Borat

Much excitement on 16th Street today as the President of Kazakhstan swung by his Embassy to unveil a sculpture on the front lawn. It distracted me for some time. But this was eclipsed by a spontaneous appearance in the afternoon by Borat (aka Ali G aka Sacha Cohen) holding an impromptu press conference on the steps, being refused entry to the Embassy and then marching down 16th to the White House with like a hundred media people thronging him.

For those removed from the Borat-Kazakhstan drama, Ali G/Cohen has a movie coming out in November in which he plays Borat touring the USA on a cultural tour on behalf of Kazakhstan. The movie is supposedly homophobic, anti-semitic, racist and deeply deeply funny. The Kazakhstani government is trying to counter its depiction of their nation and are trying to get it banned and such... (Kazakhstanis on the street seem nonplussed). So it was a brilliant PR stunt this afternoon, but funny all the same.

Otherwise today was a bit of a tetanus shot day. Painful at the time, but ultimately good for me.