Wrong Way's Loser and Winner of the Year Awards

@wwaycorrigan

[Listen to an audio version of this blog entry here.]

Yes, it's that moment you've all been waiting for, the Wrong Way Corrigan Loser and Winner of the Year Awards 2020. We've had plenty of contenders for the former, the latter has been much more difficult to choose. Basically, we've had a dearth of outstanding candidates.

Our Loser of the Year brought about our Winner of the Year. (Photo from Facebook.)

Amazon high

It has, of course, been a year that most people will probably want to erase from memory. Not everybody, though. There's Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, for example. He's had a bumper 12 months. Ditto for those holding the purse strings at Facebook, Netflix and Zoom.

Also, a fair few folk in the First World's comfortable classes — their public mutterings of enduring an annus horribilis aside — have seen their lot actually improve, from a financial perspective in any case.

OK, it's not all about money. I've certainly had to keep on telling myself that this last while in any case. Alas, it doesn't tend to wash with many Colombian women. 'Instead of that fancy restaurant, how about a litrazo of Poker in the barrio tienda? No? Really?!' They'll come round, they will.

Anyway, let's get to the awards, starting with our Loser of the Year.

Xi's the man

The obvious choice for many here is outgoing US President Donald J. Trump. He certainly, um, trumps the lot for sore loser of the year. Indeed, he didn't actually lose the presidential election so he and many of his supporters tell us. 

Whatever the case, he won't be residing at the White House after 20 January, we can be pretty sure of that. Thus, he is a loser, but it's not enough for him to take our gong.

No, the Wrong Way Corrigan Loser of the Year Award is going east, to China to be precise. As the head of a country that initially buried its head in the sand when news emerged of a novel, easily transmitted and somewhat lethal virus at large, Xi Jinping is our top failure.

Not only that, but once coronavirus was let out of the bag (or is that lab? Or wet market?) and reached the four corners of the globe, Xi did what the Chinese Communist Party does best at home: suppression. 

Thus, contagion was curtailed in China while it flourished outside, aided and abetted by a dithering World Health Organisation kowtowing to Beijing.

'Our Loser of the Year and other world leaders did much to ensure Alan scooped the top prize, but credit where credit is due.'

This dithering behaviour proved to be as contagious as coronavirus itself, as governments across the world followed suit. Cue pandemic pandemonium and cures more damaging to society as a whole than covid-19, the infection coronavirus can bring about.

For all that, together with China's backfiring wolf-warrior diplomacy which is only serving to deepen mistrust abroad about the CCP's intentions, Xi Jinping is a worthy Loser of the Year.

Crowning glory

And now for the big one, our Winner of the Year. Many have waxed lyrical about the darling of world leaders, New Zealand's Jacinda Ardern. She's done well in some areas for sure, but in terms of being a global champion, that's stretching things.

There can really be only one winner. Some will accuse me of picking this individual simply because he appeared on my podcast.

For sure, I was delighted to have him on as a guest, but it's disingenuous to say this played a part in my decision. I'm far more balanced than that.

So, our Winner of the Year 2020 is — no, not Niall Ferguson — it's "Alan", aka coronavirus.

For sure, our Loser of the Year and other world leaders did much to ensure Alan scooped this accolade, but credit where credit is due. It may have been an open goal of sorts, but he still had to tuck it away. And that he did with gusto.

He has, quite literally, touched the hearts and minds of millions of people across the planet. At the risk of being facetious, his modus operandi hasn't been to everyone's liking and there are many who certainly wouldn't put him in the winner's enclosure.

Nonetheless, in terms of world dominance in 2020, be that good, bad or indifferent, no one else comes close.

What's more, his emergence may have just given humanity a timely heads-up to get our act together before something far more deadly comes along.

In a divided world, one doesn't hold out much hope that we'll take great heed of this warning.

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Listen to Wrong Way's Colombia Cast podcast here.

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All hail the TV gods

Wanted: Enthusiastic people to take anything from six to 24 hours out of their day (with the promise of more days to come), be ordered around like dogs when needed, virtually walked over when not. Food may or may not be included, it depends on how the employers feel. Same goes for payment.

It should be a case of 'show me the money' when you get miked up.

'Any takers?' 

'Eh, no thank you!' 

'But it's for television.' 

'Me!' 'Me!' 'Me!' 'Me!' 'Me!'

Ah yes, what some of us little people will put ourselves through just to get on television. The lure of the camera makes certain folk lose all perspective.

Some are what we call 'media whores', those who stop at nothing to get a bit of exposure. It's a tad off the mark to actually call them 'whores', as a lot of the time they're happy to prostitute themselves out to the media lords for free.

The thinking behind this is that the "nobody" will become a "somebody", thereby reaching a position where they can demand payment (for example, Bart Simpson, accidental as it was, as the 'I didn't do it kid' and more recently all those seeking fame and "recognition" via YouTube).

Others aren't quite as, um, in your face or driven as the above, but they still get weak at the knees when the chance to be on TV comes along.

Thus, with a number of people acting in such a subservient manner towards the TV gods, it's little wonder that the industry's powers that be take advantage of the situation. Why pay people for something that they'll willingly do for free, or practically for free anyway?

In countries such as Colombia, this mentality appears worse than in more, let's say affluent places. There are a number of factors at play in this.

First, for outside productions, which predominantly come from the USA, the costs of filming here are generally cheaper. Wage demands for personnel hired on location, those used both on- and off-screen, are much lower than the country of origin. No big surprise there, the cost of living in Colombia is lower (for most) after all.

Then we've locals with next to nothing in terms of income and future prospects, so any sort of "easy money" they can make is taken, understandably, without question. There's also the steady stream of backpackers passing through the country who jump at the chance to do some 'glamorous' extras work, regardless of pay.

On top of all this you've a host of greedy agents, all trying to pocket as much as they can from the people they send to film.

Now, the argument can be made that the payments offered are fine in a Colombian context. Again, it depends on how you look at it, where you come from and what exactly you're being asked to do. For one, in terms of basic extra work, foreigners tend to be paid better than locals, receiving up to five times more.

When it comes to landing speaking parts, some agencies pay little better than what they give extras. The problem here is that landing even just a small role can rule you out of working on that production again, unlike being a standard extra. What's more, you generally have to go to castings and learn lines for these more prominent parts.

For example, I was paid 180,000 Colombian pesos (less than 60 euros) for my little speaking part in Narcos II, practically the same as extras pay. It now appears I can't be in Narcos again, so from a monetary point of view, I was robbed (for the record, other agencies offer at least 500,000 Colombian pesos for speaking parts).

Considering the amount of money the likes of Fox, Netflix and Univsion -- to name but a few of the companies that film in Colombia -- have in their coffers, there's no reason why they can't be more financially generous to those at the bottom rung.

That they're not may be more to do with the agencies on the ground than the production companies themselves. The former are doing their bit in maintaining and deepening the gap between rich and poor. They're certainly not doing us any favours, despite what they might like us to think.

Some of us poorer folk are not only happy to let all this happen, but we also help them along the way as well. Hey, it's all-powerful TV after all; thou shalt not question its wisdom.
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