Watch Your Language Blog

Ken Lee Tulibu Dibu Douchoo

We've all struggled with getting the song lyrics right before, and things are just so much harder when you're trying to figure them out in a language that you don't speak well. Remember the endless rewinding? And can you ever hit the right spot?! Teenage life became so much more bearable when cassettes were replaced by CDs, but any reason for drama positively disappeared with the internet and iPods.

For instance, I had to wonder for years what Lovely Rita made... why wouldn't they just tell us? (Lovely Rita, Rita made...) "Meter maid" was an equally foreign term for my friend, but she, relying on a strange construction, wondered what kind of meter that Lovely Rita was made of? (Lovely Rita, meter made...). It's almost unfair that now, in contrast to these years of puzzlement, you can just google "Lovely Rita Beatles" and a Wikipedia page, a page with lyrics and a video pop up within seconds, along with 134,000 other potentially crucial links: Lovely Rita, meter maid, nothing can come in between us...

And has anyone got the French Jeux sans frontières refrain in Peter Gabriel's "Games Without Frontiers" except, perhaps, Kate Bush who sings them with such a thick accent? She's so popular or She's so funky now were our best guesses here at the office.

Lyrics are not always so obscure, and yet hilarious things can happen when you're eager to sing what you don't quite understand. Here's a different take on "Without You" by Mariah Carey. In other words, "ken lee tulibu dibu douchoo" somehow equals I can't live if living is without you.

[ZVIEZDANA]

Tags: mariah carey, song lyrics
May 9, 2008