QI (2003–…): Season 9, Episode 2 - International - full transcript
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Hello. Good evening, good evening,
good evening, good evening,
good evening, good evening.
Good evening, ladies and gentlemen.
This is Captain Fry speaking
in, I hope, a very reassuring tone,
welcoming you aboard
this QI international,
around-the-world trip.
We have an impressive roster of VIP
passengers on board with us tonight.
International man of mystery
Jack Dee.
APPLAUSE
Global phenomenon Bill Bailey.
APPLAUSE
Seasoned world traveller
David Mitchell.
APPLAUSE
And from another planet entirely,
Alan Davies.
APPLAUSE
And gentlemen, if at any time
you wish to get my attention, don't
hesitate to use your call buttons.
Jack goes...
'Icelandair to Inverness, Gate B.'
LAUGHTER
Bill goes...
'Iran Air to Istanbul, last call.'
David goes...
'Air India to Islamabad now closing.'
And Alan goes...
'Unexpected item
in the bagging area.'
LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE
- Very good. - Oh, yeah.
Good. If you make sure that all your
seats are in an upright position,
we are cleared for take-off.
Don't forget that this year
we are celebrating our ignorance
with the Nobody Knows Round.
FANFARE
'Nobody knows.'
If you think that nobody knows
the answer to that question,
then you can wave your "nobody"
and you get a big bonus.
But if you wave it and you're wrong,
you get a bit of an old forfeit.
What are the points that
you can gain by using it correctly?
I think we all agree that nobody
in this universe understands
QI's scoring system.
So, by that logic, were we to raise
the subject of the scoring system
and I was to do that, then...
A-ha!
APPLAUSE
- Nobody knows. - Nobody knows.
- He's made a very good point.
- It's a good point.
I suppose I'm trapped
in an infinite loop.
- Yes. Fortunately, that isn't
one of the questions.
- Ah.
If it were, in the hypothetical
round, a question, "What is
the QI scoring system?",
and nobody knows, what would happen
to the person that DOES
the QI scoring?
Would they not then feel
rather sad?
- They would. - They, at least,
presumably, are sitting there
THINKING that they know.
His name's Colin. He is
brilliant. He works for Lumina,
the scoring-system people,
and HE knows what he's doing.
But it is a bit of a puzzle
to the rest of the world.
- There's a company out there
responsible for the scoring system
on this programme? - That's right.
For nine years we've used them,
and I think they've served us proud.
- What happened before then?
- Served themselves!
- They must be laughing all the way.
- What a good scam, Colin!
I think they also do
Pointless and Eggheads,
and other things like that.
- I think they reserve a lot of
their creativity for this show,
don't they? - Yes, I know!
- I wonder what the score is now.
- Yes, the score now...
Amazingly, Bill has three
and everyone else has zero.
APPLAUSE
Why three?
I either thought one or ten,
but three?
- How could you divide your
contribution by three? - Better than
you, you, you. Three!
APPLAUSE
Let's get going, shall we?
Now, if by some terrible, terrible
concatenation of circumstances,
both my co-pilot and I on
this flight are suddenly taken ill,
how would you land this plane?
Can't they just land themselves?
I'd stop reading the Kindle on
the steering wheel and concentrate.
LAUGHTER
That would be a wise start, yes.
- Don't you radio the...? The co-pilot
is slumped normally in these
situations. - Someone talks you in.
- Somebody talks you in?
- That's what happens in the movies.
- Robert Duvall would probably be
good. That's who I'd ring. - Or Lloyd
Bridges in the case of Airplane.
- Perfect choice.
- Presumably, there are legal problems
with someone talking you down
because you could sue if it was
interpreted by your relatives
that you were given bad advice.
So probably these days,
the air traffic controller would
refuse to give advice and say,
"We're not covered
for my saying something..."
You'd have to sign a waiver
and text it to them, then insurance
would cover you to be talked down.
It is a minefield. Extraordinarily,
and happily, it has never occurred
in commercial airline travel history
that someone has gone, "Can anyone
fly this plane because the pilot
and co-pilot are ill or dead?"
It's never happened, but
it would be fraught with difficulty.
They have tried various simulations.
For example, those with American
civil private pilot licences
in America who can fly light planes
were invited on to simulators
of big jets.
One of them couldn't even operate
the seat that moved him
towards the control.
Another one turned the radio off.
Another one turned off the autopilot
and instantly crashed the plane.
The fact is
it's incredibly difficult.
Stephen, am I allowed to say
that in your uniform how incredibly
unlike a pilot you look?
So what do I look like instead?
Be brutal, be frank.
I think you'd be the chap
who calls himself the bursar.
He's got a big leather wallet
and takes money for duty-free.
Yeah, CALLS himself the bursar.
- He calls himself the bursar? - Yes,
I think he does.
- Or the purser?
- The bursar is the one that does the
money for... - Public schools. - Yeah.
What kind of plane is he flying on?
LAUGHTER
"The bursar will be collecting money
for the end-of-term jamboree."
"Here on Charterhouse Air..."
The bursar with the trolley and then,
with the drinks, the groundsman.
Anyway, the fact is it's fraught
with difficulty. The first problem
is simply getting into the cockpit
because since 9/11, of course,
cockpits are locked.
If the pilot and co-pilot were too
ill to be able to fly, they may be
too ill to let you into the cockpit.
- Do they have a secret knock?
- That's a lovely thought.
- When they give them their lunch, they
have to get in. - Yes. - So they must
have a coded knock or something?
Like... "It's me.
"I've got your...
"I've got your lunch."
Something like that.
They go, "It must be the lunch."
Yes, it must be Deirdre
with the lunch. The lunches.
Why do I say "lunches"?
- Because there's more than one.
- But why is there more...?
LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE
- You are accruing points at
a fantastic rate.
- I tell you what...
- Why is there more than one lunch?
- They have to eat different meals.
- Yes, the pilot and the co-pilot
must eat different meals. - In case
one of them gets botulism? Exactly.
If one is by accident poisoned.
And in extra long-haul flights,
there are three pilots, not two.
So you can't get into the cockpit,
it's very dangerous, never been done.
If it was on autopilot, you'd be
able to fly level, but once you got
into the landing situation,
yes, the film scenario would take
over whereby you'd be told how to
operate the flaps and at what speed,
but there are so many variables in
terms of glide paths and vertical
and horizontal axes and so on,
it is extraordinarily difficult.
There is an auto-land system.
There's no way of flying it remotely
from the ground? Just somebody
with a Wii or something.
- I don't know. - Maybe one day.
Someone comes in the room.
"What? Oh!"
LAUGHTER
It's a horrifying thought,
but fortunately
it never has yet happened
in major commercial air travel.
They say the chances are one in ten
if it was an intelligent person
and the plane was on autopilot,
- they could be talked down, there is
a one in ten chance the plane
would survive the landing. - Right.
- If it was not on autopilot, probably
one in 100.
- This is not reassuring.
There are 400,000 people in the air
at any given time.
- Is that right? - Yeah.
- That's fabulous. Wow!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Very good!
There is no question
that trampolining
is a very popular sport.
- Yes! It sounded really plausible. - I
heard it once in a pub or something.
There are points if you can give me,
within five years,
when the autopilot was invented.
1965.
1965 we've got there.
- 1970. - 1970.
'77 to coincide with the Jubilee.
I'm going to go for 1945.
You're the closest, but
you're still miles away. It's 1914.
The first autopilot was used at the
Paris Air Show. An American invented
it. They were a huge success.
They had a big rubber band
on the joystick. "Look, no hands!
"It's flying itself!"
The gyroscope got so popular
they would have the pilots
standing on the wings.
- We've got a picture showing you
how impressive it could be. - People
were just crazy in those days.
That's when people went over Niagara
Falls in a barrel. They were mental!
Those were the days
of the barnstormers.
You wouldn't want to be ball boy.
But it's a surprisingly ancient
invention. It was the early days...
That's almost before aeroplanes
were invented. He probably had
this thing in his shed,
- hoping something would be invented
he could apply it to. - It was
a gyroscopic corrective mechanism.
Is the modern autopilot
still recognisably the same system?
- No, it's more complicated. - It's not
a gyroscope where you put string in
and wind it round to get it going?
One of the worrying things about
the autopilot is it's on for most
of the time you're in the plane.
They switch it off just before
they land. They switch it off
just as they take off...
They watch the telly,
then now and again they go
to that channel where the map is
to make sure they're heading
in the right direction.
Then they put Michelle Pfeiffer
back on.
There are long flights, but where
is the shortest commercial flight?
Do you know?
Oh, Bill!
I think I might know this.
I don't know. I'll try it.
I'll go out on a limb.
Is it the Orkney Isles?
- Yes! - Is it? - Yes!
APPLAUSE
Oh, Bill, well done!
- How many points?
- There's another 4.5 points(!)
- Yeah. - It's between... - 27 and a half,
I think you'll find.
- It's between Westray
and Westray Papa.
- Yeah.
It's usually done in around
two minutes, though the record is
58 seconds from take-off to landing.
Do you think people go,
"I hope it's a quick one today?"
The distance is shorter than
the runway of Edinburgh Airport.
Do they just take off,
throw peanuts at you and then land?
Run up to you and rush back again.
But the most bizarre thing about it
is a return ticket is ?39.
- It's not cheap.
- Why don't they build a bridge?
- I'm assuming there is some sort
of gorge to be got over.
- I assume there is too.
You get a certificate and
a miniature of Highland Park whisky
for doing the flight,
so maybe people just get off
on the idea of doing
the shortest flight in the world.
The sea's quite choppy round there,
so it's quite difficult...
It is a bit like that. They just do
the exits and... "Oh, here we are."
Well, there we are.
Ladies and gentlemen, we've arrived
at our first destination,
which is India.
Which of these two gentlemen is
going to make the better policeman?
One of them has seen the camera and
is about to arrest the photographer.
That seems to be what policemen do
nowadays, so I'll go with that one.
- Interesting. - And he's got a Biro.
- Yeah, the one with the pen.
Writing notes down.
The other one seems to be
more concerned with how he looks.
He's smiling, chatting away.
The other one's a bit more sober,
more professional.
I think it's the guy in white
behind them.
He's plain-clothes.
He's mingling in.
You've missed the one detail
that the state of Madhya Pradesh
will pay policemen an extra 30
rupees a month to grow a moustache.
- Really? - They consider that policemen
are better in all kinds of ways.
They're less intimidating, they work
better with the community, they're
more respected by the public.
- They're extraordinary... - The human
race never ceases to disappoint.
It's not just India. The British
had weird ideas about moustaches.
In India, they're considered a sign
of virility, but at the moment
there's a north-south divide.
In the north of India, it's rarer to
have moustaches because in Bollywood
and the cricket team, the great
heroes tend not to have moustaches,
but in Tamil cinema,
everybody has a moustache
and that is just considered...
It's Steve Wright in the Afternoon,
isn't it?
I've never trusted a moustache.
I'm completely the other way.
That's interesting because
in the British Army from 1860
it was a regulation that every
soldier had to have a moustache.
You could be imprisoned
for shaving your upper lip,
right up until the First World War,
- then you had the option
of shaving off your moustache.
- Why?
Why suddenly in the First World War?
"We're fighting total war.
The moustache, that was ridiculous."
Surely, if they think...if we need
moustaches, we need them more
than ever now. It should be beards.
They give you a certain...
Don't they?
Yeah? Yeah?
APPLAUSE
I think so.
But this "beh-h-h" sort
of moustache is...
APPLAUSE
Thank you. It's going to win a war,
isn't it?
But as you can see there,
that's typical British soldiers,
all of them with moustaches.
I'm just imagining that
that moustache is going to have
its own website by the end of this.
How long do you imagine the longest
moustache in the world might be?
24 feet.
- Well, that's a little bit too much.
- OK. 12.
- It's 14 feet. There it is. It's
pretty impressive, isn't it?
- Wow.
This man makes a living out of it.
LAUGHTER
He was in the film Octopussy.
I don't know what he did
with his moustache...
- But it's pretty impressive.
- Do you distrust him?
Deeply.
If he turned up to do
a bit of woodwork in the house
and he just...
"I'll measure 14 feet."
APPLAUSE
I'd naturally...
- You wouldn't want to stand
at a urinal.
- Oh...
- Oh, dear. - Trailing it around
on the floor?
He's wringing them out!
LAUGHTER
- Did... When you were children,
did you have Action Men toys?
- Yes.
If I was to show you a picture of
an Action Man toy, what could you
tell me about this particular one?
- Oh, Lord! - That's the adventurer.
Well, the adventurer just had
a polo neck and jeans and boots.
He seemed to be
kind of a one-man band.
- Yes, but this one is
a member of an armed service.
- Well, he'll be in the Navy.
Exactly, because it's only
in the Navy that you're allowed to
grow a beard.
Yes, yes.
And there are three jolly Jack Tars.
In the Disney Corporation, none
of the staff can have facial hair.
- Really? In Disney?
- Or earrings or anything.
There was a rather good story
about Disney some years ago.
There was a furious e-mail sent
out by the head of human resources,
or whatever,
to all Disney employees, and said,
"The Disney Corporation
takes strong exception to the use
by some employees
"of the phrase 'Mauschwitz'
to describe the Disney Corporation.
- "If it is used again, anyone using
it will be summarily fired."
- Shot!
Within half an hour,
they were using the phrase "Duckau".
I think it's very pleasing,
isn't it?
APPLAUSE
It's interesting they didn't, in any
way, see the irony of the fact
people had been using a term -
a sort of fascist term - to refer to
refer to their organisation.
- "Well, we'll put a stop to this!"
- Yes, I know! Exactly. Exactly!
You might like to see a picture of
some interesting moustaches there.
And I have actually... I have what
you might call moustachabilia.
These are real things used by people
with moustaches.
This is simply to drink.
It's a silver, beautifully made
thing you put in a cup
so that you can sip through here
without...
- Without staining your moustache.
- Keeps it out of it. - Nice and dry.
With soup, you'd want a soup spoon.
You just sip through that part.
So you take your soup like so
and you just...like that.
Again, I keep my moustache nice and
dry. What else have I got here?
They hadn't invented the straw
at this point?
Albert Finney had this
in Murder On The Orient Express.
At night this went round your ears.
Like that. Look at that.
LAUGHTER
Wh-What's that for, though?
- You say you want to keep your
moustache. Keep it from what?
- Escaping!
APPLAUSE
Wild creatures of the night?
I don't know.
- People might come and nibble at it.
- There's a slight air of gimp
about it. There is!
- Isn't there? - The odd thing is
that people using that spoon and
drink cover
are people who don't want
to look stupid. "I don't want
to look like a complete arse,
- "so excuse me while I get out
all my paraphernalia."
- It is true, what you are saying.
Oh, dear. I'm going to take
my moustache off now, cos it's
causing me rather a lot of pain.
Mm. Now, this is a question inspired
by the International Brigade,
who fought - as I'm sure you know -
on the republican side
in the Spanish Civil War.
Which of these is the odd one out?
- Machine gun. - Machine gun. - A tomato.
- It's a Vickers. - Vickers?
You asked which one is
the odd one out. They ALL are!
They're all the odd one out!
They kind of are, aren't they?
Well, there is
a misapprehension about jellyfish.
- If you're stung by a jellyfish, what
are you supposed to do? - Wee on it.
Yes. The odd thing is,
the jellyfish is the odd one out
cos it's the only one you're NOT
supposed to wee on.
- You're supposed to wee on a tomato?
- Yes.
Weeing on tomatoes is good,
and weeing on machine...
DAVID: I've never been stung by
a tomato. - Not for that reason.
If they'd known about the weeing
in the First World War, it could've
saved a lot of casualties!
Well, it DID, actually.
They did use them.
After the first wave on the Somme,
everyone's following
with their cocks out?
It's not quite like that.
There's a little more to it, David.
To get rid of the jellyfish first,
it's a fallacy to suggest that you
should pee on a jellyfish sting.
The best thing you can do is
sea water, which is likely to be
around anyway.
Sometimes, acid is better than...
But you can't be sure
unless you know the species.
But just leave it alone,
and use sea water. Tomatoes?
Well, the fact is, the world is
running out of phosphorus,
and human urine is an extremely good
fertiliser for tomatoes.
When you said "urinate on tomatoes",
I thought you meant
instead of salad dressing.
I agree -
it was a laxly phrased question.
We're quite happy to use animal
manure in order to grow things
and know that they grow well.
I know. That's weird, isn't it?
That's because I think we find -
and this may be
a function of our own self loathing.
- We find our own excrement more
disgusting than that of other
creatures. - Speak for yourself!
- What about the wee and the gun,
though? Why is... - Now, the gun...
- Now, what is the issue with machine
guns? - They kill you dead.
Dead, Stephen, dead.
- As a... We have here... - A gun?!
We have a gentleman
from the Royal Armouries - welcome.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
- Thank you very much.
- He's not going to wee on it, is he?!
We did ask if he would -
he declined.
He's left it unattended. Come on!
It's a mark one Vickers, 1917 model,
as used in the First World War.
Used by the British Army
all the way up to the Korean War.
A very, very popular form, but
the main problem for the operator
- aside from them getting jammed
occasionally - was overheating.
So they had a jacket,
- and they were water cooled. - Oh, OK.
But very often, of course,
you were fighting in places
where there was no water.
There's a jerry can - that's not
where the water comes from.
The water is poured into
a hole in the top,
and then it condenses and collects
in the jerry can. You then reuse it.
But in the Spanish Civil War,
the phrase "pass the piss" was used,
and they would actually
fill up jerry cans
and use human urine
to cool down the guns.
It was the only way of doing it -
there was no water.
- Oh, I see. - Must have been horrible
in the trenches -
- not only the risk of being shot,
but then, later,
a very nasty cup of tea. - Yes!
"Which jerry can did you use
for the...?"
Actually, Robert Graves, in his
great novel Goodbye To All That,
claims they used to make tea from
the water used in the machine guns.
- Yeah, yeah. Very unpleasant. - But
that's not necessarily...
- Pee water.
There's no shortage of water
in eastern France.
No, hence I was saying it was the
International Brigade, in particular
- the drier parts of La Mancha.
They probably made sangria out of it.
The Russians actually made a gun
with a hole in which to pee,
they were so used to the idea that
peeing into it would help.
They gave a little peehole so you
could pee straight into the gun.
So you could pee and...while you're
firing the gun.
I don't think...
Oh! Oh, that's good. Oh!
Oh, I needed that.
What a relief!
Well, there you are.
That's really the answer, I suppose.
The jellyfish is the odd one out,
because it's the only one that isn't
improved by being widdled upon.
Maybe we can ask our lovely Royal
Armouries friend to wheel away his
Vickers now. Thank you very much.
Now, what was Italy's
biggest export in the year 1953?
Er...frozen urine.
KLAXONS WAIL
- Urine? - Yes, urine. We know you, Bill
Bailey.
Would it be dried pasta?
KLAXON WAILS
Ooh, I'm sorry.
It came from a place called
Castelfidardo, and it's an object.
- It had thousands of parts but a very
complex mechanism.
- Jigsaw. Jigsaw!
In 1954, they were overtaken
by Fiat,
who then were the biggest
exporter from Italy with their cars,
but in the year 1953, amazingly,
it was this object that Italy
exported more than anything else.
- It was a musical instrument, Bill.
- Oh. Em, er... A hurdy-gurdy.
- No, an accordion. - An accordion is the
right answer!
- Yes. - There you are.
Rather extraordinary!
There you are - it's the Italian
town of Castelfidardo,
which still makes them to this very
day, and is proud to do so.
Mm. Now what did Mussolini
want Italians to eat
to make them big and strong?
He had a national propaganda day
for this foodstuff
and he wanted Italians
to take to it.
- Was it a vegetable? - Not quite.
- Nuts. - Not nuts, no.
- It's something Italians do eat.
They have a specialist dish.
- Polenta? - Very close.
- What's a great Italian dish, apart
from pasta? - Macaroni cheese.
- R... - Ravioli? - Ri...
- Risotto! - Which is made from...? - Rice.
- Rice, exactly.
And he wanted Italians off the habit
of eating pasta and onto rice.
- They didn't take kindly to this and
so here are some... - Paddy fields.
..Italian ladies growing rice.
- And singing while they do it.
- As they did it.
He had on his side the Futurists.
You probably know
about the Futurist movement.
- Not yet. - Like the Dadaists...
"Not yet". Very good!
Much too quick. That was brilliant.
The Futurists were an art movement
and they were pretty witty.
Filippo Tommaso Marinetti,
one of the great Futurists,
said pasta made Italians lethargic,
pessimistic and sentimental.
This caused outrage.
He opened his own restaurant
and had some extraordinary dishes.
Way ahead of Heston Blumenthal
and anybody like that.
My favourite one is Aerofood.
Pieces of olive, fennel and kumquat
eaten with the right hand,
while the left hand caresses
various pieces of sandpaper,
velvet and silk.
All the while, the diner is blasted
with a giant fan and sprayed
with the scent of carnation
to the music of Wagner.
LAUGHTER
Isn't that a dish?
I think somebody should have
the guts and the wit to open
a Futurist restaurant.
There was Chicken Fiat.
The chicken is roasted with
a handful of ball bearings inside.
When the flesh has fully absorbed
the flavour of the mild steel balls,
it is served with whipped cream.
And Excited Pig - a salami skinned
is cooked in strong espresso coffee,
flavoured with eau de cologne.
GROANS
Have you been to a motorway services?
- I quite like the idea of a chicken
that tastes a bit of metal. - Yes.
I love the idea of stroking something
while you're eating.
Have you ever been to one of those -
there's one in Berlin I went to -
restaurants where
it's completely dark?
All the waiters are blind,
and they lead you to your table,
they recite the menu to you,
and you order the food
and it's put in front of you.
You often use your fingers.
It concentrates you entirely
on the taste of the food.
I know it sounds a bit weird,
but it is a fantastic experience.
I'm not saying you should
go there every night.
The kitchen - chefs wandering around
with no fingers.
I get stressed in restaurants,
when the waiters don't
write down your order.
You know - "No, we're a cool
restaurant, we can remember it."
And you say, "Well, CAN you remember?
Are you sure?"
Because this is specifically
what I have to eat.
If I want to torture my mother,
which...
Then, it's a free country.
Do what you like, Wing Commander.
In a restaurant, she'll say,
"What are you going to have?"
You say, "I'm not telling you.
I'm going to tell the waiter."
- "No, tell me what you're going to
have." - "Waterboarding for you,
Mother."
There ARE people who cannot...
Who just can't bear it
unless they know what everyone
else is going to order.
So it does drive my mother slightly
potty not to tell her.
Now, as far as pasta is concerned,
what sort of sauces
fit what sort of pasta?
Do you think there's a rule
that you should apply?
The Italians have a kind of code,
that certain pastas hold more sauce,
so if it's a very strong flavour,
you want a pasta
like the little shell-shaped ones.
Anything hollow, they reckon
should have a tomatoey one,
because it's more liquid and
it fills the inside of the tube,
as well.
- They also don't have Parmesan on,
by any means, any of it. - They often
regard that as vulgar.
- And Bolognese is just for idiots.
- Yeah. 'Fraid so, yeah.
And the other major thing is that
we use about four times more sauce
on the pasta than
the Italians do.
They just basically coat
the pasta with the sauce.
The point is, though, they just have
pasta as one of many courses
in an elegant meal.
We say, "Oh, pasta's a great way of
getting the whole chore of feeding
ourselves over with,
"in one great stodgy go.
We'll have loads.
"I'll have a pile of it, until I just
can't face another mouthful."
Exactly. You're looking
at the cooking instructions.
"Serves what?"
APPLAUSE
"Serves four? Nah!
I'll double that, I think."
I regard myself, in some ways, as
a sophisticated being and, yet,
I'm not even ashamed of the fact
that I love spaghetti hoops on
toast. I just do!
That's what the Italians wouldn't
understand - the thing to do with
pasta is to put it on toast.
Is that what you do after a show?
Go home, get some spaghetti hoops,
heat them,
put the toast on, turn the lights
out, put the blindfold on...
My life! That's my life!
Moving to another country now,
which international head of state
snubbed Jesse Owens after
his triumph at the 1936 Olympics?
- Yes, Jack? - Hitler.
KLAXON SOUNDS
Oddly enough, it's not true.
It's what the whole world thinks.
And we know this from no greater
source than Jesse Owens himself.
It's a really rather sad and
very typically unfortunate story.
Jesse Owens won four gold medals
at the 1936 Berlin Olympics,
stage-managed, of course, by Hitler.
On the first day, Hitler
congratulated only German winners.
Someone said to him that he should
either congratulate all the winners
or none of them,
- so he said, "I won't congratulate
any winners." So he didn't
personally... - Look at the far right.
..he didn't personally
congratulate Jesse Owens.
LAUGHTER
Who are you looking at there?
The bloke on the far right
is just going like that.
That bloke on the far right
is called Hermann Goering.
LAUGHTER
- Surely they're all on the far right?
- Hey!
Wa-hey!
APPLAUSE
Brilliant!
They're all taking bets on how high
the high jump was going to go.
- "About there."
- The one on Hitler's left is
thinking, "I didn't get the memo."
How To Dress.
Well, no, it is rather sad.
Hitler decided that he wouldn't
congratulate anyone,
so he didn't snub Jesse Owens
at all. According to Jesse Owens,
"When I passed the Chancellor,
he arose, waved his hand at me
"and I waved back at him. Hitler
didn't snub me. It was..."
Who snubbed him?
- So Hitler wasn't such a bad guy
after all...
- The jury's still out.
- We know he's bad, but he didn't snub
Jesse Owens. - The King of England.
- No, FDR. - Bastard.
The President of his own country.
It's a terrible story here.
"The President didn't even send me
a telegram." He won four golds.
"When I came back to my native
country, I couldn't ride
in the front of the bus,
"I had to go to the back door,
I wasn't invited to the White House
to shake hands with the President."
He had to use the goods lift
at the Waldorf Astoria
to get into the reception
for returning US athletes
as he wasn't to use the front door.
- Sammy Davis Junior couldn't go in
the front of hotels in Vegas where
he was performing. - Astonishing.
- He went in through the kitchen.
- I know. That still happens
to me sometimes.
Moving on elsewhere again,
where does the rainwater
that falls into this creek go?
It's in Wyoming, I should say.
FANFARE
- 'Nobody knows!' - You're right!
CHEERING
Well done!
All right!
You're very good at this.
As you probably know,
round about the Rockies
there is the Continental Divide
and rainwater that falls on one side
drains into the Pacific,
the other to the Atlantic,
but in this particular place...
LAUGHTER
Nobody knows.
- It's called North Two Ocean Creek
in Wyoming. - It's a big one.
LAUGHTER
Nobody, as you rightly say, knows.
And there it is.
Now fasten your seatbelts
as we head into a spot
of unexpected general ignorance.
Name the world's largest pyramid.
Don't know the name of any.
That one in the middle.
LAUGHTER
KLAXON
Oh, Jack! I'm so sorry.
- Am I really that predictable? - I'm
afraid you are. Terrible thought.
Well, well, I don't know.
I'm going to say something
that will be wrong, like Giza.
Well, that's where we're looking.
- The three great pyramids of Giza.
- It's not an Aztec one, is it?
Yes, it is.
I don't expect you to know its name.
If you did, you'd get 40 points.
I don't know its name,
but I'll spit out some consonants!
- It's called Cholula.
- Ah, Cholula!
- It was on the tip of my tongue.
- It's not Opl-lopl-opl...?
- No, it's not Popocatepetl.
It's Cholula. Although it's got
a flat top and it's not as high,
its cubic capacity is much bigger.
It's 4.3 million cubic yards
as opposed to Khufu or Cheops' 3.36.
- It's not actually a pyramid.
- According to archaeologists,
that qualifies as a pyramid.
There is a word for a pyramid
with a flat top.
Unfinished.
LAUGHTER
APPLAUSE
It's on the sign.
"Due for completion
early BC497."
It's called a frustum.
Name the world's fattest country.
Or the country
with the fattest citizens.
- Cos otherwise I'd say it
would be Russia. - No. - Tonga.
- Not Tonga. No. - Fiji.
No, but you're absolutely in the
right area, you've correctly...
- Vanuatu. - No, you're abso...
- You're so... Oh! - The Cook Islands.
- So close to round there. - Fiji.
It begins with N.
Nnnn...
Nyuh!
Nnn-not Tonga.
Nauru.
Near Tonga.
North Tonga!
Nnn-never Tonga.
Is it Nauru?
Now! Exactly, yes.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
In your face!
It only has a population
of 10,000 people,
but 97% of the men are obese
or overweight and 93% of women
are obese or overweight.
- I remember they had a one-man Olympic
team and he was in the weightlifting.
- Yes.
They get rather upset at being
called obese and they say
they're a stocky people
- and... - Big boned.
Big boned, exactly. Exactly.
- It's their metabolism.
- Well, I'm afraid the fact is,
you can't really put on weight,
as I know to my cost,
unless you put things in your mouth.
That's where it comes from.
When was the First World War
first named as such?
The outbreak. The assassination
of Archduke Ferdinand.
- You think it was straightaway?
- Before it started.
It would be an act of a pessimist
to call it that early.
- It's going to be some point
after 1939, isn't it?
- A realist, surely.
"There's going to be more of these."
KLAXON
Excuse me! I think what I said,
people in the box,
is AFTER 1939,
which may contain 1939,
but does not mean it.
KLAXON
OK... No, no, no.
I think
"After 1939" and "After the Second
World War" are not synonymous.
This is just giving you time to type
"After 1939".
KLAXON
Oh...
Why not just type,
"Mitchell is a cock"?
I wouldn't put it past them!
LAUGHTER
No, the surprising news is
that it was in 1918 that it was
first called the First World War.
A British officer,
Lt Col Charles a Court Repington,
recorded in his diary for 10th
September that he met Major
Johnstone of Harvard University
to discuss what to call the war.
Repington said to call it
The War was no good.
- That War? - To call it the German War
gave too much credit to the Boche.
"I suggested the World War,"
Repington said, "Finally, we agreed
to call it the First World War
"to prevent the millennium folk
from forgetting that the history of
the world was the history of war."
In 1920 he published a book called
The First World War, 1914-18.
- Wasn't it called The Great War?
- Yes, but there was another Great War
before that. Do you know it?
- Napoleonic War? - Napoleonic, yes.
So wars do change their names.
There you are.
Supplementary
on this international question,
why did the colonels in
chief of the Royal Dragoons
and the 1st King's Dragoon Guards
fail to turn up for duty
at the start of the First World War?
They were entwined in an embrace.
- Only now can we reveal the truth.
- It was one of those embarrassing
things about... Oh, I know! - Yes?
Because it was Kaiser Bill.
Yes. Kaiser Bill was in fact
the colonel in chief
of the Royal Dragoons,
and Franz Joseph Habsburg
was the colonel in chief
of the King's Dragoons,
- so... - That's a security risk, that.
- It was a bit, wasn't it?
If it turned out that Osama bin Laden
was actually an admiral of the fleet,
that would have been a nightmare.
We appointed Emperor Hirohito
a field marshal in the 1930s though,
so we carried on doing this.
There was a bit of embarrassment
when they had to go to war
with their colonel in chief.
It was eventually sorted out,
and we pretty much
spanked their botties.
We pretty much did.
- So... - Only four years of carnage.
- Yes. Quite.
And lastly,
on the international journey
that we've been enjoying,
who invented this salute?
- The Scouts. - The Scouts, no.
Is this a kind of "who were
the first fascists" question?
Not really, no.
Who actually used this
as a salute first, do we know?
Oh! Was it a Roman?
Ah... No.
KLAXON
Unfortunately not.
It was basically the French
Classical artists, notably David,
- the leading French Classical artist,
who...
- Artists have a salute?!
They painted Romans doing this,
but there is no evidence
in Roman literature, murals or art
- that Romans ever did this as a
salute.
- They're bound to have done.
- At some point, I mean...
- They might have put their arms out,
but it wasn't used as a salute.
It just became a common idea
that they did this.
And so it then became very much
a symbol of the Olympic movement,
it was the Olympic salute,
until 1936.
Um, and also, American school
children when they took the Oath
Of Allegiance they did that.
- And then again, once it became
a fascist salute...
- Now they do...
It's a strange thought that the Nazi
salute was in fact American school
children and Olympic athletes
who first used it. There you are,
wasn't invented by the Nazis at all.
And with that we reach
our final destination. Please
remain seated for the scores.
My goodness, me.
Well, I'm afraid very much
in the bucket class,
with minus 44, is David Mitchell!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Standing room only at the back.
With minus 27 it's Jack Dee!
APPLAUSE
- With a surprising amount of leg
room, at minus 10, Alan Davies!
- Thank you.
Which means...
that tonight's First Class passenger
with four points is Bill Bailey!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
So thank you for flying with
QI International. My cabin crew,
David, Jack, Bill and Alan, and I
wish you a pleasant onward journey.
And don't forget the wise words
of Halvard Lange, PM of Norway,
who said, "We do not regard
Englishmen as foreigners. We look
on them as rather mad Norwegians."
Good night.
Hello. Good evening, good evening,
good evening, good evening,
good evening, good evening.
Good evening, ladies and gentlemen.
This is Captain Fry speaking
in, I hope, a very reassuring tone,
welcoming you aboard
this QI international,
around-the-world trip.
We have an impressive roster of VIP
passengers on board with us tonight.
International man of mystery
Jack Dee.
APPLAUSE
Global phenomenon Bill Bailey.
APPLAUSE
Seasoned world traveller
David Mitchell.
APPLAUSE
And from another planet entirely,
Alan Davies.
APPLAUSE
And gentlemen, if at any time
you wish to get my attention, don't
hesitate to use your call buttons.
Jack goes...
'Icelandair to Inverness, Gate B.'
LAUGHTER
Bill goes...
'Iran Air to Istanbul, last call.'
David goes...
'Air India to Islamabad now closing.'
And Alan goes...
'Unexpected item
in the bagging area.'
LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE
- Very good. - Oh, yeah.
Good. If you make sure that all your
seats are in an upright position,
we are cleared for take-off.
Don't forget that this year
we are celebrating our ignorance
with the Nobody Knows Round.
FANFARE
'Nobody knows.'
If you think that nobody knows
the answer to that question,
then you can wave your "nobody"
and you get a big bonus.
But if you wave it and you're wrong,
you get a bit of an old forfeit.
What are the points that
you can gain by using it correctly?
I think we all agree that nobody
in this universe understands
QI's scoring system.
So, by that logic, were we to raise
the subject of the scoring system
and I was to do that, then...
A-ha!
APPLAUSE
- Nobody knows. - Nobody knows.
- He's made a very good point.
- It's a good point.
I suppose I'm trapped
in an infinite loop.
- Yes. Fortunately, that isn't
one of the questions.
- Ah.
If it were, in the hypothetical
round, a question, "What is
the QI scoring system?",
and nobody knows, what would happen
to the person that DOES
the QI scoring?
Would they not then feel
rather sad?
- They would. - They, at least,
presumably, are sitting there
THINKING that they know.
His name's Colin. He is
brilliant. He works for Lumina,
the scoring-system people,
and HE knows what he's doing.
But it is a bit of a puzzle
to the rest of the world.
- There's a company out there
responsible for the scoring system
on this programme? - That's right.
For nine years we've used them,
and I think they've served us proud.
- What happened before then?
- Served themselves!
- They must be laughing all the way.
- What a good scam, Colin!
I think they also do
Pointless and Eggheads,
and other things like that.
- I think they reserve a lot of
their creativity for this show,
don't they? - Yes, I know!
- I wonder what the score is now.
- Yes, the score now...
Amazingly, Bill has three
and everyone else has zero.
APPLAUSE
Why three?
I either thought one or ten,
but three?
- How could you divide your
contribution by three? - Better than
you, you, you. Three!
APPLAUSE
Let's get going, shall we?
Now, if by some terrible, terrible
concatenation of circumstances,
both my co-pilot and I on
this flight are suddenly taken ill,
how would you land this plane?
Can't they just land themselves?
I'd stop reading the Kindle on
the steering wheel and concentrate.
LAUGHTER
That would be a wise start, yes.
- Don't you radio the...? The co-pilot
is slumped normally in these
situations. - Someone talks you in.
- Somebody talks you in?
- That's what happens in the movies.
- Robert Duvall would probably be
good. That's who I'd ring. - Or Lloyd
Bridges in the case of Airplane.
- Perfect choice.
- Presumably, there are legal problems
with someone talking you down
because you could sue if it was
interpreted by your relatives
that you were given bad advice.
So probably these days,
the air traffic controller would
refuse to give advice and say,
"We're not covered
for my saying something..."
You'd have to sign a waiver
and text it to them, then insurance
would cover you to be talked down.
It is a minefield. Extraordinarily,
and happily, it has never occurred
in commercial airline travel history
that someone has gone, "Can anyone
fly this plane because the pilot
and co-pilot are ill or dead?"
It's never happened, but
it would be fraught with difficulty.
They have tried various simulations.
For example, those with American
civil private pilot licences
in America who can fly light planes
were invited on to simulators
of big jets.
One of them couldn't even operate
the seat that moved him
towards the control.
Another one turned the radio off.
Another one turned off the autopilot
and instantly crashed the plane.
The fact is
it's incredibly difficult.
Stephen, am I allowed to say
that in your uniform how incredibly
unlike a pilot you look?
So what do I look like instead?
Be brutal, be frank.
I think you'd be the chap
who calls himself the bursar.
He's got a big leather wallet
and takes money for duty-free.
Yeah, CALLS himself the bursar.
- He calls himself the bursar? - Yes,
I think he does.
- Or the purser?
- The bursar is the one that does the
money for... - Public schools. - Yeah.
What kind of plane is he flying on?
LAUGHTER
"The bursar will be collecting money
for the end-of-term jamboree."
"Here on Charterhouse Air..."
The bursar with the trolley and then,
with the drinks, the groundsman.
Anyway, the fact is it's fraught
with difficulty. The first problem
is simply getting into the cockpit
because since 9/11, of course,
cockpits are locked.
If the pilot and co-pilot were too
ill to be able to fly, they may be
too ill to let you into the cockpit.
- Do they have a secret knock?
- That's a lovely thought.
- When they give them their lunch, they
have to get in. - Yes. - So they must
have a coded knock or something?
Like... "It's me.
"I've got your...
"I've got your lunch."
Something like that.
They go, "It must be the lunch."
Yes, it must be Deirdre
with the lunch. The lunches.
Why do I say "lunches"?
- Because there's more than one.
- But why is there more...?
LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE
- You are accruing points at
a fantastic rate.
- I tell you what...
- Why is there more than one lunch?
- They have to eat different meals.
- Yes, the pilot and the co-pilot
must eat different meals. - In case
one of them gets botulism? Exactly.
If one is by accident poisoned.
And in extra long-haul flights,
there are three pilots, not two.
So you can't get into the cockpit,
it's very dangerous, never been done.
If it was on autopilot, you'd be
able to fly level, but once you got
into the landing situation,
yes, the film scenario would take
over whereby you'd be told how to
operate the flaps and at what speed,
but there are so many variables in
terms of glide paths and vertical
and horizontal axes and so on,
it is extraordinarily difficult.
There is an auto-land system.
There's no way of flying it remotely
from the ground? Just somebody
with a Wii or something.
- I don't know. - Maybe one day.
Someone comes in the room.
"What? Oh!"
LAUGHTER
It's a horrifying thought,
but fortunately
it never has yet happened
in major commercial air travel.
They say the chances are one in ten
if it was an intelligent person
and the plane was on autopilot,
- they could be talked down, there is
a one in ten chance the plane
would survive the landing. - Right.
- If it was not on autopilot, probably
one in 100.
- This is not reassuring.
There are 400,000 people in the air
at any given time.
- Is that right? - Yeah.
- That's fabulous. Wow!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Very good!
There is no question
that trampolining
is a very popular sport.
- Yes! It sounded really plausible. - I
heard it once in a pub or something.
There are points if you can give me,
within five years,
when the autopilot was invented.
1965.
1965 we've got there.
- 1970. - 1970.
'77 to coincide with the Jubilee.
I'm going to go for 1945.
You're the closest, but
you're still miles away. It's 1914.
The first autopilot was used at the
Paris Air Show. An American invented
it. They were a huge success.
They had a big rubber band
on the joystick. "Look, no hands!
"It's flying itself!"
The gyroscope got so popular
they would have the pilots
standing on the wings.
- We've got a picture showing you
how impressive it could be. - People
were just crazy in those days.
That's when people went over Niagara
Falls in a barrel. They were mental!
Those were the days
of the barnstormers.
You wouldn't want to be ball boy.
But it's a surprisingly ancient
invention. It was the early days...
That's almost before aeroplanes
were invented. He probably had
this thing in his shed,
- hoping something would be invented
he could apply it to. - It was
a gyroscopic corrective mechanism.
Is the modern autopilot
still recognisably the same system?
- No, it's more complicated. - It's not
a gyroscope where you put string in
and wind it round to get it going?
One of the worrying things about
the autopilot is it's on for most
of the time you're in the plane.
They switch it off just before
they land. They switch it off
just as they take off...
They watch the telly,
then now and again they go
to that channel where the map is
to make sure they're heading
in the right direction.
Then they put Michelle Pfeiffer
back on.
There are long flights, but where
is the shortest commercial flight?
Do you know?
Oh, Bill!
I think I might know this.
I don't know. I'll try it.
I'll go out on a limb.
Is it the Orkney Isles?
- Yes! - Is it? - Yes!
APPLAUSE
Oh, Bill, well done!
- How many points?
- There's another 4.5 points(!)
- Yeah. - It's between... - 27 and a half,
I think you'll find.
- It's between Westray
and Westray Papa.
- Yeah.
It's usually done in around
two minutes, though the record is
58 seconds from take-off to landing.
Do you think people go,
"I hope it's a quick one today?"
The distance is shorter than
the runway of Edinburgh Airport.
Do they just take off,
throw peanuts at you and then land?
Run up to you and rush back again.
But the most bizarre thing about it
is a return ticket is ?39.
- It's not cheap.
- Why don't they build a bridge?
- I'm assuming there is some sort
of gorge to be got over.
- I assume there is too.
You get a certificate and
a miniature of Highland Park whisky
for doing the flight,
so maybe people just get off
on the idea of doing
the shortest flight in the world.
The sea's quite choppy round there,
so it's quite difficult...
It is a bit like that. They just do
the exits and... "Oh, here we are."
Well, there we are.
Ladies and gentlemen, we've arrived
at our first destination,
which is India.
Which of these two gentlemen is
going to make the better policeman?
One of them has seen the camera and
is about to arrest the photographer.
That seems to be what policemen do
nowadays, so I'll go with that one.
- Interesting. - And he's got a Biro.
- Yeah, the one with the pen.
Writing notes down.
The other one seems to be
more concerned with how he looks.
He's smiling, chatting away.
The other one's a bit more sober,
more professional.
I think it's the guy in white
behind them.
He's plain-clothes.
He's mingling in.
You've missed the one detail
that the state of Madhya Pradesh
will pay policemen an extra 30
rupees a month to grow a moustache.
- Really? - They consider that policemen
are better in all kinds of ways.
They're less intimidating, they work
better with the community, they're
more respected by the public.
- They're extraordinary... - The human
race never ceases to disappoint.
It's not just India. The British
had weird ideas about moustaches.
In India, they're considered a sign
of virility, but at the moment
there's a north-south divide.
In the north of India, it's rarer to
have moustaches because in Bollywood
and the cricket team, the great
heroes tend not to have moustaches,
but in Tamil cinema,
everybody has a moustache
and that is just considered...
It's Steve Wright in the Afternoon,
isn't it?
I've never trusted a moustache.
I'm completely the other way.
That's interesting because
in the British Army from 1860
it was a regulation that every
soldier had to have a moustache.
You could be imprisoned
for shaving your upper lip,
right up until the First World War,
- then you had the option
of shaving off your moustache.
- Why?
Why suddenly in the First World War?
"We're fighting total war.
The moustache, that was ridiculous."
Surely, if they think...if we need
moustaches, we need them more
than ever now. It should be beards.
They give you a certain...
Don't they?
Yeah? Yeah?
APPLAUSE
I think so.
But this "beh-h-h" sort
of moustache is...
APPLAUSE
Thank you. It's going to win a war,
isn't it?
But as you can see there,
that's typical British soldiers,
all of them with moustaches.
I'm just imagining that
that moustache is going to have
its own website by the end of this.
How long do you imagine the longest
moustache in the world might be?
24 feet.
- Well, that's a little bit too much.
- OK. 12.
- It's 14 feet. There it is. It's
pretty impressive, isn't it?
- Wow.
This man makes a living out of it.
LAUGHTER
He was in the film Octopussy.
I don't know what he did
with his moustache...
- But it's pretty impressive.
- Do you distrust him?
Deeply.
If he turned up to do
a bit of woodwork in the house
and he just...
"I'll measure 14 feet."
APPLAUSE
I'd naturally...
- You wouldn't want to stand
at a urinal.
- Oh...
- Oh, dear. - Trailing it around
on the floor?
He's wringing them out!
LAUGHTER
- Did... When you were children,
did you have Action Men toys?
- Yes.
If I was to show you a picture of
an Action Man toy, what could you
tell me about this particular one?
- Oh, Lord! - That's the adventurer.
Well, the adventurer just had
a polo neck and jeans and boots.
He seemed to be
kind of a one-man band.
- Yes, but this one is
a member of an armed service.
- Well, he'll be in the Navy.
Exactly, because it's only
in the Navy that you're allowed to
grow a beard.
Yes, yes.
And there are three jolly Jack Tars.
In the Disney Corporation, none
of the staff can have facial hair.
- Really? In Disney?
- Or earrings or anything.
There was a rather good story
about Disney some years ago.
There was a furious e-mail sent
out by the head of human resources,
or whatever,
to all Disney employees, and said,
"The Disney Corporation
takes strong exception to the use
by some employees
"of the phrase 'Mauschwitz'
to describe the Disney Corporation.
- "If it is used again, anyone using
it will be summarily fired."
- Shot!
Within half an hour,
they were using the phrase "Duckau".
I think it's very pleasing,
isn't it?
APPLAUSE
It's interesting they didn't, in any
way, see the irony of the fact
people had been using a term -
a sort of fascist term - to refer to
refer to their organisation.
- "Well, we'll put a stop to this!"
- Yes, I know! Exactly. Exactly!
You might like to see a picture of
some interesting moustaches there.
And I have actually... I have what
you might call moustachabilia.
These are real things used by people
with moustaches.
This is simply to drink.
It's a silver, beautifully made
thing you put in a cup
so that you can sip through here
without...
- Without staining your moustache.
- Keeps it out of it. - Nice and dry.
With soup, you'd want a soup spoon.
You just sip through that part.
So you take your soup like so
and you just...like that.
Again, I keep my moustache nice and
dry. What else have I got here?
They hadn't invented the straw
at this point?
Albert Finney had this
in Murder On The Orient Express.
At night this went round your ears.
Like that. Look at that.
LAUGHTER
Wh-What's that for, though?
- You say you want to keep your
moustache. Keep it from what?
- Escaping!
APPLAUSE
Wild creatures of the night?
I don't know.
- People might come and nibble at it.
- There's a slight air of gimp
about it. There is!
- Isn't there? - The odd thing is
that people using that spoon and
drink cover
are people who don't want
to look stupid. "I don't want
to look like a complete arse,
- "so excuse me while I get out
all my paraphernalia."
- It is true, what you are saying.
Oh, dear. I'm going to take
my moustache off now, cos it's
causing me rather a lot of pain.
Mm. Now, this is a question inspired
by the International Brigade,
who fought - as I'm sure you know -
on the republican side
in the Spanish Civil War.
Which of these is the odd one out?
- Machine gun. - Machine gun. - A tomato.
- It's a Vickers. - Vickers?
You asked which one is
the odd one out. They ALL are!
They're all the odd one out!
They kind of are, aren't they?
Well, there is
a misapprehension about jellyfish.
- If you're stung by a jellyfish, what
are you supposed to do? - Wee on it.
Yes. The odd thing is,
the jellyfish is the odd one out
cos it's the only one you're NOT
supposed to wee on.
- You're supposed to wee on a tomato?
- Yes.
Weeing on tomatoes is good,
and weeing on machine...
DAVID: I've never been stung by
a tomato. - Not for that reason.
If they'd known about the weeing
in the First World War, it could've
saved a lot of casualties!
Well, it DID, actually.
They did use them.
After the first wave on the Somme,
everyone's following
with their cocks out?
It's not quite like that.
There's a little more to it, David.
To get rid of the jellyfish first,
it's a fallacy to suggest that you
should pee on a jellyfish sting.
The best thing you can do is
sea water, which is likely to be
around anyway.
Sometimes, acid is better than...
But you can't be sure
unless you know the species.
But just leave it alone,
and use sea water. Tomatoes?
Well, the fact is, the world is
running out of phosphorus,
and human urine is an extremely good
fertiliser for tomatoes.
When you said "urinate on tomatoes",
I thought you meant
instead of salad dressing.
I agree -
it was a laxly phrased question.
We're quite happy to use animal
manure in order to grow things
and know that they grow well.
I know. That's weird, isn't it?
That's because I think we find -
and this may be
a function of our own self loathing.
- We find our own excrement more
disgusting than that of other
creatures. - Speak for yourself!
- What about the wee and the gun,
though? Why is... - Now, the gun...
- Now, what is the issue with machine
guns? - They kill you dead.
Dead, Stephen, dead.
- As a... We have here... - A gun?!
We have a gentleman
from the Royal Armouries - welcome.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
- Thank you very much.
- He's not going to wee on it, is he?!
We did ask if he would -
he declined.
He's left it unattended. Come on!
It's a mark one Vickers, 1917 model,
as used in the First World War.
Used by the British Army
all the way up to the Korean War.
A very, very popular form, but
the main problem for the operator
- aside from them getting jammed
occasionally - was overheating.
So they had a jacket,
- and they were water cooled. - Oh, OK.
But very often, of course,
you were fighting in places
where there was no water.
There's a jerry can - that's not
where the water comes from.
The water is poured into
a hole in the top,
and then it condenses and collects
in the jerry can. You then reuse it.
But in the Spanish Civil War,
the phrase "pass the piss" was used,
and they would actually
fill up jerry cans
and use human urine
to cool down the guns.
It was the only way of doing it -
there was no water.
- Oh, I see. - Must have been horrible
in the trenches -
- not only the risk of being shot,
but then, later,
a very nasty cup of tea. - Yes!
"Which jerry can did you use
for the...?"
Actually, Robert Graves, in his
great novel Goodbye To All That,
claims they used to make tea from
the water used in the machine guns.
- Yeah, yeah. Very unpleasant. - But
that's not necessarily...
- Pee water.
There's no shortage of water
in eastern France.
No, hence I was saying it was the
International Brigade, in particular
- the drier parts of La Mancha.
They probably made sangria out of it.
The Russians actually made a gun
with a hole in which to pee,
they were so used to the idea that
peeing into it would help.
They gave a little peehole so you
could pee straight into the gun.
So you could pee and...while you're
firing the gun.
I don't think...
Oh! Oh, that's good. Oh!
Oh, I needed that.
What a relief!
Well, there you are.
That's really the answer, I suppose.
The jellyfish is the odd one out,
because it's the only one that isn't
improved by being widdled upon.
Maybe we can ask our lovely Royal
Armouries friend to wheel away his
Vickers now. Thank you very much.
Now, what was Italy's
biggest export in the year 1953?
Er...frozen urine.
KLAXONS WAIL
- Urine? - Yes, urine. We know you, Bill
Bailey.
Would it be dried pasta?
KLAXON WAILS
Ooh, I'm sorry.
It came from a place called
Castelfidardo, and it's an object.
- It had thousands of parts but a very
complex mechanism.
- Jigsaw. Jigsaw!
In 1954, they were overtaken
by Fiat,
who then were the biggest
exporter from Italy with their cars,
but in the year 1953, amazingly,
it was this object that Italy
exported more than anything else.
- It was a musical instrument, Bill.
- Oh. Em, er... A hurdy-gurdy.
- No, an accordion. - An accordion is the
right answer!
- Yes. - There you are.
Rather extraordinary!
There you are - it's the Italian
town of Castelfidardo,
which still makes them to this very
day, and is proud to do so.
Mm. Now what did Mussolini
want Italians to eat
to make them big and strong?
He had a national propaganda day
for this foodstuff
and he wanted Italians
to take to it.
- Was it a vegetable? - Not quite.
- Nuts. - Not nuts, no.
- It's something Italians do eat.
They have a specialist dish.
- Polenta? - Very close.
- What's a great Italian dish, apart
from pasta? - Macaroni cheese.
- R... - Ravioli? - Ri...
- Risotto! - Which is made from...? - Rice.
- Rice, exactly.
And he wanted Italians off the habit
of eating pasta and onto rice.
- They didn't take kindly to this and
so here are some... - Paddy fields.
..Italian ladies growing rice.
- And singing while they do it.
- As they did it.
He had on his side the Futurists.
You probably know
about the Futurist movement.
- Not yet. - Like the Dadaists...
"Not yet". Very good!
Much too quick. That was brilliant.
The Futurists were an art movement
and they were pretty witty.
Filippo Tommaso Marinetti,
one of the great Futurists,
said pasta made Italians lethargic,
pessimistic and sentimental.
This caused outrage.
He opened his own restaurant
and had some extraordinary dishes.
Way ahead of Heston Blumenthal
and anybody like that.
My favourite one is Aerofood.
Pieces of olive, fennel and kumquat
eaten with the right hand,
while the left hand caresses
various pieces of sandpaper,
velvet and silk.
All the while, the diner is blasted
with a giant fan and sprayed
with the scent of carnation
to the music of Wagner.
LAUGHTER
Isn't that a dish?
I think somebody should have
the guts and the wit to open
a Futurist restaurant.
There was Chicken Fiat.
The chicken is roasted with
a handful of ball bearings inside.
When the flesh has fully absorbed
the flavour of the mild steel balls,
it is served with whipped cream.
And Excited Pig - a salami skinned
is cooked in strong espresso coffee,
flavoured with eau de cologne.
GROANS
Have you been to a motorway services?
- I quite like the idea of a chicken
that tastes a bit of metal. - Yes.
I love the idea of stroking something
while you're eating.
Have you ever been to one of those -
there's one in Berlin I went to -
restaurants where
it's completely dark?
All the waiters are blind,
and they lead you to your table,
they recite the menu to you,
and you order the food
and it's put in front of you.
You often use your fingers.
It concentrates you entirely
on the taste of the food.
I know it sounds a bit weird,
but it is a fantastic experience.
I'm not saying you should
go there every night.
The kitchen - chefs wandering around
with no fingers.
I get stressed in restaurants,
when the waiters don't
write down your order.
You know - "No, we're a cool
restaurant, we can remember it."
And you say, "Well, CAN you remember?
Are you sure?"
Because this is specifically
what I have to eat.
If I want to torture my mother,
which...
Then, it's a free country.
Do what you like, Wing Commander.
In a restaurant, she'll say,
"What are you going to have?"
You say, "I'm not telling you.
I'm going to tell the waiter."
- "No, tell me what you're going to
have." - "Waterboarding for you,
Mother."
There ARE people who cannot...
Who just can't bear it
unless they know what everyone
else is going to order.
So it does drive my mother slightly
potty not to tell her.
Now, as far as pasta is concerned,
what sort of sauces
fit what sort of pasta?
Do you think there's a rule
that you should apply?
The Italians have a kind of code,
that certain pastas hold more sauce,
so if it's a very strong flavour,
you want a pasta
like the little shell-shaped ones.
Anything hollow, they reckon
should have a tomatoey one,
because it's more liquid and
it fills the inside of the tube,
as well.
- They also don't have Parmesan on,
by any means, any of it. - They often
regard that as vulgar.
- And Bolognese is just for idiots.
- Yeah. 'Fraid so, yeah.
And the other major thing is that
we use about four times more sauce
on the pasta than
the Italians do.
They just basically coat
the pasta with the sauce.
The point is, though, they just have
pasta as one of many courses
in an elegant meal.
We say, "Oh, pasta's a great way of
getting the whole chore of feeding
ourselves over with,
"in one great stodgy go.
We'll have loads.
"I'll have a pile of it, until I just
can't face another mouthful."
Exactly. You're looking
at the cooking instructions.
"Serves what?"
APPLAUSE
"Serves four? Nah!
I'll double that, I think."
I regard myself, in some ways, as
a sophisticated being and, yet,
I'm not even ashamed of the fact
that I love spaghetti hoops on
toast. I just do!
That's what the Italians wouldn't
understand - the thing to do with
pasta is to put it on toast.
Is that what you do after a show?
Go home, get some spaghetti hoops,
heat them,
put the toast on, turn the lights
out, put the blindfold on...
My life! That's my life!
Moving to another country now,
which international head of state
snubbed Jesse Owens after
his triumph at the 1936 Olympics?
- Yes, Jack? - Hitler.
KLAXON SOUNDS
Oddly enough, it's not true.
It's what the whole world thinks.
And we know this from no greater
source than Jesse Owens himself.
It's a really rather sad and
very typically unfortunate story.
Jesse Owens won four gold medals
at the 1936 Berlin Olympics,
stage-managed, of course, by Hitler.
On the first day, Hitler
congratulated only German winners.
Someone said to him that he should
either congratulate all the winners
or none of them,
- so he said, "I won't congratulate
any winners." So he didn't
personally... - Look at the far right.
..he didn't personally
congratulate Jesse Owens.
LAUGHTER
Who are you looking at there?
The bloke on the far right
is just going like that.
That bloke on the far right
is called Hermann Goering.
LAUGHTER
- Surely they're all on the far right?
- Hey!
Wa-hey!
APPLAUSE
Brilliant!
They're all taking bets on how high
the high jump was going to go.
- "About there."
- The one on Hitler's left is
thinking, "I didn't get the memo."
How To Dress.
Well, no, it is rather sad.
Hitler decided that he wouldn't
congratulate anyone,
so he didn't snub Jesse Owens
at all. According to Jesse Owens,
"When I passed the Chancellor,
he arose, waved his hand at me
"and I waved back at him. Hitler
didn't snub me. It was..."
Who snubbed him?
- So Hitler wasn't such a bad guy
after all...
- The jury's still out.
- We know he's bad, but he didn't snub
Jesse Owens. - The King of England.
- No, FDR. - Bastard.
The President of his own country.
It's a terrible story here.
"The President didn't even send me
a telegram." He won four golds.
"When I came back to my native
country, I couldn't ride
in the front of the bus,
"I had to go to the back door,
I wasn't invited to the White House
to shake hands with the President."
He had to use the goods lift
at the Waldorf Astoria
to get into the reception
for returning US athletes
as he wasn't to use the front door.
- Sammy Davis Junior couldn't go in
the front of hotels in Vegas where
he was performing. - Astonishing.
- He went in through the kitchen.
- I know. That still happens
to me sometimes.
Moving on elsewhere again,
where does the rainwater
that falls into this creek go?
It's in Wyoming, I should say.
FANFARE
- 'Nobody knows!' - You're right!
CHEERING
Well done!
All right!
You're very good at this.
As you probably know,
round about the Rockies
there is the Continental Divide
and rainwater that falls on one side
drains into the Pacific,
the other to the Atlantic,
but in this particular place...
LAUGHTER
Nobody knows.
- It's called North Two Ocean Creek
in Wyoming. - It's a big one.
LAUGHTER
Nobody, as you rightly say, knows.
And there it is.
Now fasten your seatbelts
as we head into a spot
of unexpected general ignorance.
Name the world's largest pyramid.
Don't know the name of any.
That one in the middle.
LAUGHTER
KLAXON
Oh, Jack! I'm so sorry.
- Am I really that predictable? - I'm
afraid you are. Terrible thought.
Well, well, I don't know.
I'm going to say something
that will be wrong, like Giza.
Well, that's where we're looking.
- The three great pyramids of Giza.
- It's not an Aztec one, is it?
Yes, it is.
I don't expect you to know its name.
If you did, you'd get 40 points.
I don't know its name,
but I'll spit out some consonants!
- It's called Cholula.
- Ah, Cholula!
- It was on the tip of my tongue.
- It's not Opl-lopl-opl...?
- No, it's not Popocatepetl.
It's Cholula. Although it's got
a flat top and it's not as high,
its cubic capacity is much bigger.
It's 4.3 million cubic yards
as opposed to Khufu or Cheops' 3.36.
- It's not actually a pyramid.
- According to archaeologists,
that qualifies as a pyramid.
There is a word for a pyramid
with a flat top.
Unfinished.
LAUGHTER
APPLAUSE
It's on the sign.
"Due for completion
early BC497."
It's called a frustum.
Name the world's fattest country.
Or the country
with the fattest citizens.
- Cos otherwise I'd say it
would be Russia. - No. - Tonga.
- Not Tonga. No. - Fiji.
No, but you're absolutely in the
right area, you've correctly...
- Vanuatu. - No, you're abso...
- You're so... Oh! - The Cook Islands.
- So close to round there. - Fiji.
It begins with N.
Nnnn...
Nyuh!
Nnn-not Tonga.
Nauru.
Near Tonga.
North Tonga!
Nnn-never Tonga.
Is it Nauru?
Now! Exactly, yes.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
In your face!
It only has a population
of 10,000 people,
but 97% of the men are obese
or overweight and 93% of women
are obese or overweight.
- I remember they had a one-man Olympic
team and he was in the weightlifting.
- Yes.
They get rather upset at being
called obese and they say
they're a stocky people
- and... - Big boned.
Big boned, exactly. Exactly.
- It's their metabolism.
- Well, I'm afraid the fact is,
you can't really put on weight,
as I know to my cost,
unless you put things in your mouth.
That's where it comes from.
When was the First World War
first named as such?
The outbreak. The assassination
of Archduke Ferdinand.
- You think it was straightaway?
- Before it started.
It would be an act of a pessimist
to call it that early.
- It's going to be some point
after 1939, isn't it?
- A realist, surely.
"There's going to be more of these."
KLAXON
Excuse me! I think what I said,
people in the box,
is AFTER 1939,
which may contain 1939,
but does not mean it.
KLAXON
OK... No, no, no.
I think
"After 1939" and "After the Second
World War" are not synonymous.
This is just giving you time to type
"After 1939".
KLAXON
Oh...
Why not just type,
"Mitchell is a cock"?
I wouldn't put it past them!
LAUGHTER
No, the surprising news is
that it was in 1918 that it was
first called the First World War.
A British officer,
Lt Col Charles a Court Repington,
recorded in his diary for 10th
September that he met Major
Johnstone of Harvard University
to discuss what to call the war.
Repington said to call it
The War was no good.
- That War? - To call it the German War
gave too much credit to the Boche.
"I suggested the World War,"
Repington said, "Finally, we agreed
to call it the First World War
"to prevent the millennium folk
from forgetting that the history of
the world was the history of war."
In 1920 he published a book called
The First World War, 1914-18.
- Wasn't it called The Great War?
- Yes, but there was another Great War
before that. Do you know it?
- Napoleonic War? - Napoleonic, yes.
So wars do change their names.
There you are.
Supplementary
on this international question,
why did the colonels in
chief of the Royal Dragoons
and the 1st King's Dragoon Guards
fail to turn up for duty
at the start of the First World War?
They were entwined in an embrace.
- Only now can we reveal the truth.
- It was one of those embarrassing
things about... Oh, I know! - Yes?
Because it was Kaiser Bill.
Yes. Kaiser Bill was in fact
the colonel in chief
of the Royal Dragoons,
and Franz Joseph Habsburg
was the colonel in chief
of the King's Dragoons,
- so... - That's a security risk, that.
- It was a bit, wasn't it?
If it turned out that Osama bin Laden
was actually an admiral of the fleet,
that would have been a nightmare.
We appointed Emperor Hirohito
a field marshal in the 1930s though,
so we carried on doing this.
There was a bit of embarrassment
when they had to go to war
with their colonel in chief.
It was eventually sorted out,
and we pretty much
spanked their botties.
We pretty much did.
- So... - Only four years of carnage.
- Yes. Quite.
And lastly,
on the international journey
that we've been enjoying,
who invented this salute?
- The Scouts. - The Scouts, no.
Is this a kind of "who were
the first fascists" question?
Not really, no.
Who actually used this
as a salute first, do we know?
Oh! Was it a Roman?
Ah... No.
KLAXON
Unfortunately not.
It was basically the French
Classical artists, notably David,
- the leading French Classical artist,
who...
- Artists have a salute?!
They painted Romans doing this,
but there is no evidence
in Roman literature, murals or art
- that Romans ever did this as a
salute.
- They're bound to have done.
- At some point, I mean...
- They might have put their arms out,
but it wasn't used as a salute.
It just became a common idea
that they did this.
And so it then became very much
a symbol of the Olympic movement,
it was the Olympic salute,
until 1936.
Um, and also, American school
children when they took the Oath
Of Allegiance they did that.
- And then again, once it became
a fascist salute...
- Now they do...
It's a strange thought that the Nazi
salute was in fact American school
children and Olympic athletes
who first used it. There you are,
wasn't invented by the Nazis at all.
And with that we reach
our final destination. Please
remain seated for the scores.
My goodness, me.
Well, I'm afraid very much
in the bucket class,
with minus 44, is David Mitchell!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Standing room only at the back.
With minus 27 it's Jack Dee!
APPLAUSE
- With a surprising amount of leg
room, at minus 10, Alan Davies!
- Thank you.
Which means...
that tonight's First Class passenger
with four points is Bill Bailey!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
So thank you for flying with
QI International. My cabin crew,
David, Jack, Bill and Alan, and I
wish you a pleasant onward journey.
And don't forget the wise words
of Halvard Lange, PM of Norway,
who said, "We do not regard
Englishmen as foreigners. We look
on them as rather mad Norwegians."
Good night.