O-Zone -- Koi no Maiahi （恋のマイアヒ）

During the cruise over the last week, I actually managed to see a few movies on the stateroom screen including one of Sly Stallone's minor efforts "Bullet To The Head". Plus, there was also the Dreamworks flick "Puss In Boots", the spinoff sequel to "Shrek". I liked the character on "Shrek 2" especially when he pulled off that Sad Eyes look but never got to see Puss In Boots in his own movie.

As much as Antonio Banderas stole the show in "Shrek 2" though, he almost had his own show stolen by the Ohhhh Cat. All hail the Ohhhh Cat!

Speaking of cute trending felines, I'm reminded of a popular little meme several years ago when I was still living fairly contentedly in Japan and this video featuring cartoonish cats were dancing it up a notch with this European pop song playing in the background. It became the exotic earworm of the year titled "Koi no Maiahi" (Love's Maiahi) when it came out in late 2004 as a feature on 2channel.

The original song was "Dragostea Din Tei" by the Moldovan band O-Zone in 2003. With the official English title being "Words of Love" (although the literal translation is "Love From The Lindens"), O-Zone was singing an uptempo romantic ditty but in Japan, the humorists got hold of it and made it into a catchy tsukkomi tune. Not sure how it did on the Oricon charts...or even if it even did chart but it made a solid blip in Japanese pop culture for some time because of those cute cats.

The late crossdressing entertainer Ken Maeda（前田健）kept the party going for a while longer when he took on the role of a high school girl and created a singing unit called the Maeken Trance Project（まえけん♂トランス・プロジェクト）in 2005. They released a couple of singles with the first one being "Koi no Buchiage Tengoku"（恋のブチアゲ♂天国...Love's High-Tension Heaven）which was a merging of "Dragonstea Din Tei" and two other songs arranged as a trance tune. I saw the video in a store somewhere one day and I sorta reacted like the Ohhhh Cat.