age of wireless internet and self-cleaning ovens, a man should not have to become so intimate with his own feces! The only toilets I've found here that aren't so ill-designed are in the bathrooms of the building I have class in. Which is where I would do all of my shitting, if the typical Austrian diet of bratwurst and beer didn't have me shitting somewhere around 5 times a day.
It wouldn't be such a problem if it weren't for the coarseness of the toilet paper in this country, but that's a story for another day. In the meantime, though, do yourself a favor and avoid any sanitary products that are advertised by monkeys. Monkeys are not known for their fecal hygene.
POST SCRIPT:
The astute reader will have noticed that, over the past few entries here, I've been listening to something called Terry Poison. They are a pan-european/isreali band that is the absolute fucking shit. Seriously. If the members of Kraftwerk had a series of love children with the PowerPuff Girls, and their offspring started a band, Terry Poison would be that band. You could not listen to them, but you also could shove a fork into your eye. It's an easy decision if you ask me.
I write today, to discuss a disturbing trend I've witnessed among European youth : The Euro-mullet. Yes, friends, you read correctly. Mullets. In Europe. I saw them in France. I've spotted them here in Austria. I saw multiple Spanish travellers sporting them. I even caught sight of a few in Luxemburg. Luxemburg, for fuck sake! These heinious things are everywhere!
Though I consider myself something of a mullet connoisseur, I have come across entirely new species of mullet that would shock and confound even the most avid American mullet hunter. Where in the USA, mullets are most likely to be found in the vicinity of NASCAR races, Molly Hatchet concerts, and anywhere that Pabst Blue Ribbon is served on tap, in Europe, they are spotted walking out of the trendiest of night clubs, the wearers complimenting their 10/90 with a pair of Dolce & Gabbana jeans and a far-too-tight shirt proudly explaining that the wearer owns a piece of Armani Couture [side rant] what the fuck is the deal with these guys who think they look good in a shirt that's bulging at the seams with their Gösserbauch, just cause the shirt has some Italian guy's name on it? Maybe instead of that designer shirt, your money would have been better spent on a gym membership? [/side rant].
Not only is the milieu of the euro-mullet far different from their American counterparts, the euro-mulleteers have developed their own unique ways of styling this hideous plumage. If you grew up around the time that I did, you probably remember how popular the 'rat-tail' look was with certain people, for whom you probably had your own slang terms. On the U-Bahn (subway to some, and metro to others), I spotted what I can only imagine to be a strong argument against genetic experimentation: a mullet composed of rat tails--no less than six (6) of them, and each one bleached Jenna Jameson blond, in stark contrast to the wearer's natural locks, a wavy chestnut affair.
In the gym I go to, I nearly dropped a rather large weight on myself (alright, it wasn't that heavy, but it would have fucked the shit out of my foot if I dropped it), as I struggled not to become overwhelmed with laughter at one of the most ridiculous (and thus one of my favorite euro-mullets: the faux-hawk-faux-afro-mullet. I'll wait while you digest that all. Recall the disgusting habit that had some popularity a few years back, for a gentleman to carve a mohawk into his hair but, rather than shaving completely the sides, he chose to leave it trimmed to a fairly short, but most definitely present length. Thus, faux-hawk. Now, imagine that in a tightly-curled perm--think Little Richard. Hence, faux-afro. Now, on top of those abortions of taste and decency, make it a mullet. Et voila! Trashy in a way that only the Europeans can do it.
One last anecdote: As I got off the streetcar on my way home from class several days ago, I spotted a fellow who--in addition to the basic faux-hawk mullet--had etched into the empty space between his ears and the gel-coiffed stack of crazy on top of his head, a series of designs that I'll be damned if they didn't look exactly like crop circles! Seriously, who the fuck walks into a salon and asks for something like this!?
What vexes me the most about this all, is how fucking cool they think they look. In America, mullets are seen wearing Wrangler brand jeans, work boots and, if not a T-shirt from a Lynyrd Skynyrd concert, then something flanel from the racks at the local Quality Farm & Fleet. In Europe, they wear designer jeans, smoke Davidoff cigarettes (though there's a weirdly large number of people who smoke Marlboro), and walk around in Prada shoes that probably cost more than my tuition here. But on their heads are the most ridiculous mullets I've seen since the Clearfield County Fair! I would mock them mercilously if so many of them didn't have biceps thicker than my thighs. This is, after all, the land of Schwarzenegger.
While we're on the subject of things that I don't understand about this place, I'd like to talk about shit. Specifically about it's removal from our bodies via systems of modern plumbing. I've used a wide variety of styles of toilets in my time, from high-class numbers with heated seats and adjacent bidet's, to holes in the ground behind and mossy tree stumps. And I've got to say, toilets in Austria are some of the most fucked up toilets on Earth. I didn't think it would be possible, but they have managed to spend countless man-hours designing and building a toilet that is actually a regression from the basic hole in the ground!
I first encountered these perversions of Biology in Vienna's Westbanhoff, after a 10-hour train ride from Luxemburg during which neither of the bathrooms in my car seemed to function properly, and even if they did, the room itself was so filthy I didn't dare attempt to void my bowels in there. Suffice it to say, then, that I had to shit something fierce by the time my train arrived. With clenched ass cheeks (fortunately, three years of studying ballet have rendered my hinterlands nigh-bulletproof), I stowed my luggage in a locker and made my way toward the "WC" signs. Down some stairs, around a few corners, a couple of coins in the hands of a zaftig woman in an apron, and I was finally...face to face with a toilet that appeared to have been installed backwards. And likely designed by an exceptionally smart monkey. In what I'll call a 'normal' toilet, in the sense that it's what I've encountered pretty much everywhere there are toilets, the bowl is generally just that--a bowl. A more or less hemispherical deal that leads, towards the rear, to the water that will carry your shit, piss, menstruation, etc. to somewhere you don't have to look at it. Not so, apparently, in Austria!
Here, the toilets place the water at the front of the bowl. Leading into the water is something that I'll call a shit-slide. A gently-sloping plateau for poop that is no more than six or seven inches below the rim! What's more, is that this miscarriage of engineering carries no water on it until flushed, thus forcing one to coil his loaf in the open air, a mere handsbreadth from his own ass! Apart from the obvious sanitary concerns this brings to the fore, it makes the (unventilated) bathroom smell like someone just took a shit on the floor, since that's more or less exactly what has happened! Surely in this modern age of wireless internet and self-cleaning ovens, a man should not have to become so intimate with his own feces! The only toilets I've found here that aren't so ill-designed are in the bathrooms of the building I have class in. Which is where I would do all of my shitting, if the typical Austrian diet of bratwurst and beer didn't have me shitting somewhere around 5 times a day.
It wouldn't be such a problem if it weren't for the coarseness of the toilet paper in this country, but that's a story for another day. In the meantime, though, do yourself a favor and avoid any sanitary products that are advertised by monkeys. Monkeys are not known for their fecal hygene.
POST SCRIPT:
The astute reader will have noticed that, over the past few entries here, I've been listening to something called Terry Poison. They are a pan-european/isreali band that is the absolute fucking shit. Seriously. If the members of Kraftwerk had a series of love children with the PowerPuff Girls, and their offspring started a band, Terry Poison would be that band. You could not listen to them, but you also could shove a fork into your eye. It's an easy decision if you ask me.