Housei Komatsu & Himawari Sisters -- Panpaka Panda（パンパカパンダ）

 

I think that I can say that the relationship between the Japanese and pandas are like the ones between sushi and wasabi and me and kayo kyoku. As far as I know, the country has been ga-ga over the giant panda for decades. There's been a recent swell in popularity for a couple of young panda cubs siblings at the Ueno Zoo in Tokyo with fans waiting patiently for who knows how long to get their lone minute in front of the glass to take multiple photos of Xiao Xiao and Lei Lei.

From what I've learned, the Japanese love for pandas may have gone as far back as the early 1970s if not earlier, but my personal realization came in 1981 during that Japanese language school graduation trip when we made our stopover in Kobe during the Portopia fair. As I recall, there was a panda craze back then for some reason.

So as such, I wanted to see if I could find any kayo kyoku that might be associated with the giant panda. It didn't take too long before I came across this kid-friendly tune from 1973 called "Panpaka Panda" (Ta-Da Panda) as part of a novelty song compilation called "Koi no Huang Huang"（恋のホワン・ホワン...Huang Huang in Love）. Sung by a combination between Housei Komatsu and Himawari Sisters（小松方正＆ひまわりシスターズ）, I couldn't find anything really on the latter girls but I found out that the late Komatsu was an actor and a seiyuu who had appeared in some of the early anime hits such as "Eight Man"（8マン）and "Tetsuwan Atomu"（鉄腕アトム）. His music contributions were restricted to just "Panpaka Panda" and one other tune in 1974. As for the songwriting, Sammy Chiba（サミー・千葉）was on the lyrics while Yusuke Hoguchi（ほぐちゆうすけ）took care of the music; for some reason, Hoguchi didn't register his name at JASRAC under his usual kanji but all in hiragana.

To finish things off, perhaps I can leave that to adorable Mei Mei to sum up how much in love the Japanese are where the giant panda is concerned.