TRENDING: 2022 in Review – I’m dumfungled, and you?

By Louise Burgers, Retailing Africa Editor. ‘Dumfungled’ is a word from an old Scottish dialect for becoming “mentally and physically worn out, applied-up and strung-out”. Sounds about suitable for the conclusion of 2022. I’m unquestionably emotion like that. WTAF 2022? Like significantly? Exactly where do I even get started creating a humorous column to sum up this yr in memes, when my default environment is ‘stunned’ these times, like most other South Africans. It is been A Large amount guys!

These had been just some of the lowlights: Parliament burnt down Russia invaded Ukraine, ensuing in meals rates and petrol skyrocketing nearby electrical power blackouts then switched off any probability at economic restoration this yr KZN was hit by devastating floods in April curiosity fees commenced rising Twitter became the first important social media network to implode dollars in a couch brought about a constitutional disaster additional electrical power blackouts will make this a dark Christmas… and through it all, South Africans continue to keep making jokes and memes.

We could all be particularly dumfungled, but we can however aid each individual other through the difficult times, and we do still crack a joke in the course of the worst of periods. That on your own, need to give some hope. These are some of the memes that described 2022, especially in our community retail and model sector:

JANUARY

When somebody said 2022 was heading to be ‘lit’, they should really have specified, as our historic Homes of Parliament burnt down early January. Given that issues only received worse in 2022, I locate these memes instead prophetic, in retrospect!

FEBRUARY

So, there we were being, stressing about our beloved Fish Paste becoming discontinued, when the globe economy was about to blow up, as Russia invaded Ukraine with a single of the fishiest excuses at any time.

MARCH

And so, it began… the war impacted on gas and food charges globally, as perfectly as the source chain. There wasn’t a lot to snicker about, but belief Saffers and their dark humour to go on the meme manufacturing facility.

APRIL

KZN was hit by devastating floods  – and the crazy continued, with the Trolley Bandit producing headlines all over the world, as he hitched a journey on a petrol tanker whilst in a supermarket cart, in the rain, and on one of our busiest Joburg highways. Observe the video clip in this article.

Might

Elon Musk’s mid-yr bid for Twitter was the issue of quite a few memes. It was amusing for a time, but that moment did not final. Makes and staff proceed to exit Twitter as 2022 ends and Musk clips Twitter’s wings.

JUNE

Really hard relate to this meme. Ah very well, they also make good shoe luggage further baggage for things necessary at college luggage to carry library books luggage to organise charitable donations and every thing BUT the damn groceries, simply because I overlook. Just about every. Time!

JULY

Soon after the totally nonsensical story about Ryan Air introducing a ‘test’ for South Africans to prove, they were, well, precise South Africans and not nefarious criminals with pretend SA passports, the memes arrived rapidly. It all appeared a little bit of an Irish Joke, actually, in occasions when the reality is in fact harder to believe in some cases than faux information.

AUGUST

Some of our models grew to become meme targets as the overall economy continued to squeeze budgets, and premium manufacturers in certain, were being singled out.

SEPTEMBER

Stage ‘I never know what the hell stage it is’ energy blackouts from Eskom. At this phase we experienced to share memes, as what much more could we say about ‘loadshedding’ at this issue? We have no additional words – but this is our collection of loadshedding memes, if you continue to have a perception of humour remaining.

October

At minimum in Oct, we could all marvel at the spray-on dress debuted by Paris-dependent fashion designers Sebastien Meyer and Arnaud Vaillan from the Coperni style residence, in a are living demonstration with supermodel Bella Hadid. The ‘spray-on dress’ video promptly went viral and just about every single big news community, style and amusement media, company media, and way of living publication ran with the tale and video clip.

NOVEMBER

November was a very long thirty day period, with our President’s Royal Tour, The Cyril Sofa Expose, and Musk’s Twitter Takeover, which was a captivating social soap opera, shipped one insane tweet at a time. I consider we all will need to just take far more natural vitamins and have additional naps. Billionaires involved.

DECEMBER

It’s likely to be a dark festive year for many South Africans, in extra approaches than one particular, soon after the financial woes in our place and the ongoing disintegration of infrastructure and alleged sabotage at Eskom, our nationwide electrical power utility. But, we are fortunate to are living in a region with temperature that isn’t that serious and a social, braai lifestyle. No lights. No worries. We make fireplace.

Content Holiday seasons and see you in the New Yr!

Yr IN Overview

2021: https://retailingafrica.com/traits/2021-the-12 months-dumbfckery-reached-level-5/

2020: https://retailingafrica.com/traits/trending-2020-summarised-in-memes/

Most important image credit history: Unsplash.com.

Louise Burgers is the Publisher, Editor and Co-Founder of RetailingAfrica.com. She has used about 20 yrs writing about the FMCG retailing, advertising and marketing, media and promotion industry in South Africa and on the African continent. She also lectures write-up-grad college students in Marketing and advertising and Advertising Communications. Specialising in regional and Africa customer traits, Louise is a passionate Afro-optimist who believes it is Africa’s time to increase again and that the Africa Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA) will be a world gamechanger this 10 years.

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