Disney Song Memories Induced By Scary Woman-voice Man

I was on youtube today and got carried deep into my childhood by this video.

It’s kind of freaky how he can sing exactly like Ariel.

But hearing “Ariel’s” voice sure brought back memories of afternoon lunches and pre-nap disney cartoon sessions on repeat.

I was obsessed with Disney musicals. The first Disney movie that I could successfully pay full attention to was probably Aladdin. I was 5 years old and that was the first time my dad brought me and my brother to the movies. If I’m not mistaken it was Sogo. One of the only shopping malls in KL at that time. There were no cinemas anywhere outside of KL back then. And this was in 1992.

I do remember walking out of the cinema and walking pass shops selling very high tech sound systems called HiFi. My dad said something like, “Ohh..only rich men can afford….”. Hifi systems are obsolete now. 🙂 We then had supper at Delifrance, a family tradition that we still adhere to if there’s one in the mall after an evening of window shopping.

I was mesmerized by A Whole New World. I was so in love with the song that my mother bought it for me on cassette! I remember playing it over and over on the cassette player. It’s funny how I can stay in love with a song for so many years. I’m 22 already and as far as I can remember, I have always been singing this song in the shower.

Another memory would be of Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs. It was one of my first Disney movies too, but on tape. My grandfather would put it on for us in the afternoon. I think there was no us… only me. The other two were not born yet. So I was only three years old and this scene stuck in my head: Snow White playing the piano to the seven dwarfs who were listening to her dreamily and Grumpy stood in a corner huffing and puffing, basically being grumpy.

During my JMC class on one Sunday in 1990, my piano teacher played the piano and asked us to sing along. My classmates were singing along like good children and I stood in one corner and crossed my arms and sulked. Now, I was trying to mimic Grumpy, but the adults didn’t know that. All they saw was a sulky child who refused to cooperate with the rest of the class.

My mum, who was a piano teacher herself at that Yamaha Centre, was angry at me and refused to hold my hand as we walked down the narrow staircases in that maze of a building in SS2. How does a 3 year old explain to her mum that she was only copying Grumpy from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs? My self-expression skills were not fully developed yet. 🙂

But the one memory that was brought back by the video was how every single swimming trip to the Valley Club would turn into a Little Mermaid fantasy role play kind of thing. Except that it’s not that kinky lah. Though I kind of wanted to have those shell bras. I thought it was kind..of..nice. I was a bit like that already as a kid. :\

In the Swimming Pool, I was Ariel and Flounder and Sebastian (sometimes Mervyn was Sebastian, but he usually doesn’t know that) were my imaginary friends. I would be singing Part Of Your World while waddling around the kiddy pool. I remember feeling that it was quite unreal because I couldn’t go underwater and sing like Ariel. It would only truly be a scene out of Little Mermaid if I could go to the bottom of the pool and swim like a fish. This was wayyyyy before I learned how to swim. 🙂

Ahh. Disney memories. What’s yours?