Korean Culture and the San Toki Song

Factual Questions
1

A Korean friend of mine mentioned some piece of folk music known as the San Toki song, that apparently all kids have to learn as sort of a rite of passage and a way of being tormented by their elders. One of those things apparently that the elders keep alive but the younger ones would preferred was buried and forgotten. Unfortunately I can’t seem to find much information on it, save for some random clips on Youtube of young kids and middle aged women performing it.

So what am I missing out on here? And just what is the straight dope on the San Toki song?

2

“San Toki” literally means “mountain rabbit”. The song goes something like “rabbit, rabbit, where are you going? Hop, hop, where are you going?”

According to my wife (a native Korean) there’s no special meaning that she’s aware of…

3

Double post… sorry.

4

Tormented by their elders? :confused: It’s a perfectly innocuous song.

Mountain rabbit, mountain rabbit,
Where are you going?
Hopping, hopping, leaping along
Where are you going?

Yeah, the lyrics are stupid. You make little bunnies with your hands and make them leap around (like “Little Bunny Foo Foo”). That’s about it.

5

“Little bunny foo foo” now there’s culture for ya! :smiley:

6

Damn right. Here in America, we teach our kids IMPORTANT songs, like the one about the Plague (Ring around the rosies) and the one about the bridge falling down in a country across the ocean (London Bridge is falling down…).

:stuck_out_tongue:

7

Across the ocean? But London Bridge is in lake Havasu, Arizona! haha. And don’t forget the song about the poor baby in a cradle up in a tree that suddenly falls out to its doom.

Thanks for cleaning that up and enlightening me! I guess my Korean friend must have exaggerated just a bit about the torment part. But it seemed there was more to this song at first than meets the eye, because it was brought up here (#38)

:smiley:

8

We found out [after driving over and under it a few times] that london bridge is definitely in LHS … and in use as a bidge [that we drove over and under several times while LOOKING FOR IT … :smack: :smack: :smack: :smack: ]

Did you know that they really dont have a sign announcing that the bridge is London Bridge? [or at least in 1989 they didnt … just a fairly tiny little plaque screwed to it… :smack: :smack: :smack: ]