Yet none of these versions have quite achieved the same immediate effect that the 1993 jingle had on the three-year-old daughter of The Great Singapore Workout’s creator.
Without the veneer of nostalgia, the various revised workouts fall flat.
WHAT MADE ACES DAY A SINGAPOREAN CLASSIC BACK THEN?
Perhaps it was the fashion. The bright yellow T-shirt, high-waisted pants, tight cap, paired with high socks and bulky uncle-style sports shoes, made a pretty rad uniform in an era when class T-shirts were all the rage.
Or maybe it was the even-toned narrator in the video, whose calm lilt hypnotised me into an obedient stupor, arms raised and ready for the rhythm. I often felt like one of the aunties around my neighbourhood who’d blast similar-sounding exercise tapes during their morning aerobics at HDB void decks.
But it’s more likely that ACES Day got lodged in the recesses of an entire generation’s collective childhood memory because we didn’t have social media’s fleeting algorithm to shove yet another newfangled fad at us every other day. We could fully appreciate and experience trends, taking our time to decide whether to incorporate them into our culture longterm.
ACES Day in its OG form probably wouldn’t be as classic or have as lasting an impact if it were launched today.
It’d be subject to the cynicism that underlies much of online humour, and it’d be considered cringe. Or perhaps the workout would still go viral, albeit in irony rather than earnestness. The zeitgeist has shifted.
At least I will always have an effective code phrase to identify fellow millennials around my age who grew up in Singapore.
Flush, flush, poooooot.
