BUSHLANDIA: America Through the Prism of Foreign Carnivals

[kpete]

March 07, 2006
BUSHLANDIA: America Through the Prism of Foreign Carnivals




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For some years I have chronicled carnivals across different cultures - sense of duty -- and the creative power that goes into scratching an itch called America never fails to stun. This year's sojourn included several sleepy but splendid towns in Portugal's countryside. In one, Torres Vedras, the centerpiece -- not a float, the centerpiece -- is called "Bushlandia".

The artfully rendered sculpture, five or so stories high, offers up President Bush as a primitive king dressed in fur scraps, crowned, holding a scepter with a golden skull and a jeweled club, the skull of a Texas longhorn among the bones before him. He wears a crucifix upon which is a soldier, and sits within the jaws of the skull of the Statue of Liberty, which also hosts wormy critters in turbans, (NONE of them depicting Mohammed). Other heads of state supporting him in Iraq == I get confused as to which are Old Europe and New Europe -- are in his court. The most prominent is Prime Minister Tony Blair, who as W's right hand man fans him with feathers and scratches his backside.

On the flip side, the sculpture has a bearded fellow with a turban (I hasten to add it is clearly NOT a depiction of Mohammed, so call off the fatwa), with a wheelbarrow of explosives he's planting in the base of what's left of Liberty. Beneath him is a government minister struggling to feed the world's poor children. Nuclear missiles flank W, and to the side are penguins with distress or time-out whistles, on the other side toxic nuclear and chemical waste washes over nature.

For good measure, a popular Portuguese soccer coach now coaching a British team is in a lower cave, signaling the press to shut up, what you might call throwing in the kitchen sink.

It's a surreal viewing stand before which all revelers pass. The floats that go by include a sinking submarine with passengers including Blair looking out at a bearded shark with a turban (also NOT Mohammed, OK?) grinning with anticipation. Another has a Portuguese minister, couldn't yet pin down which but clearly his veracity has taken some knocks, portrayed as a giant Pinocchio.


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