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Borat Sagdiyev

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For other uses, see the character.
File:Borat happy time.jpg
Sacha Baron Cohen as Borat

Borat Sagdiyev (Cyrillic: Борат Сагдиев) is a fictional character of a Kazakhstani journalist invented and portrayed by the British comedian provocateur Sacha Baron Cohen. Borat has humorously been described on his official website as "the fourth most famous person in Kazakhstan."

Fictional background

Biography

Borat Sagdiyev was born in 1972 in Kusek, Kazakhstan. He is the son of Asimbala Sagdiyev and Boltok the Rapist, who is also his maternal grandfather. His relationship with his mother seems to be unpleasant, and Borat has commented that "she wishes she was raped by another man." Borat has a sister named Natalya, who is a prostitute and often fornicates with him; a younger brother named Bilo, who is mentally ill; and Vilo, who must be kept locked behind a metal door or in a cage.

Borat studied at the Astana University. He has been married several times, once to his half-sister Oksana Sagdiyev. His first wife was Maryam Ptulyakbay, another half-sister. She tragically died when she was shot after a hunter mistook her for a bear. He maintains extramarital relations with a girlfriend, a mistress and at least one prostitute. He has three children: Bilak, 12 year-old Biram and 11 year-old Huey Lewis; and two grandchildren, sons of Biram. Borat has a pet pig, Igor, which he claims to love, although he and his family did eat it, including the eyes. He has had many jobs ranging from ice maker to animal sperm retriever. He also claims to have previously worked as a Gypsy catcher, boasting that he can "hit a gypsy with a rock from fifteen metres away if chained — ten if not".

Borat's hobbies include ping pong, disco dancing, rape, shooting dogs for fun, and taking pictures of women on the toilet. Borat has said that he once suffered a "very bad Gypsy attack," in which his wife and plough were stolen and "they touch[ed] [his] horse in [a] very bad way; it was depressed". Borat claims to have the tightest anus of his village, tight enough to open a bottle of Pepsi. He has had many diseases like gonorrea, syphilis and herpes

He was sent to various countries; England, Canada, the Netherlands and most notably United States, to make reports about different cultures. He was sent by the Kazakhistani goverment and television network. If his movie about his journey around the United States isn't successful, Borat will be executed.

Beliefs

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Borat has a great admiration for Joseph Stalin, whom he describes as being both "strong" and "powerful". He believes politicians should be like him and have large "khram". (Template:Lang-ru, literally "temple," but intended to mean "testicles").

Sacha Baron Cohen is himself Jewish and says that he uses the Borat character to expose anti-Semitism and racism. By having Borat make anti-Semitic and racist statements, Baron Cohen claims to be able to show people's favourable reaction and thereby expose anti-Semitic/racist sentiment in society. For example, he was hunting and asked in an interview if it was legal to shoot Jews, to which his host replied that he would have no problem with that although others would. Sometimes people are repulsed by his anti-Semitism. At a dog pound he asked his host if he could test if a dog was trained. He had the interviewee place a finger on each side of her head (like a horn) and say Shalom, then he told the dog: "Attack! Attack the Jew." The woman was very distressed, saying "No! Jews are Jesus's children. She [the dog] probably loves Jews." Also, while taking a self-defense class, Borat asked the instructor to teach him how to defend against the "Jew Claw" (in all fairness, the instructor made it very clear that one should respect the beliefs of others; he didn't believe the "claw" to be literal), and then he made a claw with his hand and had the instructor defend himself against it.

Borat is also known for his animosity toward Uzbekistan. He has been known to talk about the fictional 'Tishniek' massacre, including during his 'Soul Motion' Dance class where he depicted the massacre and proceeded to explain how many Uzbeks were "crushed" on that day. He later told how he was "very proud" of the massacre and said it was not sad because "it is us who do the kill." In a recent press interview (which attracted more reporters than one given by the actual Kazakhstan president held at the same time) Borat threatened his country would "commence bombardment" of Uzbekistan cities with catapults if their anti-Kazakhstan propaganda did not cease. He also claimed that while he was studying "English, journalism, and plague research" to have "Made two new ones [plagues] that killed over five million goats in Uzbekistan."

He also asked the Oklahoma City Traffic Commission to stand in silence for ten minutes to commemorate the 14th anniversary of the massacre, but only got about a minute and a half. In the meeting, which was broadcast live on local TV, he thanked them for letting him join the meeting and then asked to give "short speech" which lasted 17 minutes. The speech covered traffic and American democracy. He made several comments that dumbfounded the commission, including how the only women allowed into government buildings in Kazakhstan are prostitutes.Audio of news coverage

He was shocked to discover that American women have the right to vote, while horses do not, whereas in Kazakhstan, the opposite holds true. On said discovery, he recited the "chain of importance" — "God, man, horse, dog, woman, then rat, then small krutzouli" — to a female voter. When looking for a home in the US, Borat stated that his wife was afraid of "men with chocolate face," referring to black people.

Some of Borat's interviews carry homoerotic undertones. Interviews can involve discussion of "khram" or the sexual preferences of the interviewee or other celebrities, such as Freddie Mercury. Borat enjoys touching and holding men, but has a noticeable aversion toward women. Often he will kiss men on the cheek (and occasionally the lips) but when approached by a woman he will shy away or merely offer a handshake, an example of this being his report on Henley Royal Regatta where he kisses all the male members of a winning crew but not their female coxswain.

Overview

Borat evolved from previous characters that Sacha Baron Cohen had developed: An unnamed Moldovan TV reporter (for LWT/Granada TV and the BBC's Comedy Nation) and an Albanian TV reporter called Kristo (for the Paramount Comedy Channel). The character was likely influenced by Mahir Çağrı whose website was an Internet sensation in 1999.

Borat appeared irregularly on Da Ali G Show, for Channel 4 and HBO, with sketches featuring him often relying on outrageous behaviour and actions, and the reactions of uninformed individuals around him. In early appearances his name was given as Borat Karabzhanov as well as Borat Dutbayev but from 2003 his name was changed to Sagdiyev. In some cases, Borat's guests embrace his anti-Semitism and misogyny by agreeing with him, while other guests express displeasure and attempt to correct his behaviour. Borat has also appeared on BBC1's Friday Night with Jonathan Ross, he appeared on Late Night with Conan O'Brien on July 14th, 2004 and on November 2nd, 2006 in his own feature film, Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan. Cohen/Borat promoted the film with appearances on Saturday Night Live, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, and Late Show with David Letterman, on which he played the berimbau as a guest musician with Beck. He also appeared on the Opie and Anthony XM Satellite Radio show.

Because of his outrageously offensive and bigoted behavior, of which Borat seems innocently unaware, and the stereotypes of a backwards third world country, as he portrays Kazakhstan, the character has sparked controversy. The most outspoken critics of Borat so far have been government officials in Kazakhstan who've vilified Cohen for the way their nation is characterized. The differences between Borat's fictional homeland in Kazakhstan and the actual people and way of life in the country are so far apart that some speculate whether Cohen made it that way to be a satire of American views of the world.[2]

Da Ali G Show

Borat is shown in each episode of Da Ali G Show, doing satirical interviews with often-unwitting subjects in the United Kingdom and the United States. The segment was shot in low-quality video to keep a feeling of a public access show.

File:Borat in New York.jpg
Borat in New York

In order to pass himself off as a foreigner, Baron Cohen writes his alleged notes in Hebrew, and uses occasional Polish words (Dziękuję thank you, Jak się masz? how are you?, Dzień Dobry good day, Przepraszam sorry, though rarely in the correct situations) when speaking to people—not using Kazakh or Russian (the state and official languages of Kazakhstan). He has also lapsed into Hebrew while purporting to sing the Kazakh national anthem at a Savannah Sand Gnats game. He kept on repeating a famous Hebrew folk song: קום בחור עצל וצא לעבודה (kum bachur atzel ve'tze la'avoda - "get up lazy guy and go to work [...]" ) [...] קוקוריקו קוקוריקו התרנגול קרא (kookooriku kookooriku ha'tarnegol kara) ("cock a doodle do the cock has crowed"), and also called Kazakhstan a "hole" (חור)(hor).

Essentially, to elicit the trademark reactions from unsuspecting members of the public, Cohen depends on two premises that are common among American society; 1) the public is not familiar with Borat or his routine(s), and 2) the public is not familiar with anything relating to Kazakhstan. The hair and moustache are real, and it takes Baron Cohen six weeks to grow them.

It has been suggested that Baron Cohen was influenced by internet celebrity Mahir Çağrı; however, Borat had been in development since at least 1995 (at LWT/Granada TV), four years before the Mahir meme.[citation needed] During the DVD commentary of the first disc of season one of Da Ali G Show Baron Cohen says that the evolution of the Borat character was influenced by a real person he met in Southern Russia, "... I can't remember his name - he was a doctor. The moment I met him, I was totally crying - he was [this] hysterically funny guy, albeit unintentionally." There appear to be many similarities between the the character and Mahir, however. Borat's own official website is in fact very similar to Mahir's.[3]

On November 3 2005, Borat was the host of the MTV Europe Music Awards 2005 show in Lisbon.[1]

On October 14 2006 Borat won the German Comedy Award as the best international comedian.

Controversy

File:What borat believe.jpg
Borat sings a not-so-innocent song about "bad children like Jacob" at the 2005 MTV Europe Music Awards
See also Da Ali G Show: Controversy

Borat has been the cause of some controversy, mostly related to his frequent displays of anti-Semitism. Sacha Baron Cohen (who plays Borat) has also been accused of his character being a racist portrayal of Kazakhs.[2]

Cohen is a Jew of Persian descent himself. He explains his character's racist nature by stating that the segments are a "dramatic demonstration of how racism feeds on dumb conformity, as much as rabid bigotry," rather than a display of racism by Baron Cohen himself.[3]

However, the Anti-Defamation League, a prominent Jewish anti-racism group, complained to HBO after Borat performed a country western song that called on people to 'throw the Jew down the well', warning them that 'you must be careful of his teeth' and that 'you must grab him by his horns', to applause and participation from some members of an audience in Tucson, Arizona, USA. The full chorus goes: "Throw the Jew down the well/So my country can be free/You must grab him by his horns/Then we have a big party."

At a press conference just hours before the live broadcast of the 2005 MTV Europe Music Awards, he shocked local and international journalists in Lisbon, Portugal by bringing a bag of birds from Romania (the first European country to detect avian influenza) as a gift, then proceeded to say he was sorry that they had all died.

One Borat scene involves his visiting the Serengeti Range in Texas, where the owner of the ranch reveals himself to be so anti-Semitic as to believe that Hitler's 'Final Solution' was a necessity for Germany. He further implies (with the egging on of Borat) that he would have no problem running a ranch where people can hunt, in Borat's words, "deer... then Jew."

An interview with James Broadwater, a Republican candidate for U.S. Congress, caused Broadwater to receive some hateful emails after an episode of Da Ali G Show aired in which Broadwater stated that Jews will go to Hell. He was told that the interview would be played in foreign countries to teach others about the American political system. Broadwater later posted a letter on his website denouncing Da Ali G Show, explaining that his statement referred to a theological belief that anyone that "accepts Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour will spend eternity in Heaven, while everyone who rejects Him will spend eternity in Hell." Broadwater did not apologize for his comments, which were widely seen as insensitive and inflammatory. Instead, he insisted that "the liberal, anti-God media needs to be brought under the strict control of the FCC, and that as soon as possible."[4]

In January 2005, after convincing the authorities that he was shooting a documentary, Borat managed to infuriate a crowd at a rodeo in Salem, Virginia, USA: first by saying that "I hope you kill every man, woman and child in Iraq, down to the lizards...and may George W. Bush drink the blood of every man, woman and child in Iraq"; and then, by rendering a mangled version of "The Star-Spangled Banner" that ended with the words "your home in the grave," the Roanoke Times reported. "If he had been out there a minute longer, I think somebody would have shot him," said one witness. "People were booing him, flipping him off." For his own safety, Borat was escorted from the venue. [5]

Conflicts with Kazakh Government

In November 2005, following Borat's hosting of the MTV Europe Music Awards in Lisbon, the Kazakh Foreign Ministry voiced their concerns about the character. Foreign Ministry spokesman Yerzhan Ashykbayev told a news conference "We view Mr. Cohen's behavior at the MTV Europe Music Awards as utterly unacceptable, being a concoction of bad taste and ill manners which is completely incompatible with the ethics and civilized behavior of Kazakhstan's people", concluding "We reserve the right to any legal action to prevent new pranks of the kind."[6]

Baron Cohen has since posted a video on the "Official Borat Homesite" where Borat responds to Ashykbayev in character. In the video, Borat states, in part, "In response to Mr. Ashykbayev's comments, I'd like to state I have no connection with Mr. Cohen and fully support my Government's decision to sue this Jew. Since the 2003 Tuleyakiv reforms, Kazakhstan is as civilized as any other country in the world. Women can now travel on inside of bus, homosexuals no longer have to wear blue hats, and age of consent has been raised to eight years old. Please, captain of industry; I invite you to come to Kazakhstan where we have incredible natural resources, hardworking labour, and some of the cleanest prostitutes in whole of central Asia. Goodbye! Dzienkuje! "

Reuters quoted an unnamed Western diplomat as saying "They (the Kazakh Government) are damned if they do (respond) and damned if they don't," he said. "It's sort of unfortunate that he hit upon Kazakhstan."[7] Another unnamed source inside Kazakhstan's Washington embassy called Borat a "one-man diplomatic wrecking ball."

The next week, the government hired two Western public relations firms to counter Borat's claims, and ran a four-page advertisement in The New York Times. The ad carried testimonials about the nation’s democracy, education system and the power and influence enjoyed by women. On a previous occasion, Borat responded to official Kazakh complaints by issuing his own "press release", which consisted of arbitrarily arranged Cyrillic characters. He would make another response when promoting his movie in front of the Kazakh Embassy in Washington, roundly denouncing the advertisements as "Uzbek propaganda."

On December 13, 2005, the right to use the domain name www.borat.kz was suspended, and the site attached to it was closed down.[8] The domain-issuing body said that they took this action since false names were given for the site's administrators, and also because the site www.borat.kz was hosted outside Kazakhstan. However, the stated underlying cause of the action was in order to censor the content of the site: "We've done this so he can't badmouth Kazakhstan under the .kz domain name," Nurlan Isin, President of the Association of Kazakh IT Companies, told Reuters. "He can go and do whatever he wants at other domains."

Reporters Without Borders petitioned the ICANN ombudsman to intervene and reverse this decision.[9] Meanwhile, the "Official Borat Homesite" was moved to the .tv domain, where it remains. (As of November 2, 2006, the former domain name was still suspended.)

Borat has, however, recently been defended by Dariga Nazarbayeva, a politician and the daughter of Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev. She stated on a national news program Karavan that Baron Cohen's website "damaged our image much less than its closure, which was covered by all global news agencies," and "We should not be afraid of humour and we shouldn't try to control everything, I think."[10]

White House "visit"

On September 29, 2006, Cohen appeared in character as Borat at the White House gates to give a press conference [11] and invite "Premier Warlord George Walter Bush" to a screening of his forthcoming film, along with "O.J. Simpsons", "Mel Gibsons" and other "American dignitaries." Not surprisingly, Secret Service agents would not admit him to the grounds. The apparent publicity stunt was likely timed to coincide with an official visit by President Nazarbayev the following day.

Complaint by Roma in Germany

On October 18, 2006, European Center for Antiziganism Research, which works against ziganism, negative attitudes toward gypsies (e.g. Roma and Sinti people), filed a complaint (PDF file, in German) with prosecutors based on Borat's comments about gypsies in his upcoming film. The complaint accuses him of defamation and inciting violence against the ethnic group.[12]

Hoax victims

WAPT (Jackson, Mississippi) TV news producer Dharma Arthur claims in Newsweek she lost her job as a result of her booking Borat on a local afternoon news program. At the time of the appearance, she was unaware of Baron Cohen's act. During an interview with anchor Brad McMullan, Borat made sexual and scatological references, kissed McMullan, and later disrupted a live weather report.[13]

Because of him, my boss lost faith in my abilities and second-guessed everything I did thereafter.... I spiraled into depression, and before I could recover, I was released from my contract early. It took me three months to find another job, and now I'm thousands of dollars in debt and struggling to keep my house out of foreclosure.... How upsetting that a man who leaves so much harm in his path is lauded as a comedic genius.

— Dharma Arthur, Newsweek

Others fooled by Borat have become minor celebrities.

Film

File:Borat Natalia.jpg
Borat and his sister, Natalya
Main article: Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan

Subtitled Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, the film is a low-budget mockumentary comedy. The distributor of the film is 20th Century Fox and the director is Larry Charles. It debuted at the 2006 Traverse City Film Festival and is due for general release November 3, 2006, in America.

Lingo

  • Barbara bush - literally "to eat the hair from the testes satchel"; (Barbara-To eat, Bush-The hair around the testes satchel)-a reference to Barbara Bush
  • Hram - genitals (from the Russian word for "temple")
  • Dzienkuje - "thank you" Sometimes used as a greeting in the opening of the Borat segments of Da Ali G Show. from the Polish Dziękuję), Also spelled as "Chenquieh" when written by Borat, e.g., his speech on the Kazakh embassy.
  • Football - disease where a man grows a foot out of the testes satchel
  • Hand relief - masturbation or sexual contact involving the hand
  • Jagshemash - "how are you?" (from the Polish "Jak się masz?", the Czech "Jak se máš?"). Returning to Central Asia, the Uyghur greeting "yahşimusiz" means "are you well?", and in Uzbek it's "yaxshimisiz". Perhaps ironically, "yaxshi emas" means "not good/well" in Uzbek.
  • Krutzouli - small or insignificant animal of ambiguous identity, placed above women in the fictional Kazakh caste system.
  • Liquid explosion (sexy time explosion) - ejaculation
  • Sexy time (sexy intercourse) - sexual intercourse
  • Testes satchel - scrotum
  • Vazhïn - vagina (once referred to as Shakira)
  • Mouth party (sex in mouth) - oral sex
  • Moviefilm - movies.
  • Making a dirt - to defecate
  • Making brown - to defecate
  • Making romance inside - to have sexual intercourse
  • Man with chocolate face - a black person
  • She is tight like man's anus - description of sister's vagina
  • Loose like sleeve of wizard - description of wife's vagina
  • Transibiersky express - children's porno with Johnny the Monkey

Cyrillic code

In each Borat segment, there are Cyrillic letters behind the English captions. These letters are a rough cipher of the English text, according to the following correspondence:

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
Ф И С В У А П Р Ш О Л Д Ь Т Щ З Й К Ы Е Г М Ц Ч Н Я

The Cyrillic letters are not really the equivalents of the Latin ones for which they are substituted in this cipher. On a computer, this cipher can be produced by typing Latin letters on a standard QWERTY keyboard whilst having the standard Russian keyboard layout activated (QWERTY → ЙЦУКЕН).

For example, the caption "Borat's Guide to America" appears under the letters:

ПШВ ИЩКФЕФ Л ФЬУКШПШ (which would be pronounced, "PSHV ISHCHKIEF L F'UKSHPSH")

Which, deciphered, says:

GID BORATA K AMERIKE

Which, after transliterating back to Cyrillic, renders a sentence in Russian, which reads:

Гид Бората к Америке (Literally word for word: "Borat's Guide to America.")

This is broken Russian. It is more correct to say "Путеводитель Бората по Америке".

The correct English rendering would be PUTEVODITEL' BORATA PO AMERIKE.

See also

  • Ali G - Baron Cohen's other main character
  • Bruno - Baron Cohen's other character
  • Korobeiniki - One of Borat's theme songs.
  • Mahir Çağrı - Internet phenomenon, partial influence for the character
  • Pubis - A person's pubic hair. Borat requests Conan O'Brien's pubic hair because "red pubis" is said to be more valuable than diamonds. Borat's pubic hair was removed and combined with other Kazakh pubic hair, which Borat claims is the third largest export of Kazakhstan and is used for cleaning pots and pans and knitting sweaters for children.

Notes

  1. ^ http://ema.mtv.co.uk/
  2. ^ http://radar.smh.com.au/archives/2006/10/is_borat_racist.html
  3. ^ http://movies.yahoo.com/mv/news/va/20060908/115774501000.html
  4. ^ http://www.webgeordie.co.uk/borat/broadwater.htm
  5. ^ "Rodeo in Salem gets unexpected song rendition", The Roanoke Times, January 9, 2005.
  6. ^ "Kazakhstan on Borat: Not Nice", Josh Grossberg, E! Online, Nov. 14, 2005.
  7. ^ [1], Reuters, Nov. 11, 2005.
  8. ^ "Kazahkstan Strips Borat of Site", Sarah Hall, E! Online, Dec. 13, 2005. A different version of this article was formerly available on Reuters.
  9. ^ "Reporters Without Borders raps censorship of UK comedian's "Borat" website" Reporters Without Borders online press release, issued Dec. 14, 2005.
  10. ^ "Daughter of Kazakhstan's president defends Borat", CBC, Friday, April 21, 2006.
  11. ^ BORAT SAGDIYEV - White House Press Conference on YouTube
  12. ^ Now Gypsies want Borat banned, Sydney Morning Herald, October 18, 2006.
  13. ^ http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,226960,00.html
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