The Korean Invasion: In Which I Become Obsessed... Again.

Often my sister Megs will say to me... "Hey, I like this thing. I bet you'll like it too!" And many times it turns out that the thing becomes a life changing event.

For instance... blogging. She said... "Here you should join this thing and blog with me." And , since I'd been pondering blogging for oh probably two years by then, but had not been brave enough to actually start, I jumped in when she pushed without a second thought. And you know what's happened since.

Another example, Josh Groban. I'd heard of him. I thought, he sounds interesting, but eh, I don't know. She said, "Hey you should listen to this guy." So I did and, you know what's happened since.

And so well.. .she's done it again.

This time she said, "Hey, so my friend said Korean dramas are cool. I watched some. And guess what, they are cool! You should watch one!" And then one day she drug me (pretty much literally) to the computer where we watched the first episode of one called Lie to Me.

I kept watching. She was right. It was cool. I liked it. She said, "now watch this one called She Was Pretty. It has Siwon in it." I said, okay cool.

Meet... Siwon

And I loved that one, like, a lot.

Meanwhile, her infatuation with Siwon grew, and she discovered that he sings in a Korean boy band. And she sent me a couple songs through Spotify. I listened. I liked. I listened again. I loved.

That was a month ago and nothing has been the same since!

Together, we have immersed ourselves into discovering all there is about this particular group. We've learned that Kpop is a pretty big thing, especially around the world. And that there are several similar groups like this.

But this one, this group, will forever be the best because it's the one we discovered first. And besides... it has Siwon.

They are called SUPER JUNIOR, which, I agree, is a stupid name for a Korean boy band. But it grows on you. They have about 13 members, but the number changes all the time because the boys in Korea are required to serve two years in the army before they are 35 or something. So often, there are members missing. It started out ten years ago... TEN YEARS, with the idea that every year they'd switch it up and get new guys, but the first group was so awesome they didn't do that, and they've been going strong ever since. This means that now, ten years later, these guys aren't your normal young teenage band, they are late 20's early 30's which some may find weird, but others may find less weird. (When it comes to swooning over them for instance. That being said, they still LOOK like they are 18 years old!)

The list for why it's easy to fall in love with these guys is long. I'll try to sum up:

1. They are gorgeous. Beautiful. Adorable.
2. They have the most beautiful voices.
3. They dance, oh boy can they dance!
4. They play instruments too, sometimes.
5. They are funny, and cute, and silly, and humble.
6. They put on the most incredible shows, called Super Shows, which look like a roaring blast.
7. Their music ranges from rock, to hip hop, to rap, to pop, to ballads.
8. They throw in enough English that you forget that they are actually singing in Korean, a language that, alas, you don't know. But it doesn't matter because it sounds so freaking cool.
9. Did I mention the dancing? Because that's worth two points.
10. Did I mention they are gorgeous? Also worth two.

Here are the three favorites:

Donghae, Siwon, Eunhyuk

And of course, I made a collage of the whole crowd. (Minus a couple were in the group, but are not any longer.)

The two on the left in a together picture aren't in the main group, but are part of a sub group. Which is too confusing to explain. But I love their stuff just as much! Also, the group picture in the middle is missing one or two, but I'm using it anyway!

Across the top; Siwon, Heechul, Shindong, Yesung
Second row: Kyuhyun, Leeteuk
Third row: Henry and Zhoumi (together,) Ryeowook
Across the bottom: Kangkin, Donghae, Eunhyuk, Sungmin

Of course, you won't really care who they are, or what I like most about each of them, you'll just have to go and discover for yourself!

Which is the whole point of doing this post, to see if I can convince one or two people to give it a try and see if you, too, aren't sucked in. Or, to find out if there are some other closet Kpop, Kdrama fanatics out there and then you can come out, and we can bond.

So...some links;

If you especially like dancing: Mr. Simple or Sorry Sorry
If you want to see what their concerts are like: Superman
If you are blown away by beautiful ballads: Concert Ballad Medley
If you find the playing of instruments and singing and dancing all at the same time cool: Fantastic
If you enjoy a big production number with costumes and acting: Mamacita
If you want to see boys all emotional about their 100th concert accomplishment: 100th concert
If you like just plain old cuteness: Oppa Oppa (This one is just Donghae and Eunhyuk)
If you like a rocking dancing mix: Motorcycle (Also just Donghae and Eunhyuk)
The song and concert clip that sealed the deal for me: Walkin' which I'll embed here:



And it's not even a dancing one! It was the last song of this concert after they were all recovering from crying and being all emotional and they just walked around the stage, singing and mingling with the fans. I love it.

Click here for a link to my favorite Super Junior songs on Spotify

And there you go. My latest obsession revealed. Do I have any takers? Will you listen to a few? Watch some dances? Do you think I'm crazy? Do you understand the tendency to find a thing and then go crazy loving it? Do you find it fun to do that? Or painful and annoying? What sort of things have you obsessed over? Do you hide it or share it?

Anyway, let me know if you watch and/or listen and what you think!

(P.S. Want to know what Megs thinks about all this? Here's her post on Kdrama, and here's her post on Super Junior.)