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Pong Pagong is an anthropomorphic turtle, similar to Big Bird of Sesame Street, standing over six feet tall and towering over human co-stars and aged to be around six years old. Together with its co-muppet, Kiko Matsing , the characters were custom made in New York for Sesame . [ 1 ]
Unlike the bilingual (Filipino and English) Sesame!, Batibot was done entirely in Filipino and featured stories in a Philippine context. An arrangement with CTW was made in order for the characters Pong Pagong and Kiko Matsing to continue their appearance including one human character Kuya Mario.
The origin of the story can be traced to the Ilocano, [3] which is linked to Indian arts. [4] The Ilocano version of the story offers an explanation on why monkeys don't eat meat. Versions of the story has a common theme of a weaker but cunning character (the tortoise or turtle) winning over a stronger adversary (the monkey). [3]
The Philippine Children's Television Foundation is a non-profit organization that pioneered educational television in the Philippines. It was initially formed to partner with Sesame Workshop (formerly Children's Television Workshop) to create Sesame!, later known as Batibot. [1] [2] [3]
It was bilingual (Tagalog and English) and featured Filipino human characters and Filipino content alongside Sesame Street material in English. It featured a turtle muppet named Pong Pagong (the show's counterpart of Big Bird) and a monkey muppet who lived in an abandoned jeepney named Kiko Matsing (patterned after Oscar the Grouch).
This foundation went on to create Batibot, which maintained much of the Sesame Street formula while being produced solely by a Filipino team. The show was able to retain use of the Pong Pagong and Kiko Matsing puppets due to a license agreement with Children's Television Workshop.
Pascua's unique claim to fame, however, was a segment called "Mga Kwento ni Kuya Bodjie" ("Kuya Bodjie's stories") which featured Pascua telling a new short Children's story in every episode. Pascua called on his theater skills to make the narration lively and to give each character in the stories their own unique voice.
Tong also has a brother called Katang who planned to take revenge on him at the middle of the story. His name is derived from the Visayan nursery rhyme Tong Tong Tong Pakitong-kitong, which is about crabs. Pagong - a tortoise who is helping Tong in his adventure. He amazes Tong with his collection of turtle eggs. Aso - a wild dog. He is a lost ...