sweetdough

I'm a singer. You can find me hanging around UC Irvine most evenings during the school year at rehearsals, performances, etc. Check out the a cappella groups! I'm also a member of Men in Blaque, a men's chamber choir based out of UC Irvine. I've performed with them in Korea (Daegu, 2004), and definitely want to get back there some day. I've also performed in China (2006, 2010) in Beijing, Shanghai, Xiamen, and Shaoxing, most often as a part of the World Choir Games. So yeah, I've been singing for a while now.

I started really getting into Kpop around December 2009-January 2010. I started watching Wonder Girls' videos after their appearance on So You Think You Can Dance (where they said they were Asia's number one girl group(?)), and then started watching KARA videos somehow. Luckily, I had a Korean-American roommate at the time, who saw that I was watching a lot of videos, and he showed me the "Oh!" video. He told me, "Well it's short for 'Oppa,' and, I dunno, it's just a really cute video." I was kinda hooked from then on. I also saw Gee, and frankly, wasn't very impressed...until someone in my a cappella group arranged it, and I was immersed in learning the choreography and lyrics. After finding some translations and subbed videos, it made me want to find more and more. Eventually I stumbled across SoshiSubs, Invincible Youth, We Got Married (Goguma and Adam Couples!), and so many other shows that Soshified subs...and then SM Town in LA was announced. I was actually kind of freaking out because the tickets were going on sale when I was going to be in China (I think), and so I didn't know if I'd be able to get tickets...and then I heard that fanclubs would be able to get priority seating...and then I finally joined Soshified. I had been lurking for a bit (as far as I remember), when the airport style site was just coming on. But yeah, eventually I was able to get decent seats when the next wave of tickets came out, and I got some friends to come out, too. One of the guys had never really listened to Kpop, and didn't really know who SNSD was (he was the beatboxing guy from the fanmeetup). But he had a really good time. And my other friend, who is all into DBSK, is super into Kpop now, and even has taken a year of Korean.

It's been a really cool couple of years...hopefully I'll be able to go to Korea and see them in concert again, or catch them the next time they're in North America!