Ugh Ungaowa!
Posted on September 3, 2001
This was my first experience in being an author
So what the hell does that title mean? When I was in my second year at the University of Virginia (1966) one of the "traditions" of this "academical village" was the acceptance of hard spirits. It was part of the culture of the institution. And at football games we would all bring a hip flask filled with bourbon to mix with Coca Cola to help us root for our team, nicknamed The Wahoos.
This was in an era when Virginia could have been beaten by Vasser. I remember that one of the top teams in the nation came to Charlottesville; perhaps it was Purdue. While we had no business playing a top ten team, there we were, in the stands hoping for a miracle.
I had one "Coca Cola" too many and decided that we needed a new cheer. Next to me was my friend who was the assistant editor of The Cavalier Daily, the school paper (which I worked on.) I told him my idea and he said sure, lets do it.
We both thought and thought. Then IT came to me: UGH UNGAOWA, WAHOOS GOT THE POWER.
I said, "I've got the cheer. This will work. We'll be famous. Let's do it!"
My date (also blitzed), myself, the editor and his date started chanting UGH UNGAOWA WAHOOS GOT THE POWER. Then the people behind us picked it up.
It was great. The entire section "B" started chanting it. In two or three minutes, the entire Virginia section of some 12,000 spectators started yelling UGH UNGAOWA, WAHOOS GOT THE POWER.
The cheerleaders could not figure out what was going on, so they just joined in. For the entire game, we yelled at the top of our lungs, UGH UNGAOWA, WAHOOS GOT THE POWER.
People were patting me on the back, buying me hot dogs, offering me drinks, and telling me what a great cheer it was, how talented I was, and that I would be immortalized. And I believed them.
It was a great afternoon. I thought that maybe this cheer would be inscribed in Virginia sports culture and I'd be remembered as the author and "publisher" of the cheer. And I think I would have been... except that we got beat something like 84 to nothing.
When the game ended, no one on the paper wanted to be seen near me. When I went to a party that evening no one wanted to talk to me. I didn't understand why until two days later. One of the stories in the sports section of the paper the following Monday had a headline that read "New Cheer Helps Cause Huge Loss"
The story went on with interviews from players who said they could not concentrate on the game because they were wondering what "ugh ungaowa" meant. (Virginia had high academic standards for their athlete-scholars and our players had high IQs.)
The story asked, "Is it no wonder that 'our calibur' of player would be thinking about the meanings of the 'dumb' words of "ugh ungaowa" as opposed to the complex play that was called?"
Instead of concentrating on running a "post pattern" perhaps the wide receiver was trying to figure out if "ugh ungaowa" was some kind of obscure Latin conjugation.
Or perhaps it was Swahili for "Hey man, want a toke?"
Finally, the author of the article suggested that those in section "B" were responsible, especially the man who thought it up.
For the first time in my life I got my name in the paper... and I was "branded" as the cause for the worst loss in Virginia history.
Lucky me.
Well as you might imagine, the cheer was never heard again. For the rest of my years there I had to live with the dubious distinction of being the author/publisher of "ugh ungaowa."
And even now, at least once very year, I'll hear from someone who sees my name in print or in some other article on the net and who was at U. Va. when I was there. They write how they remember "me" for that cheer.
It was not the kind of legacy I had hoped to leave, but it’s the one I have (besides the fact that I was a terrible student and they almost had to burn the place down to get me out!!)
To this day I think about that "dumb" cheer (usually when I'm behind a glass of Jack Daniel's (with Coke) and consider myself lucky to have learned such a valuable lesson so early in life... that one "thing" can make you a hero one minute, and a goat the next... and that the "heroics part" will be quickly forgotten, but nobody ever forgets the "goat part" of your personal "ugh ungaowa."
In business as well as in life, your words are your own personal "ugh ungaowas." Just like my story above, the world will look at the "final" effects of your "ugh ungaowa" and make a judgement as to whether you are a hero or a goat. This is why I beseech people to take a hard look at what they write on social media... to avoid an "ugh ungaowa."
About the Author
Alan Canton has been a writer and a publisher in addition to his lifetime work as high-tech consultant. He is the author of several books (long out of print) as well as the author of the long-running Saturday Rant blog (also now dormant.)
Alan Canton has spent just over 40 years as a high-tech consultant... have ticked all the buzz-word checkboxes... programmer, analyst, system engineer, systems architect and the latest... full-stack engineer. If it has to do with computer code, he has done it... or at least most of it.
He is the managing partner of NewMedia Create which designs websites for authors, publishers, and small businesses... most often for small biz people who have "no money" but who want a simple but nice site at an reasonable price.
Ham radio is his main hobby. His callsign is K6AAI. You can see his station at his QRZ webpage.
He also runs a QSL card company and has hams from all over the country as customers. See RadioQSL.com. His favorite ham radio quote is:
"I am often asked how radio works. Well, you see, wire telegraphy is like a very long cat. You yank his tail in New York and he meows in Los Angeles. Do you understand this? Now, radio is exactly the same, except that there is no cat."
- Attributed to Albert Einstein