Joanna and I have decided to dedicate a blog page to our obsession with Korea and to include all the information we learn as we prepare to go to Korea to work. It is an easy way to keep all our information in one place and share our knowledge with others who are interested in doing the same. We thought that it would be best to start now since we have about a year to go before our dream of moving to Korea will happen.
I must admit the fascination for Korea started because I was sick in bed one day reading an online manga (not Korean manhwa). I've always been fascinated with Asian culture from a young age, yet until last year, the only thing I knew about Korea was that there was a North Korea and South Korea because of war...etc. Back to my original story now.
So I was reading the manga online and googled the title I was reading at that time. Instead of the manga, google brought up the link to a site (i.e. dramafever.com) for the Korean dramatization of the manga. Never one to question the greatness of the google search engine, I clicked on the link. I was sick anyway so I started to watch Boys Over Flowers and fell in love with goofy story. However, there were a lot of pop culture references from Korea and slang that I didn't understand that confused me. I also kept wondering why the heck were they bowing at certain times and why did they keep saying "Oppa." That started google searches to learn more about Korea.
However, the clincher to start the Korean obsession wasn't the drama per se. It was the Yun Ji Hoo character. Yep...I became a fangirl of Ji Hoo. (I'm holding in the three pages of comments I could be making on the fabulousness of the character Ji Hoo ... so be grateful.)
In the middle of watching the drama Ji Hoo sang and played a song. Ever a girl to swoon at a good looking guy singing and playing a guitar, I once again bowed to the power of google and youtube to find out who he was. Ji Hoo was played by Kim Hyun Joong who is a leader of Korean boy band, SS501. I started to listen to his band's music (my favorites being A Love Like This and A Song Calling for You) which also led to my fascination with other Korean bands that youtube recommended. At this point, I probably know more about Korean music than I do about the current American bands.
My roommates, at that time, just thought I was weird as I switched over from watching American movies to Korean dramas and started listenting to mostly Korean music. Luckily I have several friends who have lived a couple years in Korea. I actually did not realize how many people I knew that had lived there until my obsession had started. And they keep popping up in my life. If that isn't a sign, I don't know what is. Thus the Korean Obsession was born which led to our decision to move to Korea for a year and work. Joanna will add her part of the story of how she became fascinated with Korea too.
Each week, Joanna and I decided to put up links to other blogs about Korea, comment about the dramas we are watching (only to practice learning and listening to Korean, of course...keke) and things we are learning about Korea. Super excited!!!!!
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