Sounds Like Octopus

I grew up as a what man, reflexively asking what after being spoken to. Brian, did you finish your homework? What, mom? Brian, did you take the dog for a walk? What, dad? Part of the reason was well-intentioned chore avoidance, but I’m convinced that the larger part of it was because I was, and am, audibly challenged. Perhaps I probed too far with a Q-tip growing up, or maybe it is just a natural defect, but I have found that I often have trouble processing auditory stimuli. Such is the case when it comes to song lyrics. Fortunately for me though, when I can’t understand the lyric, I make them up.

So take my hearing struggles and introduce them into a foreign culture with a slightly different dialect, and the output is scrambled eggs. Thankfully, I’m in good company. While having a pint with a local volunteer from southern Australia, he asked if I was familiar with the local hiplife song that contained the lyric Sexy as cheese. Well, I originally thought maybe the bloke had a roo loose in the top paddock, but quickly dismissed this notion when he began humming the tune. Yes, I was familiar with this song. Soon enough, I too was able to pick out the lyric sexy as cheese. The problem was that I never really considered cheese to be sexy, and if I had, I would at least have had the decency to keep such a fetish to myself. The second problem was that it turns out the lyrics are actually Sexy as she is. Clearly.

Well, I recently put my ears to the test again at Reggae Night. Reggae Night draws a melting pot of personalities. Set on the sands of Labadi Beach, the musical evening brings together a varied clientele from Rastafarian locals to hippy expatriates, from university exchange students to working professionals. This particular evening, my friends and I were blessed with a well-informed emcee, or master of ceremonies as he liked to believe. Every 30 seconds he would interject with just one word. Octopus. I was not sure why he kept drawing attention to our eight-legged mollusk. Perhaps it was our proximity to the ocean, maybe he was informing the masses that octopi are sentient creatures, but whatever the reason for the incessant interjections, I found them disruptive.

Come to find out, the microphone monopolizer wasn’t trying to warn the crowds about a potential octopus invasion, but rather exclaiming On the bus. But how can you keep demanding that I get on the bus without telling me where that bus is going? Please don’t say Tamale.