The Itsy-Bitsy Spider Has a Name, pero Solo en la Hispanidad

One fun thing about living abroad and meeting expats from all over the world is seeing how bits of culture make their way from place to place and the often unpredictable changes they undergo in the process.  I was speaking with some grad students from Bolivia and China, the latter explaining how, due to the difficulty most westerners have with pronouncing the different tonalities in Chinese names, she uses a transliterated version of her real name pronounced in Spanish or English, depending on who she's talking to.  (N.B.  This is actually a trend I've noticed among Chinese students here in Madrid, although many I've met have chosen a typical American/Spanish name rather than a direct transliteration of their real name.)  Her name, in Spanish, is pronounced "Huizi" (woo-EET-zee), which the Bolivian pointed out was just like the name of the spider from the kid's song she grew up with.

Witsi Witsi Araña trepó a la canaleta,

vino la lluvia y se la llevó.

Luego salió el sol, y la lluvia evaporó,

y Witsi Witsi Araña de nuevo subió.

"Witsi Witsi" seems to be the most popular version of the name, but there are variations ranging from "Huitzi Huitzi" to "Gusi Gusi."  Otherswise, the lyrics are pretty much identical to the English version of "The Itsy-Bitsy Spider," as is the melody.  Any suspicion that this might have been a local variation or the creation of a particular teacher evaporated when one of the student's friends arrived and recognized the song.  The friend was from Ecuador. (For those without maps handy, Ecuador and Bolivia aren't exactly neighbors.)

I haven't drawn any special insights from this.  I just think it's an interesting example of cultural transmission.

Haunted, the Companion Album to House of Leaves

Music and literature have an enormous influence on each other.  In March 2000, Mark Z. Danielewski released the famous (and excellent) House of Leaves.  In October of the same year, Poe released her album, Haunted, with many songs based on or in reference to House of Leaves.  What may seem stranger is that House of Leaves also references Haunted, with Johnny Truant finding a band playing a song titled "5 & 1/2 minute Hallway" including the line "I live at the end of a five and a half minute hallway," the first line of the song.

Now the immediate assumption would be that Poe incorporated this into the album, except she began recording the album in 1999, before the book was released.  This is easily explained: Poe is the stage name of Ann Danielewski, Mark Danielewski's sister. In fact, in the 2001 remix of her song Hey Pretty, Mark provided a voice-over at the beginning, reading directly from House of Leaves.

 

If the existence of a companion album to House of Leaves wasn't enough to get you to listen to it, I should say that it's a really good album.