My kids have a strange but great selection of playground rhymes so I thought I’d share a few with you. They’ve learnt some new ones since we moved, but this is a Wolverhampton one.
So here are the Queen and the Joker reciting ‘Coca cola’ (lyrics below):
Coca cola, coca cola.
Alley alley pussy cat, alley alley pussy cat.
Coca cola, coca cola.
Alley alley pussy cat, alley alley pussy cat.
The boys got the muscles, the teacher can’t count
The girls got the sexy legs, you better watch out.
The boys go X X, the girls go ‘Whooo’
PS Please excuse me going ‘Go’ at the beginning – it’s the only way I could make sure they hadn’t launched their rhyme before I started recording.
The Vicar's Wife 
Hi, I’m a Dutch Musicology student and I’m doing research on this kind of playground rhymes. Thank you for posting this nice video. I was looking for this song, which I recorded yesterday in a version a bit different from yours, but with almost the same lyrics. The funny thing is that I recorded it on a Dutch playground in Amsterdam! The girls who played it don’t even speak English, but probably they learned the song from a friend from England or the US.
Maybe you know if it’s a new song or did you know it when you where younger? I’m trying to track down the history of the song. I hope you can help me. Thanks in advance.
Welcome to the Vicarage, Jori.
I’m sorry to tell you that I’d never heard that rhyme before my kids started reciting it (I grew up in the London suburbs). They haven’t been using playground rhymes as much since we moved from Wolverhampton either. I wonder if some of these rhymes might have an overseas origin – many of the kids at my children’s last school came from the Caribbean.
I do have some other playground rhymes that I should get my kids to recite. If I can organise them I’ll post them up here in the next few weeks.
Thought you would like to know (regarding the age and origin of the rhyme) that growing up in Lincolnshire in the 80s we had a rhyme called “Firecracker” which was similar in places:
“Firecracker, firecracker, boom-boom-boom
Firecracker, firecracker, boom-boom-boom
The boys have got the muscles, the teacher’s got the brains
The girls have got the sexy legs so we’ve won the game
Pepsi cola, Pepsi cola,
Hypnotise you, paralyse you, fall in love
Gonna hypnotise you, paralyse you, fall in love”
The “Pepsi cola” bit had the same tune as your “Coca cola” part although it came at the end rather than the beginning.
Like your one, ours was a mixture of clapping together and other actions, some of them similar to those in the video.
Hope this is of interest, don’t normally do comments but when I saw the query about the history of the rhyme I wondered if my recollections might help at all.
When I was growing up in South Yorkshire in the early 90s a group of girls used to stand at the back of the dining hall and sing the following:
The cowboys come from the USA
The indians come from far away
[A line I can’t remember that ended with “a something and a something and a something”]
All in the land of… TEX-AS!
A-cheeky-nanna-cheeky-nanna bom-bom-bom
A-cheeky-nanna-cheeky-nanna bom-bom-bom
The boys have got the muscles, the teacher’s got the brains
The girls have got the sexy legs so we win the game
Thank you for your comments. This really helps me! It’s very hard to track down the origins from these kind of rhymes. So it is nice to know that the related version of Helen was already sung in the 80’s. Maybe there is someone who knows it from before the 80’s? Or someone who knows a different, but related version?
We Do This At School But Our Words Are:
Pepsi-Cola
Pepsi-Cola
Alley Alley Pussycat
Alley Alley Pussycat
Pepsi-Cola
Pepsi-Cola
Alley Alley Pussycat
Alley Alley Pussycat
Boys Got The Muscles
Teacher Can’t Count
Girls Got The Trendy Looks
You Better Watch Out
Hypnotise Ya
Paralyse Ya
Turn Around And Faint
But With Different Actions :]]
Thanks! In which city/village do you live Chloe? Your version seems to be the most related one to that one I heard in Amsterdam. The first part is exactly the same untill ‘You better watch out’. And then they sing:
hit me baby, hit me baby
turn around and fall down
🙂
This is our one at school:
Coca Cola,
Pepsi Cola,
Alley Alley Pussycat,Alley Alley Pussycat,
Boys got the muscles,
teachers cant count,
girls got the sexy legs,
you better WATCH OUT!
Im gonna hypnotize ya,
paralyse ya,
turn around and faint! [ But as we say the last line someone turns around and falls into eachothers arms,VERY DANGEROUS! Thanks for sharing ur great vid!
Hello to other commenters, and to other persons interested in sharing, collecting, and documenting information about children’s playground rhymes and cheerleader cheers. I’m from Pittsburgh, Pensylvania, USA.
It’s my position that that this rhyme is a corruption (meaning a probably accidental modification) of the much earlier playground rhymes “Ackabaka” (also sometimes given as “Ickabacka”):
Ackabaka soda cracker
Ackabaka boo
In goes out
And out goes YOU.
-snip-
To be more specific, I think that the word “firecracker” is folk etymology for the unfamiliar word “akabacka” and the word “boom” eventually replaced the word “boo” in that rhyme.
Of course “ackabaka” probably is another example of folk etymology. Also the “alley alley pussy cat” phrase is almost certainly a corruption of earlier phrases found in children’s rhymes. I think one clue for an early source for these rhymes is the children’s rhyme called “Om Pompeii”
Om Pompeii
Cally-ey
Cally oski
Om Pompeii
Cally-ey
Mr Turnip
Apple Turnip
Mr Turnip
Boom boom.
-snip-
Visit http://www.cocojams.com/content/handclap-jump-rope-and-elastics-rhymes for more rhyme examples and comments.
Chloe and others, I’m curious if the phrase “alley alley pussy cat” is still used among British children. In the USA the word “pus” for cats has been dropped for decades because of the sexual connotation of the word “pussy”. For that reason, I don’t think those particular lines are chanted by American children.
Also, I should note that the “firecracker firecraker” rhyme appears to be mostly used in the USA as a children’s (almost entirely girls’) cheerleader cheer. I’m curious if its true (as I have read in some blogs) that Great Britain doesn’t have the tradition of school, community, or professional cheerleader squads. If that is correct, I’m wondering what performance activity/activities is/are used for the “Firecracker” rhyme in Great Britain and other nations outside of the USA.
thevicar’swife, thanks for the opportunity to discuss children’s playground rhymes & cheers!!
Welcome to the Vicarage Azizi. I’ve some other rhymes I plan to put up on the blog – hope you enjoy them! My kids still use ‘alley alley pussycat’ – although the word has sexual connotations here, it is still used in connection to felines aswell, so people aren’t so squeamish.
@Azizi, you are right that in Britain we don’t have the tradition of cheerleading that exists in the USA, although it is being adopted by some schools now and my daughters’ dancing class offers cheer dance as a discipline. As for the context in which the rhyme is used, we used to do it just for our own amusement, rather than as any kind of performance activity (can’t speak for nowadays though, it’s over 20 years since I was doing those and my girls don’t seem to do that particular kind of rhyme!)
Thanks for the welcome and for the information!
I look forward to reading other examples of children’s rhymes as well as reading other topics presented on this blog.
Best wishes from the USA.
Hello everyone,
I have been looking for the correct Om Pompeii rhyme for a while now and for some reason I remember it differently than everyone else. This may just be my memory incorrectly piecing it together, but I thought it went something like this:
Om Pompeii
Colla-ni
Colla-nasta
Om Pompeii
Colla-ni
Academie
So-far-y
Academie
Boom Boom
Does this ring a bell with anyone?
Thanks,
Nic
i remember it as something like this,
Im pompaii pom a lay
pom a gasky im pompaii
pom a lay
acadamie
so far me
acadamie
poof poof
We used to sing –
Om Pompeii moma lei
Momma lisca om Pompeii
Faraway
Hakkadunny
So funny
Hakkadunny
Push push
Hi, Nic, my sister and I have been talking about this poem and you seem to remember the version we remember.
We were at school in Lanark, Scotland, in the late 70’s (in my case) / early 80’s (in my sister’s case).
Very small (probably regional) variation –
In Pompeii, pompeii
Polla-na-ski
In pompeii
Pol-an-ie
Aca-dem-ie, aca-dem-ie
So-fam-ie, so-fam-ie
Boom Boom
Of course, I have noooo idea what it might mean but I’m sure it’s a corruption of some Latin poem / something kids in bygone times had to learn by heart.
Hey Hlz,
Thanks for the reply, this is pretty interesting because I grew up just outside of New York City, in the late 80s. I have no idea where the song comes from either, but would love to know what it meant/means.
I think we used it kind of like a ring-around-the-rosie game and all fell to the ground after ¨boom boom¨. I´m guessing it has something to do with the Pompeii eruption but who knows…
Happy New Year!
we do one called trickside
will tell u it tomoz
At my school me and some of my friends we do round one pair start then it carrys on:
pepsi cola
pepsi cola
give me give me give me some pepsi cola
boys got the muscles
teachers cant count
girls got the skinny legs
you better watch out
got Hypnotise
power liser
turn around and flait
Theres a home video of me and my sisters doing this rhyme. I’m 20 now and I was 4 in the video. I learnt it from my sisters who were 7 and 9 at the time now (22 and 24 now)
Coca-cola
coca-cola
Ally Wally pussycat
Ally Wally pussycat
The boys have got the muscles
the teacher can’t count
the girls have got the sexy legs
you betta watch out
I’m gonna hypnotise ya,
paralyse ya
turn around and faint.
they also did a remix with the Cocoavamango song haha.
@Jori instead of “hit me baby, hit me baby
turn around and fall down” at the end after “better watch out” we used to sing:
“youve gotta hit me once,
youve gotta hit me twice,
youve gotta turn around and faint”, which seems most similar to your Dutch version?
You guys it’s
Coca cola
Coca cola
Coca cola
Drink me up
Kiss a girl
Get drunk
Love coca cola!!