Japan as an example. You can barely communicate and you live in the
middle of nowhere next to a volcano. Things that used to be easy,
like grocery shopping or getting a haircut, are hard as hell. You
begin to miss home a bit, but are comforted by friends' emails and
the music that you brought with you. You have listened to every CD
twice and are beginning to realize that you may never here southern
rock or country music again for the next year of your life. Now
imagine the surprise you would feel when the very next day you find
out that there is a giant country music festival 15 minutes from
your Volcano. Then you find out that Brad Paisley is the headliner!
So I show up to this country music festival not knowing what the
hell to expect. Especially since I have never seen a japanese cowboy
and can't imagine what they would look like. So I enter this amazing venue that is completely outdoors and has the smoking volcano and
surrounding mountains as a backdrop. When I looked around I almost
lost it. It was like walking into a nashville bar, except that
everyone in the place was Japanese. I saw confederate flags, one guy
was wearing a confederate civil war cap. Others, in true Japanese
style, had put mini cowboy hats and vests on their dogs. To top it
off there was a group of japanese line dancing women who all must
have been sixty years old. I called themthe line dancin' grannies. They flew for four hours to get to the festival and were dressed in homemade vests and skirts with the US flag featuring prominently. There were booths selling American beef in the back and they were also selling Wild Turkey and Jim Beam by the shot!
Being an American with cowboy boots made you an absolute celebrity.
People asked what country music they should buy, and others wanted
pictures. But it wasn't just Japanese that were excited to see some
good ol folks (Even though Atlanta isn't that country, they were
settling for what they could get). When I walked down to the stage
and saw Brad Paisley looking a bit freaked out and walking hurriedly
away I called out in English "Brad, how bout a picture?" I guess he
was so relieved to hear something that he understood he came over
and chatted with me. About every five or ten minutes throughout the
day I would look around and ask "Where the hell am I? Did I just
meet Brad Paisley at a country music festival in the middle of
nowhere IN JAPAN?!!"
The funniest was when the country bands were singing they would try
to get the audience involved by asking for a yeehaw or not singing
lines so the audience would fill in. I guess they forgot that no one
at the concert understood a single word of english and certainly not
when it was spoken with a southern drawl. So when Brad paisley would
intentionally drop a line or ask people if they were having a good
time, there was absolute silence. No joke, you could hear the crickets chirping!!! Which was then followed by the band laughing as they wondered if they had just stepped into the country music twilight zone. So the six of us there that actually knew country music tried to fill in by yelling as loud as we could and we occasionally got a thanks or two from the bands. It was also
hilarious when Paisleys drummer went searching through the crowd
trying to pick up Japanese chicks and asking us how to say different
cheesy lines.
What a crazy life I am living!!!
