Geordieland

Geordieland (Gateshead Zone)

 

Let's get this out of the way in the very first line - there is no such thing as Geordieland. It doesn't exisit, not in the real world anyway; but, like unicorns, the 'truth' about 9/11 or the veracity of TV presenter Dermot O'Leary's heterosexuality - that doesn't stop people going on about it.

In the 1960s T. Dan Smith went for 'the Brasilia of the North', Sir John Hall took it further still when he automatically started babbling on about 'the Geordie Nation' whenever someone pointed a TV camera at him in the 1990s. Now we have 'Geordieland', it might only exist in the world of lazy newspaper articles, low quality television programmes and people who think everything above the M25 is "ap norf", but that's enough and enough is enough. Enough. It has to stop. Geordie Nation? Jesus H Spender...

Newcastle upon Tyne is Geordieland in the same way that London is Cockneyland, Sunderland is just Cockland (they always get it slightly wrong don't they?) and Gloucester is (Fred) Westworld. "Shall we go to Gloucester this weekend love? Dirty weekend? The kids'll love it".

If Geordie FInishing School For Girls (BBC Three) and MTV's Geordie Shore are to be believed then most Geordies live on the breadline, spend their nash on fake tan and booze, hump without blobs and go to the gym a lot. That's it, nothing else. If you didn't know any better you could be forgiven for thinking that's all that happens in this Geordieland. Obviously there's far more to it than that so allow me to flesh it out a bit:

Geordies? They're mad aren't they?  (Yeah, look at Raoul Moat - absolutely mental)

Newcastle - it has pubs.

They don't wear coats. None of them. Ever.

If you can't pull in Newcastle you can't pull anywhere (no comment).

There is a river. It is called the Tyne. There's also a weather condition know as fog. At certain times the two are not mutually exclusive.

Geordielanders communicate solely through the use of the phrase "why aye". There are no other words, not in Geordieland.

Are ye gannin doon the Grove Spuggy?

See? See the richly textured layers of diverse culture and society that get 'lost in the edit' as they say in television circles. It's the BBC's fault; they might not have started it but they took up the reigns and now look where we are. Branded as languageless simpletons, broke, bronzed - but happy. Licence fee boycott anyone?

Status: None-existent.

Lookalike: Brasilia (T. D. Smith), Barcelona (J. Hall)

In Three Two Words: Why Aye!