…nā manaʻo ulu wale…

When my son was about 2, he and I were in front of the TV one morning, and I had been flipping through the channels. I stopped on this channel that had a pirate and a dog talking/barking at each other. I thought it was so silly. What is this thing? But my son really got into it. I, however, was getting irritated, and turned the channel. We don’t need another Barney, I thought!

The next weekend, we were channel surfing again, and I caught a show that had a song, “Fruit Salad.” It was quite hypnotic. I listened to the song and the “yummy yummy” part just kept repeating in my head. So I didn’t change the channel and kept watching it. Ugh! This was the show I was watching the week before and just had to change the channel! But, that song was pretty cool. And my son was into it, so I kept it on. They sang “Shaky, Shaky” and were all dressed in Elvis-like costumes. Hilarious! And the song wasn’t bad, too.

I found out that this show was called “The Wiggles.” My son really liked them, and it appeared he saw them before, so I guessed it was from the babysitter’s. I made it a point to catch it the next week.

The next day, we were at Costco with my mom. She was looking at the all the video tapes (yes, this was before DVDs were popular!), and we came across the kids’ section. She was wondering if my son liked any of them. The Wiggles one caught my eye–it was bright yellow, and there were a lot of them. There were also a green one, a blue one, and a red one. My mom asked which one my son would like, and I took the yellow one, because it had that “Yummy Yummy” on it, like that song I had heard previously. I flipped it over and saw that it had “Fruit Salad” on it as well as that “Shaky Shaky” song. “Oh! This is the one he likes!” I told my mom, trying to hide the fact that I knew all of their names already from the show, and well, I liked the songs, too. My mom bought it for him, and we watched it together. I was rolling my eyes at it, but the songs were pretty catchy. My son especially liked the “Do the Monkey” song. It was fun to dance along to.

Pretty soon, I was getting as sucked into it as he was. They’re a very wholesome group with a college-educated background in early childhood. They were goofy, but their songs were very hummable, and I swear, I couldn’t see the word “Fruit Salad” at the grocery store and NOT automatically go, “Yummy, yummy!” Through eBay and Half.com, I ended up buying my son all the Wiggles video tapes, which he would watch over and over and OVER. I even found the Wiggles underwear which was a good incentive for him to potty train, so he could wear his Wiggles BVDs. I found Wiggles shoes and Wiggles shirts. I got him Wiggles toys. He even was Captain Feathersword at Halloween. He could sing and dance to all the Wiggles songs–the songs never failed to make him get up and dance along. It made me dance, too, and hum it ALL day. Talk about earworms!

But then, my son grew up. He no longer listens to the Wiggles, and we have passed on all his Wiggles tapes to the next toddler in the family. Which is kinda sad, because *I* still like them! I like their songs! But I cannot watch their tapes, just me by myself, without my son with me! Then everyone’ll know that I really do know a lot about them–I’ve searched for many old Australian articles on them, I’m part of their fan forum, and I subscribe to their video diary podcast. What can I say? I’m hooked! And I care about them. I was happy for Anthony when he got married and had baby after baby…after baby. I wondered about Jeff–did he have a family? And I absolutely hated that Greg had to leave the group. He has the most soothing, hypnotic voices, I swear. I hoped he could still at least sing and record songs with them, and not need to travel for concerts. But sadly, I guess they have to tour, even though they are headed into their late 40s and early 50s!

Anyway, I haven’t been able to watch the Wiggles lately (at least a couple of years) so I have no idea what more cool songs they have (the songs we get in the U.S. are already “old,” having already come out in Australia earlier). I was looking on their website the other day and wow, they have really changed. Not only looking older, but more…well, expensive. When compared to their first tapes that we got, it’s all flashy and lights and effects and all that! Very different! But I guess that’s what happens once you get loads of money. You can afford all that stuff, why not? But to me, it takes away from the simplistic way they communicated with kids through their songs. I kinda miss that.

Well, unless I have another child, I don’t guess I’ll be able to get into that whole Wiggles phenomenon again, but it was fun, and the songs are still very memorable. Sometimes my kids will say something, and that’ll remind me of a song, and I’ll blurt it out, and they all look at me like, “You watch the Wiggles?!?!” heehee We’ll just file that away with the Pokemon for now

as an aside: I had also thought the same thing about Dora when I first saw Dora–what is this weird girl with the big head that’s talking to us and making like we’re using a computer? Ugh. But then I grew to love Dora and her songs. I’m the map, I’m the map, I’m the map, I’m the map, I’m the map, I’m the map, I’m the map, I’m the map, I’M THE MAP! I mean, come on, how’s that for creative? But I never, ever, EVER got into Barney. Sorry.