Yakko's World

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"Yakko's World"

"Yakko's World" is a song from the second episode of Animaniacs, sung by Yakko Warner. The song starts with a map of the world and an announcer saying "And now, the nations of the world, brought to you by Yakko Warner!" Yakko pops onto the screen and then starts a very fast song, the melody of which is based on the tune of the Mexican Hat Dance, naming the countries of the world, save some irregularities (see below). As he sings, he points to each country so it glows.

1 Lyrics
2 Missing countries
3 Places that are not countries
4 Other irregularities
5 Trivia
6 See also

[edit] Lyrics

And now, the nations of the world, brought to you by Yakko Warner.

"United States, Canada, Mexico, Panama, Haiti, Jamaica, Peru
Republic Dominican, Cuba, Caribbean, Greenland, El Salvador too
Puerto Rico, Colombia, Venezuela, Honduras, Guyana and still
Guatemala, Bolivia, then Argentina, and Ecuador, Chile, Brazil
Costa Rica, Belize, Nicaragua, Bermuda, Bahamas, Tobago, San Juan
Paraguay, Uruguay, Suriname, and French Guiana, Barbados and Guam....

The other nations are mentioned in the following order:

Norway - Sweden - Iceland - Finland - Germany
Switzerland - Austria - Czechoslovakia - Italy - Turkey - Greece
Poland - Romania - Scotland - Albania - Ireland - Russia - Oman
Bulgaria - Saudi Arabia - Hungary - Cyprus - Iraq - Iran
Syria - Lebanon - Israel - Jordan - Yemens - Kuwait - Bahrain
The Netherlands - Luxembourg - Belgium - Portugal - France - England - Denmark - Spain
India - Pakistan - Burma - Afghanistan - Thailand - Nepal - Bhutan
Kampuchea - Malaysia - Bangladesh - China - Korea - Japan
Mongolia - Laos - Tibet - Indonesia - Philippine Islands - Taiwan
Sri Lanka - New Guinea - Sumatra - New Zealand - Borneo - Vietnam
Tunisia - Morocco - Uganda - Angola - Zimbabwe - Djibouti - Botswana
Mozambique - Zambia - Swaziland - Gambia - Guinea - Algeria - Ghana
Burundi - Lesotho - Malawi - Togo - Spanish Sahara
Niger - Nigeria - Chad - Liberia - Egypt - Benin - Gabon
Tanzania - Somalia - Kenya - Mali - Sierra Leone - Algier
Dahomey - Namibia - Senegal - Libya - Cameroon - Congo - Zaire
Ethiopia - Guinea-Bissau - Madagascar - Rwanda - Mahore - Cayman
Hong Kong - Abu Dhabi - Qatar - Yugoslavia
Crete - Mauritania - Transylvania - Monaco - Liechtenstein - Malta - Palestine - Fiji - Australia - Sudan

[edit] Missing countries

Some have commented that this song does not actually name all the countries of the world. Naturally, some were non-existent at the time, such as Eritrea, East Timor, and Palau; while some states broke up into smaller countries after the song was made, such as Czechoslovakia, which was to split into the Czech Republic and Slovakia shortly after the release of the song and Yugoslavia, which subsequently broke up into Slovenia, Republic of Macedonia, Serbia, Montenegro, Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. It should also be noted that the map being used is that which includes Russia after the Soviet break-up but prior to the independence of each of the individual Soviet republics, so Ukraine, Belarus, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and so on are treated as part of Russia, which was accurate at the time the song was produced. The United Kingdom is not listed as such, but instead two of its constituent countries, England and Scotland, are listed, and two are not--Wales and Northern Ireland.

That notwithstanding, the song in fact excludes:

[edit] Places that are not countries

Several regions, territories, islands or cities are mentioned which are not actual countries:

Crete is an island of Greece.
Caribbean is a sea or region, not a nation.
Transylvania is part of Romania.
Tibet and Taiwan claim to be, but are not widely officially recognised as, independent from People's Republic of China.
Bermuda is a British colony, as was Hong Kong at the time of broadcast, prior to its handover to People's Republic of China in 1997.
Greenland is a self governed territory of Denmark.
Puerto Rico (with its capital San Juan, also mentioned) and Guam are American territories.
Sumatra is an island of Indonesia, and Borneo is an island that includes Malaysian states of Sabah and Sarawak, Brunei and Indonesian province of Kalimantan.
French Guiana and Mahoré are colonies of France.
Mahore is also another name for Mayotte, which is an island in the Comoros. This is most likely why they weren't mentioned.
Abu Dhabi is mentioned, but the United Arab Emirates as a whole is not.
Algier is mentioned; this is an incorrect way of saying Algiers, the capital city of Algeria, which is also (correctly) mentioned.
Asia is listed, but it is not incorrectly listed as a country. It is listed as the continent where Bangladesh is located (Bangladesh, Asia).
Palestine is not recognised by the UN as a country but a region containing Israel, Jordan, the West Bank and the Gaza strip.
Tobago is mentioned by itself, but the country is actually Trinidad and Tobago.

[edit] Other irregularities

North and South Korea are mentioned together simply as Korea.
Yakko refers to "both Yemens"; the country was reunited in 1990, three years prior to the episode's release.
Kampuchea was renamed, most recently to Kingdom of Cambodia in 1994.
Dahomey is also mentioned by its modern name, Benin, with its territory highlighted both times.
The map has many mistakes, e.g., in addition to wrongly showing the former USSR as Russia, Nepal and Bhutan were not shown on the map but flashed when it was mentioned. The Chinese province of Tibet was shown as Nepal on the map. Sicily, the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, was not shown.
Israel is misspelled as 'Isreal' in the sing-along version.
Switzerland is shown larger than it really is.

Most of the irregularities occur simply to fit the tune of the song. True, Wales, for example, could have been inserted instead of Benin, which is also mentioned as Dahomey, but since the other countries being sung at the time were in Africa, it would have made little sense. Therefore, these irregularities fall under poetic license.

[edit] Trivia

During the first verse, the camera is zoomed in on North and South America. In a (likely intentional) act of goofiness at the end of the verse, the camera quickly pans left as Yakko reaches across the Pacific to point to Guam, with eastern Asia visible beyond. When the entire map is viewed, however, the map is not continuous across the Pacific; Asia and Guam are on the viewer's right.
In another episode, Yakko does the same thing with the same music and costume to say all the words in the English language, presented as buffers between shorts throughout the episode.
In the Season 4 episode "Cutie and the Beast", when Yakko manages to say Dot's full name ("Princess Angelina Contessa Louisa Francesca Banana Fana Bo Besca the Third") without error, Dot comments, "Thank you, Mr. United States-Canada-Mexico-Panama!" These are the first four countries in the song.
In the Pinky and the Brain episode "The Third Mouse", when asked what he knows, Pinky responds, "The lyrics to 'Yakko's World'." Yakko and Pinky are both voiced by Rob Paulsen.
Zaire is the last word Yakko sings when he sings every word in the English language.
Yakko's World is also the title of one of the musical albums that Animaniacs released with the Rhino Records label.
In the episode "The Sound of Warners," as the Warners are sleeping in their bed, Yakko has a nightmare, stressing over missing a country in the song.