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I'm a General Music teacher.

One of my 1st grade books has a song called, "Naka Naka Hoi."

The (what I'm learning may be the romaji) words are:

Naka Naka Hoi Soto Soto Hoi Naka Soto Soto Naka Naka Naka Hoi

There is, however, no translation. As far as I can figure, naka means inside and soto means outside, and the Japanese for naka is 中 and for soto is 外. Please correct me if I'm wrong!

My last problem is I cannot for the life of me find anything about the word, hoi.

I would like to teach this as authentically as possible, but do not want to do so until I have the translation and Japanese.

Thanks in advance for your help!!

Felipe Chaves de Oliveira
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Erin Ronne
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    *Hoi* (ほい) does not mean anything, it is an interjection juste like *hey* in English. – 永劫回帰 Apr 25 '19 at 14:18
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    Related: https://japanese.stackexchange.com/questions/66023/what-does-%e3%81%95%e3%81%a3%e3%81%95-mean/66025#66025 –  Apr 25 '19 at 16:06

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You seem to be on the right track. Seeing as it is more of a fun activity song for children, it most likely carries no deep meaning, so "hoi" in this context could be a "hey" or "yeah"

Rainy
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  • Thank you for your help! I thought it was something like that (children's songs are kind of universal that way...), but I didn't want to make an assumption. – Erin Ronne Apr 25 '19 at 15:02