Arato András, known on the Internet as Harold (or Morris), Hiding Pain, entertained the guests of one of the bars in the Hungarian capital and posted a photo from there on Facebook. He is also a retired engineer, leads tours of Budapest, enjoys his fame, does not hide any pain and holds creative evenings for fans.
Almost everyone who has been on the Internet more than once knows these eyes full of pain and a painful smile. This is Harold, Hiding Pain, aka Morris, aka Grandfather Harold, aka Hide The Pain Harold, one of the ancient but still popular memes.
Harold was born in 2011 on the Facepunch forum, where they posted a whole photo shoot with him, and since then he has not left the screens. He is loved in VK.
He is loved in Odnoklassniki.
He is known in the West.
And he knows a lot not only about physical pain, but also about mental pain.
"Oh shit. I hope they didn't see it."
If you know the memes with Harold, then you can guess that on the screen of his laptop - porn with horses.
The man is especially popular in Russia, where he is used not only on boards to create new memes, but also for advertising, quite serious purposes. Especially often it is taken out of photobanks to advertise medical services.
And financial products for pensioners.
That is, in areas where pain is not just a word.
In fact, the role of Harold is played by a Hungarian pensioner named Arato Artash. He is an engineer, lives in Budapest, is fully aware of his fame and treats it with irony. Arato knows a little Russian, and in 2015 he even started a page on VK. In this regard, TJournal took a comment from him.
Arato is 72 years old and continues to live an active life. How active can be judged by his facebook. It was there that he posted a photo from a bar in Budapest where he worked at the bar last week pouring beer.
The trademark smile and pain have not gone away, everything is in place. This immediately gave rise to suitable jokes on the Internet. For example, on Pikabu.
Medialeaks also had a hand.
Hungarian Andras Arato, better known as "Hiding Pain Harold", became the face of the advertising campaign of the Russian chain of shopping and entertainment centers "Planet". With a trademark facial expression (pain through a smile), he played the role of a sales assistant standing in front of empty counters and mannequins in a clothing store. At the end of the video, it turns out that the season of big discounts has begun in the shopping center and everything is quickly sold out. “We are hurt by these discounts,” says the voiceover. Filming took place at the end of May, during his visit to Moscow. Photos and Instagram stories with him appeared in the account of the TutkovBudkov advertising agency, which filmed the commercial.
Andras Arato. Photo: Shutterstock.com
What is he known for?
Now on the Internet you can see a lot of memes with photos of a Hungarian who became famous after repeatedly using pictures with him from photo stocks. Massive photos of Arato appeared on the dreamstime resource, where they tried to make them a symbol of the rich and interesting life of people in old age. The reason for the Internet popularity of "Harold" lies in the expression on his face: the smile looks strained, and pain, bitterness and regret are visible in the eyes. At first, Arato was insulted and upset by memes with his photos, but then he resigned himself to specific fame. Arato claims that his "meme career" began in Russia, with a Russian guy who found him on a stock site on the Internet. He sent the future celebrity an email. “I didn’t even answer the first one,” Arato says. “But he sent more and more, and finally I gave up. He asked to show himself, his real life, because many Russians did not even realize that I was a real person. Then my popularity spread to other countries. But it all started in Russia, so I think they treat me in a special way here.”
What does Andras do in life?
Arato is an electrical engineer by profession. But now he moonlights as a tour guide in Budapest, arranges meetings with fans, travels and starred in commercials. Advertising of shopping mall chains in Russia is Arato's second advertising collaboration in his life. The first was in Hungary: a series of three commercials in 2017. Harold can no longer run his own social networks. There is a small team that helps him fill the pages with content.
Arato is a famous football fan, he also came to the World Cup in Russia. The Hungarian posted the video on his VKontakte page and said that he would be a consolation for the losing teams, because who, if not him, would help the players and fans survive the pain of defeat. After the opening match, in which Russia defeated Saudi Arabia 5-0, my grandfather praised the championship hosts for their strong performance and joked that it was time for Saudi Arabia to hide the pain. Any exit of Arato to the street is accompanied by numerous selfies with everyone. “It seems that I am famous as a football star,” Arato writes about himself.
In 2011, a meme was created on the Internet, the cult character of which was "hide the pain of Harold." A 73-year-old resident of Hungary named Arato Andras gained popularity thanks to his signature smile. Internet users found photos of a man in a foreign photo stock. The facial expression of the model from stock photos was compared to the cry of the soul, which is hidden under the mask of a forced smile.
The trend to joke about photos from photobanks appeared in Russia about four years ago. Since then, social media users have had time to laugh at the many models who often become disposable heroes of meme stories.
The expression on the face of "hide the pain of Harold" in itself says a lot. The character of memes has become an indispensable hero of stories about life's difficulties.
On the photo stock, pictures with "hide the pain of Harold" were published by a user with the nickname Greenen72. Hungarian resident Arato Andras agreed to pose for promotional photos of goods for pensioners. As a result, potential buyers paid more attention not to the goods, but to the pensioner himself, who became the object of jokes on the Internet.
The peak of Harold's popularity came in 2014. It was then that memes with “hide the pain of Harold” began to spread on imageboards - 2ch, 4ch, etc. In social networks, pages dedicated to the character were created. The second pseudonym of the hero of numerous memes is Maurice, but this name failed to take root.
The smiling old man Harold is used in memes that describe situations where a person deliberately pretends to be joyful, but in fact he is unpleasant and hurt. Various funny inscriptions were attached to the photographs of Arato Andras.
March 3, 2016 Arato Andras announced himself. The man registered on VKontakte. Fans of "hide the pain of Harold" already thought that he was dead. However, it later turned out that these were just rumors.
Pain-hiding Harold's visit to Russia
Recently it became known that Arato Andras visited Russia. In Moscow, "Harold hiding the pain" visited Red Square, the mausoleum and St. Basil's Cathedral. Along the way, he was photographed with Russian graduates and a poster with the inscription "I love Moscow." A man came to Russia for the purpose of cooperation for advertising.
In an exclusive interview, Andras admitted that he was in Russia 30 years ago. Since then, he says, a lot has changed. Many buildings were reconstructed, which pleasantly surprised the guest of the capital. Russia is a special place for "old man Harold": it is here that funny pictures with his participation are most popular on social networks.
Initially, the man reacted with indifference to the fact that now everyone knows him as "hiding the pain of Harold." However, now he is actively promoted in social networks and even starred in music videos for rock musicians. So, recently a resident of Hungary became the main character of the Cloud 9+ video for the song Hide The Pain.
Opinion of relatives of Arato Andras about memes
Arato Andras told how relatives and friends reacted to his popularity. Jokes about "hiding the pain of Harold" are not liked by all members of the man's family.
The son of a well-known meme hero with a signature smile reflecting pain, can not stand jokes about his father. Once, he even asked Internet users to stop sharing pictures of "Harold's grandfather."
Arato's wife Andras initially reacted negatively to the fact that the man became the object of ridicule among young people. Nevertheless, over time, fame began to bring a steady income and attitudes changed.
“Harold hiding the pain” himself believes that there is nothing wrong with joking with him. The man regularly follows memes and is sure that the status of the hero of comic pictures allows him to remain forever young.
Previously, some fans often called Arato Andros on a mobile phone and wrote to e-mail. Meme lovers tried to find out the reason for the strange facial expression of the Hungarian. Harold kept this a secret in order to warm up even more public interest.