Harman Patil (Editor)

Bikicsunáj

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Bikicsunáj ([ˈbikitʃunaːj]) is a mondegreen that appeared as an internet meme in Hungary in May 2010.

László Szarka, a 40-year-old security guard from Ököritófülpös, Hungary sang the Alphaville song "Big in Japan" with very poor English pronunciation on the first episode of the fifth season of Megasztár, a talent show on TV2. "Bikicsunáj" is the mispronounced title of the song, using Hungarian phonetic pronunciation. The recording was first seen on TV2 on May 1, after that it immediately appeared on the Internet and rapidly gained extraordinary popularity.

The meme spread from user to user, people sent the link of the video through circulars and messaging services, then it appeared on blogs too. On May 2, the recording was uploaded to the video sharing website YouTube and within a week was seen by more than 500,000 people. The Internet community responded quickly to the video, Bikicsunáj labeled T-shirts can be bought and the Bikicsunáj fan club on Facebook already reached more than 30,000 members. All of this was reached in less than a week.

He also performed the song "Forever Young" by Alphaville with similar English pronunciation ("Furevü ján" pronounced [furɛvy jan]).

Szarka was invited as a guest to the Hungarian late night show Frizbi, aired on TV2 on June 6. In the show, he performed "What is Love" in the presence of the song's original performer, Haddaway; the resulting performance quickly became known on the Internet as "Don Hörbi". He also announced his plans to run for Mayor in his home village of Ököritófülpös. Finally, he did not fulfill this promise, and didn't run for the title on the 2010 elections.

The song 'Bikicsunáj' was covered by Palic-based ethnic Hungarian, Ana Kojic, in her weekly Saturday night concert at the Boss Cafe in Subotica, Serbia.

Lyrics to the "Bikicsunáj" song:

References

Bikicsunáj Wikipedia