The year is 1996. The Clintons are in the White House, and Taiwan finally has its first direct presidential election. The "Magnificent Seven" are the darlings of the Atlanta Summer Olympics, which featured the unfortunate mascot Izzy (short for "Whatizit?"). The Bulls win the NBA Championships. Again. The Yankees win the World Series. Again. OJ Simpson is on trial. Again. Carried along in life's rhythms and repetitions, I am navigating through my junior year at Berkeley. And saturating the airwaves, popping up in dance clubs and a host of unlikely places is the strange phenomenon called the Macarena. Everywhere you go, you can hear the catchy but monotonous beat of this one-hit wonder. Everywhere you look, you can see people doing this sexified version of the hokey pokey. The fad spreads and spreads, becoming fixtures at sporting events and even reaching senior aerobic classes. And this mania isn't localized. When I visit Taiwan in the winter, my cousins show me a goofy video of them doing the dance. I even participate in a subsequent homemade Macarena video. God, I hope that tape's been erased since then...
As I look back, I wonder what magic ingredients went into the synthesis of that obsession. Is it because even the most uncoordinated people could do that dance? Is it because people like songs to which they know only one phrase (Ehhh Macarena! Hai!)? Or, is it because every era (whether it be year or decade or century) needs something that will cause us to look back and ask, "What were we thinking?!"
Not surprisingly, the Macarena craze spawned a slew of parodies. Recently, I came across this hilarious video on YouTube. It is a brilliant Animaniacs parody titled "Macadamia Nut." Pure comic genius. (And it's even funnier if you compare it to the original video by Los Del Rio.)
Ah, nostalgia. They just don't make cartoons like this anymore. And maybe that is the real secret behind silly fads. They make us laugh, in all their incarnations. More importantly, they make us remember with a smile those days of yore and with them, our past selves. So, no matter how stupid and incomprehensible the fad, we still feel fondness for it because of all the associated memories and feelings it brings back.
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3 comments:
Dot says she's acts like a nut so they call her Macadamia. Based on that, there are several people I know that I could call Macadamia but none of them are as nearly as cute as Dot. (That's a simile by the way.) Do you think people--especially coworkers--would get it if I started calling them Pecan and Almond for seemingly no reason?
Haahaa, never thought of it that way... sexified hokey pokey!!! maybe that's why i am enchanted by the hampton hamster dance :)~j
I think that we could all use a little more sexified hokey pokey!
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