Marketing Gone Bad

I think I've never blogged this story before, and it's pretty funny. I was in Russia during the summer of 1998 on a program involving maybe a dozen other American high school kids. We were all living with Russian families that had kids enrolled in the advanced English class in this one high school in Nizhny Novgorod. For several days in early July, the Americans were all sporadically busy thinking about how we would mount a July 4 celebration. Eventually, we found some sparklers, some peanut butter, and I guess maybe some stuff from McDonalds.

It was only near the last possible moment that this one Russian dude got to asking what it was we were celebrating. "Thees fourth July is for eendependence day?" Yes, of course. "Eees eeemportant holiday in U.S.?" Yes, of course. "Americans make eemportant day for movie? Will Smeeth fight the aliens."

Comments

hurray for hollywood!

Posted by 2cynicalbyhalf | July 4, 2007 11:57 AM

Sounds like the sort of response Howard Stern's man-on-the-street interviewer used to get when he asked blacks in Harlem what the meaning of the 4th of July was.

Posted by Juan | July 4, 2007 12:03 PM

Juan Williams? Is that you? Such a big name posting to this here blog?

I bet Ezra's really proud. A big mazal tov to Ezra for a post by a big wig!

And Happy Fourth!

P.S. a dorm-mate of mine once described Independence Day thus: "you have a WASP President ordering people around based on ethnic stereotypes: 'Jew, think for me', 'Black person, fight for me', 'Asian dude, get fancy new technology working for me'". I guess it was an all-American movie?

Posted by DAS | July 4, 2007 12:11 PM

And robots! Don't forget the robots! Very important to celebrating patriotism!

Posted by Nicholas Beaudrot | July 4, 2007 12:27 PM

That movie sucked so bad.

Posted by jg | July 4, 2007 12:28 PM

Ooops ... I forgot which blog I was reading ... all you kidz with your blogs that look so much alike in their lay-out (I can talk like this about BMM and Young Ezra ... I'm older than they ... by, I guess about 5-10 years). Anyway, I guess the Mazal Tov goes to Matt! Sorry for the mistake ...

Posted by DAS | July 4, 2007 12:47 PM

Matt, this charming little anecdote might work a little better if it were told in such a way that the wry sense of irony contained in the questions of that educated Russian 'dude' gets expressed instead of your making him look like a french accented version of the Valley Girl living in Russia.

If you chose to use it in your book try it that way.

Posted by ken | July 4, 2007 1:31 PM

I'm in Germany right now, and I contemplated buying some "Sammy's Super Sandwich Bread" for the occasion. Luckily, my wife and I found a restaurant (besides McDonald's) that serves burgers, along with a mysterious treat only known as Cajuns.

Posted by Clark | July 4, 2007 1:40 PM

There was an Asian dude in Independence Day?

Posted by Klug | July 4, 2007 2:02 PM

If you search on "Independence Day" the first link is about the movie. Apparently Google is siding with the Russian on this one.

Posted by DJ | July 4, 2007 3:05 PM

What ken said. Matt, you really have no idea how to transcribe a Russian accent. Hell, your tin ear is almost as bad as Jonathan Safran Foer's.

Posted by vanya | July 4, 2007 9:42 PM

I believe it should be spelled "Yindependence Day."

Posted by godoggo | July 4, 2007 10:16 PM

First Google result for "Independence Day" return Will Smith action extravaganza?!

America: What a country!

Posted by Yakov S. | July 4, 2007 10:33 PM

"Hell, your tin ear is almost as bad as Jonathan Safran Foer's."

Vanya, we should all give thanks that Matt hasn't become another Jonathan Safran Foer. Matt has as good or better publishing connections (through his novelist/screenwriter father), and could have easily taken the same tack of lifting half of his text from a little-known Hebrew novel, padding it with crap, and then serving it up to a gullible (carefully selected?) NY Times book reviewer. Instead, Matt has chosen to serve humanity with his blog, and forthcoming book of wonkery.

Posted by Fred | July 5, 2007 3:43 AM

Fred wrote..."easily taken the same tack of lifting half of his text from a little-known Hebrew novel, padding it with crap, and then serving it up to a gullible (carefully selected?) NY Times book reviewer"

Are you accusing Jonathan Safran Foer of plagiarism? I've read lots of mean things about the guy, but I've never read anything about this.
Do you have a citation to back this up?

Posted by peep | July 5, 2007 9:06 AM

I work with a sarcastic Russian bastard, and I thought the transcription was OK. Maybe leave the "d"s out of independence (eennepennence), and use use "theece" (this) and "eece" (is).

Posted by Njorl | July 5, 2007 9:15 AM

"Are you accusing Jonathan Safran Foer of plagiarism? I've read lots of mean things about the guy, but I've never read anything about this.
Do you have a citation to back this up?"

It's been alleged that the magic realism dictionary parts of "Everything is Illuminated" were largely lifted from David Grossman's novel "See Under: Love". Read both and see what you think.

Posted by Fred | July 5, 2007 12:46 PM

Aww, HELL no!

Posted by will smith | July 5, 2007 1:18 PM

"It's been alleged that the magic realism dictionary parts of "Everything is Illuminated" were largely lifted from David Grossman's novel "See Under: Love". Read both and see what you think."

Wow! When you mentioned a "little-read Hebrew novel" it didn't occur to me that it would be one of the 3 or 4 contemporary Hebrew novels I've read.

I would say it is more of a homage to the Grossman novel than anything else.

I googled this to see if I could find any discussion of Foer's "plagiarism" (I realize I'm only one to use this inflammatory word) -- and couldn't find anything -- but I did find this: "Among my very favourites: David Grossman's See Under: Love (Vintage), one of the most ambitious, generous, beautiful, indispensable books I've been fortunate enough to read" -- the writer of this being, of course, Jonathan Safran Foer.

Posted by peep | July 5, 2007 1:42 PM