Borat in the City

It's Ali G! I mean Borat! I mean Sasha Baron Cohen!

Cohen, to my mind, is a strong contender for the position of Funniest Human Being on Earth, which to my values system is about the highest honor one can aspire to. So you can imagine my reaction last night when I was walking around Times Sqaure and, emerging through the thick crowd of tourists, came Cohen, in his character as the Kazakhstani TV host Borst, followed by his camera crew.

The problem? My camera didn't have any batteries. That's always when the best shots present themselves. The s2pro takes two kinds of batteries, and the compartment that drives the camera was completely empty. I prayed to the camera gods: "Please, just let this work!"

I raised the camera and snapped. It worked.

I ran along beside him for a few seconds, but he wouldn't look at me and his camera crew gave me the evil eye. For good reason -- Borat's whole schtik relies on people thinking he's just some foreign rube, not a guy with a show on HBO.

He was in the wrong place, though. His image has far too thoroughly pervaded the New York scene to make catching people around here unaware an easy task. Even in the minute I ran along beside, three different people called out "Kazakhstannnnnn!"