It may not have been organic, hand-cuddling, or educational, but it still triggers dreamy, nostalgic memories: The toys of the 80’s and 90’s. bets?!
Every Friday Marijke Amado sent us through the magic bullet. Instead of Playstation we played Sagaland while Grandpa smoked one after the other. In the schoolyards, rubber twist was the thing and painted pencil cases were a hit. So who doesn’t fondly remember their childhood between Rubik’s Cube, Gameboy and Co? Do you remember back then?
1. Monchhichi
Loved dearly because simply super cute: My Monchhichi. The thumb-sucking cuddly toy from Japan was already very popular in the 70s and 80s, but even in the 90s it faithfully accompanied me through one or the other crisis of my childhood self. I still don’t know exactly what a Monchhichi is supposed to be, but the memory I associate with the monkey-like figure is at least as cuddly as its fur.
2. Polly Pocket
Just playing with her wasn’t really enough for me. I wish I could have been a Polly myself and lived in a pocket. Everything was always so colorful and she always had ice cream or a pool or both and even more. What kind of grand life is that? And the fact that you could take the squeaky miniature world with you everywhere was of course an extra plus.
3. Keyper’s animals
My best friend had an armada of Keyper’s animals. I thought they were all great and so mysterious, because you could hide all the little treasures you had in them and lock them away. We felt mysterious. And I was jealous, too, because my parents refused to buy me one.
4. The trolls
Did we all? The strange trolls with wild punk hairstyles in the brightest colors. And although actually not particularly pretty, they were somehow dearly loved, the imperfect trolls.
5. Pacifier chains
Looking back, I’m still ashamed of this trend: pacifiers! On chains, backpacks, braid holders, shoes – everywhere. But why only? Freud might attest to deficits in living out our oral phase, but either way we just found them incredibly easygoing.
6. Tamagotchi
One of my absolute highlights: Tamagotchis. Almost the counterpart to today’s smartphones. At least we’ve definitely driven our teachers crazy with our “pets” at one time or another. But it doesn’t help, if the chick was hungry, it just had to be fed. Priorities were clearly set.
7. Diddl Mice
As soon as the pacifiers had disappeared from the backpacks, the diddle mice took over and dangled from the zippers of the lowest Eastpak backpacks. But not only there: Diddle was available in various sizes. The most popular was probably the common cuddly format, and then came the postcards, mugs, key rings… Well, wasn’t that nice. Rarely has a cuddly toy triggered such a hype as this mouse with the completely oversized shoes.
8. Furby
Today Furby actually scares me a bit. If you were to equip the strangely speaking cuddly toy with a miniature axe, he would be a potential candidate for the next trash horror film. Back then, we thought Furby was pretty cute. Even if he could only utter single words, you had to play with him all the time, he wanted to be fed somehow and only gave peace if he was banished to a dark corner.
9.Barbie
Barbie, Ken, Skipper and Co. – The pink world around the plastic doll with the unrealistic body dimensions was incredibly popular. Put it on, take it off, style it: Barbie has been through it all. Fortunately, Barbie is now not only available in the super skinny version that is far removed from reality, but also in other body shapes, skin colors and different professions and vocations.
10. Surprise Egg Characters
Shake until your joints hurt! After all, the Happy Hippps, dwarfs, penguins and the like were in great demand and were given their place of honor in incomparably ugly type cases in quite a few households.
11. My Little Pony
The colorful ponies with the funky names are still around and millions of children still love them. However, they look a little different today than they did 33 years ago. Nevertheless, we thought little paradise, sweet wood, cuddly fluff and flowers were at least as great back then.
12. Worliworm – The magic worm
In the 1970s/80s they had absolute cult status in the toy scene. Even today you can still buy the worm in different colors and have it perform a trick or two.
13. Stair Runner
The thing and a lava lamp were pure relaxation for me. In an endless loop I let the stair runner slide back and forth in my hands and stared at the lava lamp. Unparalleled relaxation and digital detox.
14. Game of Life
Once a classic, always a classic. The board game with dice game elements, in which a curriculum vitae from high school to retirement is played through in various stages, whereby the individual decisions of each player in relation to career, family and financing are important. The goal is to have accumulated as much capital as possible by the end of the game. So actually like in real life.
15. Bouncy Ball
The bouncy balls really got going. There were a thousand colors and later also various shapes. In addition, it was of course much more fun than the ergonomic version that we have in the office today.