Stereotypes are there for a reason...

Yesterday was the Annual UAAP Cheerleading competition. In case you don't know what that's about, that's when cheerleaders/dancers from all UAAP-league university go head to head in a
"cheer off" in a spectacle of glitz, blitz, and stupidity.

I wasn't able to watch the entire competition, but I did see enough footage to make my stomach hurt from laughing. Here are a few notes I've managed to remember about the show.

Good dancing, respectable choreography, and decent looking cheerleaders. How can that go wrong? Two words: Bad Music. I'm not a remix genius but it doesn't take much musical taste to figure out that slapstick cartoon soundeffects don't mix well with club music. Apparently this obvious fact isnt so obvious for the NU Cheerleading squad. If you cant imagine how horrible the performance got because of the bad music, imagine a bunch of cheerleaders seriously dancing with the beat of their feet matching the soundeffect of shoes stepping on turd. The immortalized whoops-I-slipped sound from roadrunner and cayote didn't help make any mistakes go unnoticed either. In the end, the whole spectacle turned into looney tunes on court, without the tunes and with twice the loon.

And you'd think it' d stop there. No. Other universities just had to follow suit, as if bad taste for music was in fact infectious. UST, FEU and Ateneo also came up with the "wacky" sound effects that made their would-have-been-stellar performances appear like a circus.

The only troupes that I saw that actually thought of using acceptable remix music is UP, who unfortunately had too much of a good thing and ended up overshooting their performance way beyond the time limit. So much so that they actually had to just run out of the stage in panic mode for fear of being disqualifed, leaving props behind in a whirlwind of chaos. The panic that ensued got so bad, I was starting to think I was watching a rally dispersal.

On a lighter note, UP, notorious for extremely beefy (read: manly) cheerleading girls showed up with more feminine ones this year. They were easily dethroned from the amazon awards by political-statement totting FEU who broke traditions by coming up with unisex uniforms and girls who look manlier than their guys.

At first I thought it was random. Because hey, maybe I'm just reading too much into things. Never mind that I thought the performers doing the cancan were guys because of their muscular builds and lack of busts. Nevermind that these superwomen were at the base of the pyramids, actually the ones doing the lifting of male cheerleaders isntead. I mean, sweet lord, if these women can lift two men, it only takes a few drops of sweat for them do grow moustache and an Adam's apple to boot.

But then again, there was FEU's music. Intro: Chicksilog by Kamikazee. That's gotta be saying something. It gets cut off after 10 seconds, afterwhich we are bombarded with Enrique Iglesias tracks sequenced in the most suggestive way possible. These guys meant business.

As if their Yellow and Green boyscout motiff wasn't enough to tell us that.

Pound for pound though, the "biggest" performers weren't around this year. DLSU PEP Squad was noticieably missing (went over the weight restriction?). Which is sad, because everybody loves that scene where Willy jumps over a small kid in Free Willy. I'm not implying anything. I'm just saying if cheerleading uniforms could talk, they'd be screaming "I CAAANT TAKE IT ANYMOOORE. IM BEING TORN APART BY THE PRESSUUUUURE." that or "It. came. from .behind!" ala StarWars.

Also, there are the after performance interviews that were just as interesting. I remember seeing one interview where the commentator goes to interview a cheerleading captain about the performance in English. The stupid fuck was dumbstruck and you can just see it in his face. After ten agonizing seconds, he finally replies, deciding he'd rather not risk it and answer in Filipino instead. Safe answer, bitch. Cheerleader rep is bad enough, don't make it worse.

Speaking of rep, perhaps the best highlight of the whole event comes from FEU. It was the last few seconds of their performance. The center columns started pyramiding while images of the tamaraw in plaquards appeard on the sides.

And then it appeared in giant letters - a banner that says F.E.U.

It would have been perfect.

If it did not appear inverted in front of everybody in the judge's PoV.

Nice way to screw up a good performance. 4 months of nightly practice and you screw up the "this side up" part of the finale. *sigh*

Stereotypes are there for a reason.