Gap Yah

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A typical scene, depicting Orlando talking on the phone.

Gap Yah is a comedy sketch that gained widespread popularity and press coverage, especially in the United Kingdom, after being published on the video-sharing site YouTube in February 2010. It was created and performed by Oxford University graduate Matt Lacey of sketch comedy theatre troupe The Unexpected Items. The video was produced and directed by VMproductions and The Unexpected Items, originally from the School of Oriental and African Studies.[1] The video became a viral hit, with 660,000 views in its first month and around 50,000 "fresh hits a day"[2] in late March 2010.[3] As of April 2014, the clip has been viewed over five million times.

The video depicts a student named Orlando describing to his friend Tarquin several of his experiences and encounters during a gap year in Tanzania, Peru and Burma, all of which resulted in him vomiting—or "chundering"—everywhere.[4] The video is a spoof of British upper-middle-class ex-public school students (using distinctively drawn-out vowels)—commonly known as rahs—who boast about their experiences, typically in the third world, prior to attending university.[4] The sketch has resulted in the term being increasingly used in schools and universities across Britain.[5] An online following has developed, with tribute Facebook pages as well as several remixed versions of the video having been created by others.[4][5] Phrases from the video have become cultural memes, with the phrase "...and then I just chundered everywhere" being added to satirise election posters of Conservative Party leader and current UK prime minister David Cameron as well as events such as the eruption of the Icelandic Eyjafjallajökull volcano.[6] Gap Yah is described by its creator as follows:

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"It's a satire on the great number of people who seem to be leaving these shores to vomit all over the developing world."

— Matt Lacey, The Guardian[4]

Lacey also states that "depressingly, there are a lot of these people and I even have elements of them myself."[5] The Unexpected Items are a sketch comedy group, founded in 2008, consisting of six actors, who also write the material. The sketch is incorporated as part of the troupe's routine while they perform in Islington, London.[7]

A sequel to the sketch, entitled Gap Yah 2: Afterparty was released on 26 April 2010.[8] It featured Orlando, again chatting to his friend Tarquin on his mobile, while he and his friend Pandora place posters around a town to advertise a fund-raising event for "Haiti, in Africa". An official Gap Yah single called 'Gap Yah ft. The Banter' was released in June 2010[9] and Gap Yah 3: Intahnshup was released on 12 December 2013.[10]

References

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External links

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