| Drupatee Ramgoonai - "Lick up mih Nani":
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This irreverent song, an ostensible lament for a grandmother's
accident which conveys in its tone a totally different meaning, was on its first appearance
both hugely appreciated by Drupatee's fans and severely criticized by her detractors.
While the main text of the song relates the details of the accident in gruesome detail
(grandmother's leg was broken, she's now in a coma, etc.), the refrain, sung by the female
chorus is fast-paced and almost joyous. The song plays on the double meaning of "nani" in
Trinidad: grandmother to East Indians, and vagina in street slang.
Drupatee's manager Simone Ragoonanan talks about the double meanings in chutney and chutney-soca,
saying that because Trinidadians did not know Hindi or Bhojpuri "most of the people.don't have
a clue what's in the song; but when they hear it in English they get mad", suggesting that
Nani was not very different from the cooking night songs from East Indian weddings. Drupatee
herself insists laughingly that the phrase is "lick down mih nani" (although the chorus sings
"lick up mih nani"), "but it's double meaning", adding that "The audience love that song".
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