hahahem.

My father, the Balinese, has several nonsense rhymes that he learned from his childhood days which he has kept reciting forever. He would do one out of the blue:

Kaki, Kakiang,
Dadong, Dadongkang.

And he would do another one to follow his yawnings:

Ha, ha, hem
Meli tuak ji nenem
Men sing telah bang Dèlem
Kutang pedalem
Nuangin masem.

Both are sung with only two tones, one low and the other one higher, with a diatonic interval of a bit more than a major second, and more emphasis (tenuto-like) on the higher tone.

If I would try to notate them (with the rhythm and tone), the first one would be somewhat like this:

2/4

.1 | 2 12 | 1
.1 | 2 12 | 1 ||

And the second one:

4/4

2 2 1’1 11 | 2 22 1’1 11 |
2 22 1 .1 | 2 22 1 11
2 2 1 . ||

The first one is just simply a funny word game:

Kaki means Grandfather; Dadong means Grandmother. Kakiang is a general term for all old people; while Dadongkang doesn’t mean anything. Dongkang, however, is some kind of a frog that’s really big.

Ha, ha, hem in the second one is somewhat onomatopoeic. My father would yawn and already start the rhyme – so Ha, ha, hem would be the sound of his yawn and the rhyme would extend out from it.

Meli tuak ji nenem – bought coconut-wine of six (bottles)
Men sing telah bang Dèlem – if not (/can’t) finish (them just) give (to) Dèlem
Kutang pedalem – throwing (them is) a pity
Nuangin masem. – keeping (them only turns them) sour.

Dèlem is the fat, meek one of the two fools in a popular traditional form of puppet theatre. Dèlem‘s skinny companion is Sangut who’s more opportunist. In the Javanese version of the same characters, Dèlem is Garèng, and Sangut is Petruk.

My father doesn’t know where exactly he learned these from. Just from around, he said, from the Balinese people.

Another one that he likes to recite out of the blue is:

34 | 5 32 1 34 | 55 32 1
Duni – a, duni a, duni – a ha, duni a

Dunia simply means the World(ly). He said he started reciting this only after he reached adulthood.