Growing Up In The 90s 16 Things Our Kids Will Never Understand
Each decade is identified by its own respective idiosyncrasies when it comes to fashion, music, TV shows, movies, and technology. The 80s were pretty over-the-top with hair-sprayed bangs, shoulder pads, and punk rock. Perhaps to atone for said outrageous times, the 90s were a lot more subdued, but if you ask any child who grew up in the 90s, no less fun.
In fact, many can attest to the fact that the 90s was a pretty awesome decade. There were major leaps in technology like the more widespread usage of cable TV and the advent of the Internet. Fashion was a lot classier and less kitschy. And oh, the games 90s kids played back then were awesome. Without any smart phones or high-tech consoles, children had to rely on the likes of kooch balls and Quizmo to keep them entertained. It was a great time to have a childhood, that's for sure. Here are some of the things that only kids who grew up in the 90s would understand and appreciate.
16 Everyone and their mother danced the Macarena
Catchy tunes are always hits and the song Macarena is no exception. Pair it off with some kitschy dance moves and it goes down in music history as a classic. Even more than 20 years later, the 90s kid still has good memories of the hit song performed by the Spanish singing duo Los Del Rio. It's still played every so often on the radio, as a backdrop for kiddie parties, and is even part of dance challenges in video dance games.
15 Spice Girls everything
Before Beyonce and Rihanna dominated the pop music world, there were the Spice Girls, that all-girl singing group from the UK. All the girls from the 90s adored them and the boys crushed on them. Girls wanted to identify with each of the five ladies and fought over who was like Sporty Spice (Mel C), Ginger Spice (Geri Halliwell), Baby Spice (Emma Bunton), Scary Spice (Mel B) or Posh Spice (Victoria Adams Beckham). And of course, everyone sang or danced to their songs, which included Wannabe, Stop, 2 Become 1, and Spice Up Your Life.
14 We ruled at Super Nintendo
Kids these days play video games in fancy consoles like the Xbox, PlayStation or Nintendo Wii. But many of them might not realize that Nintendo started it all with its Family Computer back in the 1980s. A Nintendo Super NES was considered a significant upgrade from the console a decade prior. The 90s kid played games like Street Fighter and Super Mario Brothers on the NES, in which graphics were pixelated and movements of the characters were choppy rather than fluid and smooth, but no one complained!
13 Boy bands
While it's true that boy bands have been around for decades with the likes of The Beatles or New Kids on The Block dominating the music charts during their respective heydays, it was in the 90s when the boy band trend truly reached its peak. Boys and girls alike went gaga over the likes of The Backstreet Boys singing Quit Playing Games with my Heart, Boyzone belting out Love Me For a Reason, and 98 Degrees crooning Invisible Man.
12 You had to take your Tamagotchi with you everywhere
When the parents of 90s kids asked them what they wanted for Christmas, almost all of them begged for a Tamagotchi. For those not familiar with what this is, it's a handheld, pocket-sized digital pet created in Japan and housed in a small egg-shaped computer and hung on a keychain. You had to treat it like a real pet, meaning it had to be “fed,” “cuddled”, “played with,” and “put to bed,” all by pressing the various buttons on the device. To say it was a distraction from school and homework is an understatement!
11 Rose and Jack in Titanic were your OTP
For those not in the know, “shipping” goes way, way before the likes of Damon and Helena from The Vampire Diaries or Noah and Allie from The Notebook ever graced our screens. In modern speak, we totally ship our OTPs or One True Pairings. OTPs are our favorite onscreen couples whose love stories we absolutely drool over. Back in the 1990s, the ultimate OTP for almost anyone who flocked to the movies was Rose and Jack, played by Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio in the blockbuster film Titanic.
10 Dial-up internet was the way to go
Kids of today will never know the pains 90s kids went through just to get on the Internet. Back then, there was no such thing as Wifi, LTE, or the speed we enjoy on our home Internet connections. Dial-up Internet may be a thing of the past, but it was painstakingly real for those who experienced it. You needed a telephone line to dial the Internet Service Provider to connect online. But if Mom or Dad needed to use the phone, too bad. You had to get offline pronto so they could make a call.
9 You'd listen to the radio all day just to record your favorite song
Back in the day, there was no such thing as iPods, iTunes or satellite radio stations. There were regular radio stations that played the latest hits all day. Today, if you want a copy of your favorite song, you just download it on iTunes and save it onto your music player. But over twenty years ago, 90s kids would have to listen to the radio all day with a cassette recorder and blank cassette tape on hand. When the song came on, they'd scramble to record it, then hit the stop button before the DJ's voice could come back on.
8 MASH was the best pen and paper game
Instead of going to a fortune teller or psychic to get your fortune told, the 90s kids had a fun pen and paper game called MASH to “predict their future.” MASH stands for Mansion, Apartment, Shack, and House and it determines what type of house the player will live in in future. The players can choose other categories as well, such as name of future spouse, how many children they'll have, and type of career they'll end up in.
7 You owned one of those 10-in-1 colored ball pens
Notetaking was never more fun than in the 90s, when you could write in your notebook using varying colored pens. Red for the heading, blue for the content, green to underline important portions. And it was so easy because back then, 90s kids had 10-in-1 colored ball pens. They just had to pick the color of choice and alternately switch from one color to another. Said pen was practically a staple in all students' pencil cases.
6 You were cool for owning a CD player
If cassette tapes were huge in the 1980s, the big technological enhancement in music in the 90s was the CD and CD player. 90s kids could easily brag to their friends in school that their dad just bought a CD player for the family and that they were building their collection of music in the form of CDs. The sound was sharper sans any of the scratchy audio that was found in music played through cassette tapes or records.
5 You Can't Do that on Television!
If you watched Nickelodeon in the 80s and 90s, then for sure you came across the show You Can't Do that on Television, a sketch comedy featuring pre-teen and teenage actors. Probably the most memorable aspect of the show was its main star: green slime! Every time one of the actors said “I don't know” a pail-full of slime would be poured over their heads from above. The audience got such a kick out of it and looked forward to all those slimy moments.
4 “Be kind and rewind” those VHS tapes
Today, kids and adults alike watch movies on on-demand, Netflix or those recorded on their DVR. But in the 90s, kids had to bug their parents to rent movies in VHS format. Those big, boxy monstrosities came in tape format and would be popped into bulky VHS players. And there was no better place to rent movies than the local Blockbuster Video Store, where the moto was “be kind and rewind” before returning the rented tape to the store.
3 You had to get your film developed
It's practically unheard of in this day and age to go into a Kodak store and have photos developed, unless those photos are meant to be framed. Putting together actual photo albums is a thing of the past. Back before digital cameras and phone cameras were the way to go in terms of taking and storing photos, 90s kids had to rely on point-and-shoot cameras and polaroid cameras. And let's not forget the negatives that came with the actual photographs after being developed!
2 Everyone loved the Savage brothers and their shows
Regular kids of the 90s would watch TV every opportunity they got. With the great selection of shows back then, it's hard to blame them. In the early 90s, kids loved seeing Fred Savage playing the titular character Kevin Arnold in the coming-of-age show The Wonder Years. The year it got cancelled, Savage's brother Ben Savage appeared in his own pre-teen-targeted show entitled Boy Meets World. It's safe to say the Savage brothers were fixtures in every 90s kid's growing up years.
1 You got to watch Ariel, Belle, Jasmin, and Simba in theatres
While it's true that Disney animated films have been around since it released Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937, there was a decided decline in the success of the studio's films for quite a few decades. The “rebirth” of quality Disney films happened in the 90s, to the excitement of kids back then. They were lucky to have had the privilege of watching in theatres such films as The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin and The Lion King, which are some of Disney's most beautiful films.
Sources: buzzfeed.com, emgn.com, lifehack.org, hellogiggles.com, popsugar.com
