Hi. My grandmother used to sing a children’s song to me in Czech or Slovak. I believe it is about a little hunter. It went along the lines of (phonetically):

Ya simali nissli vechek…

Any ideas?

If anyone can help Lewis, please let us know in the comments below.

Thanks!

Lisa

I went to school in Chilton (England) when I was six (1972), in California now, and my class sang this song, but that is the only line I can recall, I even recall the melody…

“And when the journey was all over /
The ship sailed for the /
White Cliffs of Dover.”

Anybody? Was it maybe a song about a ship with two cats and the crew were all mice, and when they got home all that was left were two fat cats?

Dan

If anyone can help Dan, please let us know in the comments below.

Thanks!

Lisa

Have you ever heard of a Korean song that school girls sing as they clap hands that goes like this:

Pong dong pong dong
dolel (stone) donjiora (throw)…

Thanks, Curtis

If anyone can help with this song, please email me or comment below.

Thanks!

Mama Lisa

Lisa,

There is a nursery rhyme or song that my grandmother used to sing to me (she has been dead about 8 years now) that I can only remember a few lines to… it could be a Cuban nursery song, I’m not really sure… I am dying to find the lyrics to the entire song, I now sing the parts that I can remember to my daughter and wish i could remember it.

It goes something like this…

Quien es me morena que habre su boca, en ella le caben dos mil calabasas un saco de higo y otro de pasas.

I hope you can help me locate this

Thank you so much!!

Jeanette Duque

Here’s a similar version we found in Spanish, with an English translation by Monique Palomares of Mamá Lisa’s World en español…

Original Spanish Lyrics

Tiene Pinochito

Tiene Pinochito
tan pequeña boca
que en ella le caben
cien platos de sopa
trescientos pepinos
y mil calabazas
un saco de higos
y otro de pasas
a la pobre niña
le entró la viruela
calentura mala
y dolor de muelas
el médico le receta
sardinas a la parrilla
a ver si le engordan
esas pantorrillas.

Which means in English:

Little Pinocchio has
such a little mouth
that into it fits
a hundred plates of soup,
three hundreds cucumbers
and a thousand pumpkins,
a bag full of figs
and another one of raisins.
He caught the smallpox,
a bad fever
and his back tooth aches.
The doctor prescribes him
grilled sardines
to see if his calves
get bigger.

This is a jump rope song.

Monique said regarding the original question, “Jeanette’s grandma’s version must have been : ‘¿Quién es mi morena que habre su boca, en ella le caben dos mil calabazas un saco de higos y otro de pasas…?.’ The ‘quién es mi morena que…’ means ‘who is my little brown girl who opens her mouth, into it fits, etc.’ It could have been a version created by her grandma to fit the situation. Perhaps she could sing it to us to help us figure it out…”

Thanks to Monique for providing the English translation and for helping with this song!

Mama Lisa

Hi, my grandma (born in Eisleben in 1875, emigrating to the Midwest in 1902, married her second husband (my grandfather) in St. Paul, lived most of her life in Wisconsin with her third husband), recited a rhyme when dandling a baby on her extended foot, either with legs crossed at the hips (or just straight out, but the dad’s were best at that). The rest of the family did it for every baby/little child, including myself. We never saw it in print, and we only have the phonetic sound from listening to it. Phonetically, it went something like what follows. I would dearly love to know exactly what it meant, although it is obvious based on what happened to the child:

Grandma (and all the rest of us who had children) would cross her legs at her hips, sit the baby on her upper ankle, hold the baby’s two hands in hers, and bounce the baby lightly up and down, until the end of the rhyme, when she would let the child fall back, laughing, and then lift the child back up, and begin again!

Scheckle, scheckle, reiderlein,
Ven die kinder kleinerschein
Reiden zie auf steckerlein,

Ven zie greis auf verten
Reiden zie auferten
Zen zie verten,
Klip, Klop, Klip Klop
Reiden zi (then something like a scary word or sounds)

“Boom stehl leckta!” really loud!

The adult lets the child fall back, usually grinning happily. (Sometimes a baby didn’t like it but others wanted you to pull them up onto your ankle and do it again! Some kids got a little dizzy if you did this action too fast! But mostly they loved it. I don’t remember their doing it with me, but I am certain they did, that’s where the phonetic sound and rhythm of the lines as I remember them come in, as well as my mother’s saying it to me when I was older and wanted her to tell me what it was, but it would always have been a phonetic memory, since she never really learned much German except what was common… the words you aren’t supposed to say!) This was done several times, until either one’s leg was tired, or the child needed a rest. I just used the phonetic version when I treated my kids as babies to the fun game, but for some reason I never asked my grandma. I was told that it meant something like, “When a child is little it rides on a stick horse, but when it tries to ride a real horse, he will go faster and fall off.” Have you ever heard this? I possibly have some of the phonetics wrongly remembered, but the rhythm and sounds and actions are still in my brain.

Thanks for any help you can give. I do like your website, I found it by way of BING. I think it is very interesting as to the German, lots of Germans settled in America. My father’s ancestors may have come from Austria, as well as Germany, but came to Wisconsin in the 1840’s, met and married, learned English, so they never spoke German at all when we knew them. A grandson, age 12, who has been learning German, took to it immediately, and loves it, as well as Norwegian, so there must be an inherited acclimation to the sound of a language.

Sincerely,

Gloria Koeser Laundrie

Thanks for sharing your song with us Gloria! If anyone can help with the German version and/or an English translation, please let us know in the comments below.

Cheers!

Mama Lisa

Greek Text

Παλαμάκια

Παλαμάκια παίξετε
κι ο μπαμπάς του έρχεται
και του φέρνει κάτι τι
κουλουράκια στο χαρτί

Παλαμάκια παίξετε
κι η μανούλα έρχεται
να το πάρει αγκαλιά
το μικρούλι της παιδιά.

Παλαμάκια, παλαμάκια
παίζουν όλα τα παιδάκια
Παλαμάκια και χορό
νταχ ντιρντι και
νταχ ντιρντο

Transliteration

Palamakia

Palamakia Peksete
Kai o babas tou erhete
Kai tou ferni kati ti
Koulourakia sto harti

Palamakia Peksete
Kai i manoula erhete
Kai ta perni agalia
Ta mikroulia tis pethia

Palamakia Palamakia
Pezoun ola ta pethakia
Palamakia kai horo
Tihdidi kai Tihdido

Rough English Translation by Penelope Karagouni (with some editing by me)

Clap

Clap your hands
His dad is coming
To bring him something,
Cookies in a paper-wrapper.

Clap your hands
Mommy is coming
To get the little one
To hug the children!

Clap, clap,
All the children clap
Clapping and dancing
Dah didrdi and dah dirdo.*

*Dah didrdi and dah dirdo’ are sounds only with no meaning.

You can hear part of the rhyme in the 2nd part of the YouTube Video below…

If anyone can help with the translation, or let us know if it’s okay, please let me know in the comments below or by emailing me.

Thanks!

Mama Lisa

Faut-il nous quitter sans espoir
Sans espoir de retour ?
Faut-il nous quitter sans espoir
De nous revoir un jour ?

Refrain
Ce n’est qu’un au revoir, mes frères,
Ce n’est qu’un au revoir.
Oui, nous nous reverrons, mes frères,
Ce n’est qu’un au revoir.

Here’s a literal English translation by Monique Palomares…

Must we leave each other without a hope
To see each other again some day
Must we leave each other without a hope
A hope of return

It’s only a goodbye, my brothers
It’s only a goodbye,
Yes, we’ll see each other again, my brothers
It’s only a goodbye.

Here you can hear the whole song…

Another Goodbye Song we have here today was written and sung by Alain Le Lait. It’s in French and English. Sit back and enjoy the song by clicking the MP3 below. You can read along with the lyrics in French and English…

Listen to Alain’s French Goodbye Song

Au revoir
by Alain Le Lait

Au revoir, good bye,
Now it is time for me to go away.
Au revoir, good bye,
But I wish I could stay with you all day.

Thanks for your smiles
And for singing along
I hope to see you again before too long.

Au revoir, good bye,
Il se fait tard et je dois m’en aller
Au revoir, good bye,
Mais j’aimerais rester toute la journée
Pour vos sourires et vos bien jolies voix
Je vous remercie et a une autre fois.

Au revoir, good bye,
Au revoir, good bye,
Au revoir, good bye.

(English Translation of French Verse)

Good bye, good bye
It’s getting late and I must go
Good bye, good bye
But I’d like to stay with you all day
For all your smiles and your pretty voices
I thank you and I’ll see you another time.

The French and English lyrics to this “Au revoir” song are © 1994 Alain Le Lait.

Alain Le Lait is a French native who grew up near Paris, France. He moved to the United States in the 1970s and now lives in Colorado. Alain writes and performs easy to learn children’s songs in French, Spanish and English. Check out his site www.Yadeeda.com to hear samples of his music and to buy his CD’s or mp3’s.

Merci Alain & Monique!

Feel free to share any French Hello or Goodbye songs you know in the comments below.

Mama Lisa

PS Here are some other Hello and Goodbye Songs…

Hi Lisa,

We just returned from a vacation in Croatia. We are German and have 3 little girls. They learned a song from a “mini disco”. I hope you can tell me the name of the song.

From what we understood it sounds like this:

Kille killi jakasaka okoama bum (repeats) Olee mal jole…….

Do you know how this song is named and what the lyrics are?

Thanks in advance for any information.

Regards,

Michael Andres

If anyone can help Michael, please let us know in the comments below.

Thanks!

Mama Lisa

I am looking for a Polish lullaby my mother used to sing…

Śpij laleczko moja mała, czas na ciebie już, ja cię będę kołysała, a ty oczka zmruz…

This is all I remember.

If anyone has all the words, I would be very grateful.

Theresa

A rough English translation of the above text is: Sleep my little baby doll, it is the time for you now, I will, I will rock, and you close your eyes.

This is the tune to the Polish Lullaby.

If anyone can help Therese with the original text of the lullaby and/or an English translation, please let us know in the comments below.

Thanks!

Mama Lisa

UPDATE:

Here’s the text of a slightly different version of the lullaby, thanks to Agnieszka Magnucka:

ŚPIJ LALECZKO

Pod pierzyną czarnej nocy
W blasku srebrnych gwiazd
Gwiżdże swoje kołysanki
Rozśpiewany wiatr.

Księżyc wplata w warkoczyki
Kolorowe sny
Śpij laleczko moja mała
Śpij córeczko, śpij.

W płatkach herbacianej róży
Calineczka śpi
Nawet przemęczony świerszczyk
Zasnął w trakcie gry.

Wszystkie małe grzeczne dzieci
Już od dawna śpią
Dobra wróżka opowiada
Bajkę którą śnią.

Księżyc wplata w warkoczyki
Kolorowe sny
Śpij laleczko moja mała
Śpij córeczko, śpij.

Agnieszka Magnucka and I came up with this English translation…

SLEEP MY BABY DOLL

Under the blanket of dark night
In the glimmer of silver stars
It is whistling its lullabies…
- Singing wind.

The Moon is braiding in plaits
Colorful dreams
Sleep my baby doll
Sleep my daughter, sleep.

Between the tea rose* leaves
Thumbelina is sleeping
Also some overtired little cricket
Fell asleep while playing.

All the good little children
Are sleeping for so long
The good fairy is telling that story
They are dreaming of.

The moon is braiding in plaits
Colorful dreams
Sleep my baby doll
Sleep my daughter, sleep.

*Tea Rose is called Herbaciana which is a rose with peachy/yellow leaves that sometimes have a little pink or cream in them.

*****

Enjoy!

Mama Lisa

PS Thanks so much for your help Agnieszka!

My wife and I are also familiar with many of the German songs. This morning while looking for them, I found the finger rhyme, and your question about the Pennsylvania German variation. This is the song my father used to sing to us – seven children. Pennsylvania German has many varieties of spelling, and perhaps you can sharpen up the spelling. (My wife, Mary, and I worked at the pronunciation and spelling of the Pennsylvania German Finger Song. Mary grew up speaking Pennsylvania German.) Here it goes…

Des ist die Daume

Des ist die Daume
Der schittelt die Plaume
Der laest sie ouf
Der traught sie Haem
Und des glae Bopplemaul
Bopplet alles mit’n ahnna da Haem.

This is the thumb.
This [one] shakes the plums,
This [one] picks them up,
This [one] brings them home,
And this little tattletale tells everyone at home.

It was always spoken, not sung.

Thanks for your work in collecting old songs.

Luke Martin
(Pennsylvania)

If anyone would like to give other variations of the spelling, feel free to in the comments below. Many thanks to Luke Martin for sending this version of the rhyme to us!

Enjoy!

Mama Lisa