Around 10 years ago I was invited to visit the Gulf Cooperation Council Joint Program Production Institution, or GCC JPPI for short. It’s a super long name, but if you grew up in Kuwait during the 80s, all it takes is one look at their logo to recognize who they are. They were behind some of the most memorable and iconic shows on television back then from popular Arabized cartoons to their own shows like Salamatak (سلامتك), Quff (قف) and of course, the Middle East version of Sesame Street, Iftah Ya Simsim (افتح ياسمسم).
The GCC JJPPI was created to strengthen the cultural, historical, and traditional connections between the GCC member states. They also wanted to create shows that reflected the Gulf spirit starting in 1977 with the iconic educational children’s program Open Sesame (Iftah Ya Simsim).
Before visiting their facilities located in Salmiya, I had assumed all their archive had been lost during the 1990 invasion, but turned out they still had copies of everything. When I visited back then they had just started digitizing their whole archive, and I recently found out that their archive was now mostly all online and available to stream for free.
If you go to YouTube and search for the user “Barameji”, you’ll find that they’ve uploaded over 3,000 videos. Thankfully, they’ve also organized them into different playlists and include the following shows:
Bombo (بومبو)
Flona (فلونة)
Jazora (جازورا)
Iftah Ya Simsim (افتح ياسمسم)
Quff (قف)
Tom Sawyer (توم سوير)
Salamatak (سلامتك)
For me, Salamatak and Quff were probably the most impactful shows growing up. They were public information programs for both children and adults, teaching things like not littering, not smoking while filling up fuel, or not talking while eating. Random educational lessons that have mostly stuck with me, and I’m sure with others as well. I mean even the opening theme songs are still stuck in my head to this day.
If you want to check all the playlists, here is the link.
10 replies on “Watch your favorite 80s cartoons and shows on YouTube with Barameji”
Wow. Today on FM I heard the opening song for the cartoons on KTV. “Kri Kri Kri Ya Kri Kri Kri”. I must have heard it after 30 years. My friends and I were from India but we used to watch Arabic cartoons even though we didnt understand. The blissful times. I remember Simsim also.
They were *pubic* information programming
shit I thought I fixed it lol
Salamatek! That intro theme song is definitely living rent free in my head too.
Tom Sawyer, cartoon ? Now that’s something I had missed watching, not knowing it exists.
I would love the voice overs in Arabic cartoons, especially, the ones in Fiona and Rajul el Hadeedi. Most summers, we kids were jobless and would watch whatever was on KTV. Iftah Ya Simsim was a perennial favourite and I vaguely, remember there was ” Zeina” I enjoyed watching as well. Woody woodpecker, Road Runner and Scooby Doo cartoons were other favourites but I think outside of “Popeye” and “Tom & Jerry”, KTV was less keen on the other English cartoons for which you depended more on Ch 33 and Ch 55.
you might appreciate this post
https://248am.com/mark/television/english-cartoons-from-the-80s/
Grandizer!!
I quite enjoyed watching Salamatak ! which presumably means, Good Health or Take Care! in Arabic.
Have they drawn the plug on Salaamatak or is it still on.
I assumed the plug was pulled a long time ago
Hey, what a great find, thanks for sharing!
Let’s hope they include “Adnan wa Lina” (Future Boy Conan) one day. I think it was also produced by GCC JPPI, I believe the Arabic dub was done by an Iraqi cast if I am not mistaken. The series is definitely one of the better anime series at the time, right up there with Grendizer and Faris Al-Fada3 (Captain Future).