I made a new tumblr (as I want to keep this one clean for whenever i have an urge to write) It’s over at http://heenim382.tumblr.com/ if anyone wants to follow ^^

“Race Gender Generation
Nation Language Culture
Religion History
Be one”

The five of us are standing not far away from the still empty stage. Eyes glittering with excitement as I stand on my toes to see if the door to the concert hall has finally closed. Still open. It seems like forever and some music is on repeat in the background; music that had gotten us into a party mode when we first got there had now turned annoying and never ending in the wait for the artist to enter the stage.

Next to me are my friends and two girls whom I’ve never met before. Not knowing eachother doesn’t matter when you’re stuck this close and you’re all waiting for the same thing, with the same form of expectations. We share a couple of highfives and keep asking eachother for the time. Finally, a man enters the stage in a warm jacket and sunglasses and soon the screams of the audience begin to echo between the walls. Mine as well. I can’t keep them back as I look over at the artist who I’ve idolized for so many years now. The one whose lyrics and words have helped me through so much is finally on the stage in front of me. Right there, rocking out on his guitar to the title song of his new album; What’s My Name.

The songs continue and weirdly enough they mix together in a blurry memory of jumping and screaming. There are laughs, sweat and even tears; a girl behind me is crying but she’s reassuring us that she’s okay. The artist, Miyavi, grabs the mic to hold a short intro speech which ends in laughter as the language fails him a little.

I had never really understood just how amazing of an entertainer he is. Following his career for so long I had always known that he had the talent of entertaining and taking well care of his audience, but actually being there and seeing it brought my understanding of him as an artist to a whole new level. He keeps his never ending promise to rock us all while making sure that everyone is singing along with him, before taking short breaks to watch over his fans by asking if everyone is doing okay in the most crowded areas of the room.

Im standing behind two girls who keep looking at eachother to exchange big smiles as if to say ‘this is really happening, isnt it?’ It’s an amazing feeling, not just the way he performs but the way he makes us all come together as one, just like he always wishes us to be; one. It doesn’t matter if you haven’t met before, at this time everyone shares the same smiles and the same passion. Everyone joins in swaying back and forth to the rhythm of Itoshii hito and We love you.

The music continues and Miyavi makes sure to move from side to side of the stage, pointing to parts of the public to make us sing along with him until our throats can’t take it no more. He calls out for us to bounce and even though I can feel a bunch of people stepping on my poor toes, at this moment it doesn’t matter and the pain can’t reach me. I turn around to see one of my friends smiling just as widely as I had been for the last two or so hours.

There’s a sort of empty feeling when Miyavi, after a great performance, decides to say goodbye for now. But even after he’s left the stage, the surroundings say it all. I find those I had talked to before it began and everyone, just like me, are exhausted and seemingly still stuck in the somewhat surreal feeling of what we had just been through. These feelings all mixed together can only come out as wide and understanding smiles.

This will forever be one of the best nights of my life and I appreciate how I can now fully understand and truly share the feeling of being one.

Timeless.
Thoughtless.

Holding the big cup of hot cocoa right under her nose, Emily took a deep breath while closing her eyes. A few seconds of silence went by before she mumbled; “No, I can’t feel it.”

She stirred the chocolate loudly by letting the spoon hit against the porcelain, her actions revealing that she was desperatly trying to drown out the sound of her own thoughts.

“How can you not?” Her friend asked.
“It’s everywhere, all the time.”

Emily’s friend had always been madly in love; not only with her just-got-married husband but with life itself, as both nature and material treasures had always appealed to her. Emily on the other hand had never really understood the meaning of love or why it caused everyone to go so awfully blind. After all, why would you adore a feeling that was meant to push all other emotions aside? If love was as kind as everyone preached it to be; why had she seen it cause so much harm, over and over again?

She turned around to face her friend, to ask about this feeling and finally have it explained to her; but her friend was nowhere to be seen, hadn’t been for months now, hadn’t been around since she gave in to love and forgot everything about silly little things such as hot cocoa. If love was patient, why was it greedy enough to leave everyone else tangled in loneliness?

Imagination.
Always timeless.

More than once have people come to me on youtube to ask for advice on how to make projects for their idols or even to claim that they wont ever be able to make a video, what they describe as, ‘good enough’. I’m in no way good at this either but I will try my best to explain the things I do while making a project, from the slow beginning to the amazing feeling towards the end.

The only time I’ve tried to give advice on this subject was through a video of endless rambling; tired after a danceclass and high up on the pink clouds as an after effect of Heechul watching our project earlier that night. I’m pretty sure my words back then made little to no sense. SO, here I am now, and knowing myself and my passion for writing; I’ll probably ramble on forever again, this time here on paper.

.. and in way too many words. If you’re willing to read, here we go;

Read More

“I actually did what I said I would do. I did music, in Korea. It worked out.”

It’s 2am in Sweden and I have this urge to write again but for some reason I end up with a blank page. It’s like I suddenly have all of these worries; How do I form my words and keep my grammar okay enough to hide the fact that english isn’t my first language at all? I once had this dream, maybe I still do sometimes, of becoming an author. Writing has meant alot to me the last couple of years, but I fear how limited I feel sometimes. How far away from the actual language. But I have something I want to get down on paper. No, not just want, need. I need to get it down in order to clear my thoughts enough to be able to finally sleep. So, as I can’t seem to write to the readers today without having too many unclear worries, I decided to write this to Tablo. Even though he may not see these words, at least my mind will be able to relax for a bit.

Dear ‘blo.
Thank you.
For not following what every other person says,
for not just going with what everyone else thinks or believes to be right.
You make me believe that no matter who a person is, where they’re from or where they’ve been; if they have dreams, they can make it happen.

I sometimes feel as if people are expected to do certain things and walk certain paths, depending on who they are, or rather who they seem to be to the outside world. It’s as if society feels this urge, this need to put everyone into little boxes with big fat labels on them, you know? Even if one dreams, others may shake their head and say things such as “but that will never happen. Not to you.” I’m never sure of what path to walk down or where I will end up but I’m hoping to find that one thing that I can cling onto hard enough to be proud of.

I hope that I can one day look back and say “You know that thing I dreamed of? It worked out.”

Now, I’m an optimistic person even thought I often feel uncertain of the future..  But with people like you, Tablo, I feel alot more determined to find a dream and do my very best to reach it, no matter what anyone else may expect or say. And that’s why I ended up feeling this need to thank you.

This text is nothing amazing, nothing that stands out, probably not with very good grammar or wisely chosen words. But I want to leave it just like this. And even though it might not have been interesting for anyone who stumbled by; I now feel as if I’ve sorted out my thoughts enough to relax again.

Thank you, ‘blo.

Your tears do not matter.
Neither do your smiles.
Your cheers of support & your reasons for love,
your time, your effort, just the same.

Money from the hands of a blurred face, it’s all they need.
All they ever had.


Copyright issues. You see them everywhere, and you know that the copyright holder is always right. You are the one who is wrong. Yet you can’t help but to feel sad, angry, frustrated, badly treated.

WMG has always been a pain when it comes to copyrights. Your favorite fanvideo is now muted. Silent. Not at all the wonderful piece you used to watch every morning to get you happy enough before you head out to face the world.

We, the kpop fandom, have had issues with full shows being removed. This is understandable, as korean citizens could simply watch online instead of paying for their tv, right? Never mind the fact that some poor fans (who never asked for a single penny) had spent hours and days translating and subbing these shows as to show it to other fans, because little do we know; not everyone in this world speaks and understands korean, but still cares for and enjoy their culture.

Is it wrong? Is it wrong to spread the like of a fandom, to make others understand a tv show that they wouldn’t have known about if it weren’t for those who had subbed and uploaded to sites like youtube?

For me, I spent a year making something called ‘the suju guide’. It was just a simple thought at first, just one of those ‘I wish everyone could see beyond the number of members and actually take their time to understand each one of them and understand why it is that they’re loved by so many’. So I did, and I still remember just how much it took from me to finish the 13 videos. I remember how each one would take nine hours straight if I only concentrated on making them and nothing else, and if I worked fast without even answering my mails and hurrying through dinner. I remember how bloodshot my eyes would be when I turned the computer off at 5am after finally getting the video up on youtube for others to enjoy. How I would stand by an open window, ready to pass out because the world wouldn’t cease to spin. No honestly, I did. That’s how much energy it all took from me.

And in the end, without a penny for the work, it was all worth it a million times over. I had so many viewers out there say that they had first now taken their time to understand Heechul, that they had thought of him as arrogant and never paid him much attention, until they saw those sides that I had tried to point out. I read so many comments about smiles and tears. I never intend to sound emotional or cheesy when I write, but the feeling of having others around the world share my emotions, at the same time, is something beyond great.

And so my ‘chaan’ account was deleted due to copyright holders of japanese dramas. I lost 2000 subscribers, which may seem like a very small amount compared to others, but to me, my ‘chaan’ channel was my home. Burnt down to the ground, with all of my friends gone, all my work, my time and one of the things that had given me the confidence that I needed. I spent hours going through a massive amount of mail in my trashbin, on my livejournal, notes of usernames in my notebook, I contacted them one by one to let them find my new account ‘heenim382’. After more than half a year, I’ve gained the number of subscribers back, but I still feel sad that there definitely are old subscribers out there who still have no idea that I came back.

Now, not only has SM Entertainment decided to put out ‘contains content from’ notes under each video that contains a song from an SME artist, but SBS is getting there too, ready to delete any clips with shows from their channel.

Now let’s face it, all together; They’re right, we’re wrong. But is this really it? Your smile doesn’t count. They don’t give a damn if you cried last night watching the Kyuhyun guide while praying for him to forever be safe. Of course they don’t care that one of their artists watched a fanproject video and told us that he appreciated it. They don’t care for the fact that their companies, their music and shows, brings people together from all of these countries, all of these different religions and believes. They don’t care for that, for us, for our work of subbing and making fanvideos, if it means that they can loose money in the process. Money that they already have a great deal of.

I might be naive but I’m not dumb. I can see right from wrong and understand the word illegal. I know that these companies have all the right in the world to do whatever they please, but I wish that they would think twice this time. Because in the end, after all that I have said now, my only wish is that these companies could, for once, understand that without the internet and videos and music spreading illegally, we wouldn’t know about them. I sure wouldn’t know of Super Junior if it weren’t for Full House being subbed on youtube. How did you find Kpop? If you don’t live in korea or a country that sells their cd’s and airs their tv shows with english subs (or at all), if you don’t live in a country that pays any attention whatsoever to kpop on their news or radio.. How would you know about kpop if it weren’t for the internet?

Honestly, tell me how. Because to me, there wouldn’t have been an SMTown tour without the internet, and definitely no sold cds over yesasia. No one on my side of the world (Sweden) would know that kpop as much as existed if it weren’t for those who have uploaded things illegally.

Now they already have our support, so they believe that taking actions against these things is a good idea because ‘of course the kids would still order the cds’, but really now, how much longer would all of these foreign fans support your bands if they can’t ever keep up with new performances and variety shows? We can buy your cd’s online but we wouldn’t know anything about the artists without these shows. ‘Knowing’ the artist is what keeps us, or at least me, a fan. Does that not matter? And here I thought that entertainment business wasn’t only about the music and the money, silly me.

So good luck SBS, SM and all of those who will soon follow. Thank you for nothing.

“He spoke to me yesterday! I can’t believe it, I was so happy.”
But she didn’t smile at all, as she continued;

“But then they all said I did wrong by speaking to their favorite artist, so I bowed my head to apologize..”  She gave out yet another sigh, causing her breath to mix with the cold air.

“They also said that they hated my hair, so I cut it off..” She whispered, gazing down at the busy streets.

Just another celebrity. She hurried to throw her friend a quick smile to reassure him that she was still okay, that she always was and always would be..

“They said they wanted me dead, so I laughed it off..”


                                                             ~ * ~


The streets. Like ants walking all over eachother to make room for their own path, to make their way through to a goal that they haven’t even set. Someone calls out in anger, slamming their hand against the hood of a car as the driver had almost run them over. Busy busy busy, we’re all too busy to notice what’s going on with our own neighbour. That one person over there or the one next to you at the bus stop. Didn’t you see her cry? Didn’t you see the man who wobbled across the street, holding a plastic bag of clinking bottles? The woman who just broke the heel of her new shoe, didn’t you take notice of her? You didn’t, did you?

This is only another one of those streets. One in a billion, even. No one pays another second of attention to what is going on down here. No, everyone’s focus is, and always will be, not only on their own lives but also on those who work to entertain. Work to make them all smile even during days like these. Those like her, the one now watching them from above.

You, the one reading this, you hate antis too don’t you? Those who pay more attention on letting their own frustrations out on a complete stranger rather than dealing with their own lives and problems. I do too, we all do. I honestly never took my time to hate on an artist, but there are those who will hate on others without giving it a second thought or even realizing it. With your hand to your heart, have you ever dissliked an artist or a band? What did you do? Did you show it in any way? Did you throw it out there, did you join others to discuss just what you hate about him, about her, about them? Even if you didn’t tell them directly, you did whisper about it to others, didn’t you? Are you telling me that you actually spent your time and attention, even if just for a second, on those you dissliked, just for the sole purpose of hating?

Now, no don’t take your hand away from your heart just yet; would you tell your neighbour girl that she had to diet even if she’s suffering from underweight? Would you slap your classmate across their face because they greeted the boy or girl that you liked? Would you smirk and wish that someone had died the second after they told you that they had survived an accident? That man who just slammed his hand against the hood of your car, were you too busy talking on your phone or did you actually intend to hit him?

For the second part of these questions, the ones not related to artists and bands but to people around you; You wouldn’t, would you? At least I believe and hope that you wouldn’t. Did you notice what I was trying to point out with this or were you too busy looking the other way? Did you spot the difference? No, because there is none. The way you treat someone who is seemingly living for the public and the way you treat the person next door shouldn’t matter. How could it?


                                                             ~ * ~


“I already told you..”  She whispered as she hurried to pull her sleeve down to let it cover what seemed to be a wound.

Her friend was still listening. They were alone up here, and he was the only one she dared to tell.

“I’m okay, really. But thank you for asking.”  She turned to her still silent friend; the plastic horse between her shivering hands.



Don’t waste your time hating on someone else, no matter what your reason may be. And just like that, don’t laugh it of if it’s done to you.

—-

Notes;

- ‘Those like her, the one now watching them from above’, The ‘rooftop’ picture I used is of Daul Kim, a model who has comitted suicide, but in no way is my text related to her or any other artist, I only used this picture as a source of inspiration.

- The inspiration of what I just wrote came from my own thoughts, the picture and from something Kim Heechul tweeted just recently after BoA had been attacked by both anti’s and SuJu fans;

“If you know that I’m hurt to see my celebrities being attacked, you should also know that I get hurt looking at other celebrities being attacked.
There are these kinds of fans and that, and I want to say ‘all the fans are mine!’, but I’m not a clean wrap and I can’t protect all of you. People who support me while attacking others. I don’t think of them as my fans..

Protect what needs to be protected and let’s have fun.”

(note: this blog entry is not written to state an opinion and I dont believe that celebrities live a 24/7 sad life, so don’t rage on me for expressing myself in this way.)

“Oppa!” Sara suddenly exclaims as she leans closer to the computer screen, causing her half eaten ramen to tip over and spill to the floor.

“Who is that woman?” She points, almost hysterically while enlarging the picture that her number one idol had just tweeted.

“Madeline, get over here! Have you seen this picture? You must’ve seen it, it’s been up for an hour already!” Sara goes on and on, as her sister enters the room.

First when Madeline kneels down to the floor to clean up her sisters mess, does Sara even notice the spillt ramen.

“Aish..” Sara mumbles.

“Leave it, I wasn’t going to finish that anyway. God knows I don’t need more food if I ever want to look like whatever-her-name-is.” she’s still concentrating on the picture and the beautiful woman next to her idol.

Sara’s fingers find the keyboard, forming words that will be part of the already spammed twitpic. “Who is that woman? Why oppa, why?!” When she’s finished, she leans back with a sigh.

“Sara..” Madeline finally speak up as she throws the spillt ramen into the trashcan.

“Don’t.” Sara raises her right hand.
“I just wish that.. for once, I could be a part of their world. A part of glamour and luxury.”

                                                       ~ * ~

Glamour. Everyone aims for some form of glory. A moment in the spotlight. Even you, even I.

But nothing is ever what it seems. Even if something is shiny on the outside, there will be scars on the inside. What you learn and see through media is never going to be the entire truth. Media can blow things out of proportion just like companies can sweep dust under the carpet.

Beauty, perfection, flawless. Do these words even exist? There is something called make up, hours of waiting while a stylist is picking out your clothes and running a brush across your face to cover up any of those signs that you weren’t able to sleep last night, or the night before that, or the night before th..

Your anti’s are flooding your cyworld with hateful words, cutcutcut.

“There were comments like ‘You should’ve died this time, too bad you didn’t die.’ Entertainers exist to give enjoyment to the public. We’re not fish on a cutting board, please don’t cut us too much.” - Kim Heechul.

Your fans are keeping the spark in your eyes burning, keeping your dream alive and your smile wide. But then there are those who comment spam your picture with hateful words and questions whenever the person next to is of the other gender. If you suddenly decide to leave because you can’t stand the way you’re being treated, there will always be those who wont understand or care about the reasons behind your actions. Your celebrity friend calls you late at night after finishing their schedule, crying over a blood written letter found outside their dorm and your other friend is still in the hospital after drinking something given by a so called fan.

Is it the expectation of working 24/7 and still being able to hold your image as ‘perfect’? Perfect. Girl bands on diets when their weights are already dangerously low. A woman on the other side of the earth dieting because her idol weighs less than her. Is this what you call glamour?

Somewhere, a boy has a dream. He fights to get there but will meet obstacles on the way. What obstacles, you and I will never know.

“Because when I debuted, I didnt know anything and I was just happy.” - Kim Heechul

And somewhere, a woman sleeps with an older man to gain the status that it takes to grow as an actress.

Sleepless nights, scandals if you stay at home as well as scandals when you go outside, obsessed fans and hateful comments..

Camera cue, now smile. Brighter, like you actually mean it.

                                                       ~ * ~

Madeline stands quiet, her thoughts in a mess and Sara’s eyes still piercing hers, waiting for an answer.

“You have freedom..” Madeline whispers, causing Sara to roll her eyes.
“You can go to the store or the park. You can look the way you want without it being anyone elses business, eat what you feel like eating and express what’s on your mind without worrying about tomorrows headlines.”

That freedom is luxury in itself.

The 5th of July 2010 has just passed in my country.

The 5th of July.. Now I wish that I could pour my heart out and explain what this day meant and how it affected so many people, but it seems like the words wont come to me. I write just to delete it and start all over again. Words wont do it justice. There’s just this change in the air.

There’s this one thing that I wish to say though. Something that I wish to get down in this blog. To put it out there in a simple way; I don’t know about other ELF but to me Super Junior has been something for me to fall back to. Even while going through difficult times they’ve made me smile alot.. And so, of course, every time a member leaves I’d end up thinking “What about me?” How ever selfish that sounds, it’s just at the back of my head. “If they go, what will happen to my smile?”

Now I know for a fact that anyone reading this have at least one problem at the back of their head right now. Something that’s bothering them, may it be small or big, may it be something that you’ve struggled with for a long time or just the fact that there’s a horribly big spider on your wall right now; everyone has something that they need to deal with. For me, I have a couple of major things that I’ve pushed to the side for many years now, and I’ve learned that problems wont go away just because you’re trying to cover them up.

The 5th of July.. It’s the day that Kangin left for army. He will be back in two years, and we all know that it seems like forever right now. So what will we do during these two years? I don’t think just sitting around, waiting for him to return is the right thing to do; I think we all need to take this time to over come whatever problems we might have. The strongest raccoon of korea is going to become even stronger during his time in the army, isn’t he? So we should do the same.

Now this may of course seem confusing to anyone else and only make sense in my own little messy head, but I think that, by dealing with our problems and taking good care of ourselves during these two years, we’ll be able to greet him again with our heads held high and with our smiles brighter than before.

So to all ELF who cried when he left; hwaiting!
And to Kangin, stay strong and know that your fans will do the same.

It’s 2:23am, I’m tired and I should sleep but I have this urge to write. Not about anything specific, just write. There’s this silent scratching beneath my chest, telling me that this day wont be completed unless I put some words down on a way too blank paper.

It’s 2:27am, Paramore just changed to G-dragon and I wish I could turn the volume up but the world is still asleep. Oh right, where were we? Ah, writing. I chose to just write about the first topic that popped into my already full mind, that one thing that’s always at the back of my head; fandom. Though if I were to spaz about my favorite korean boy band you would all get tired of me too soon (we’ll just leave that for my next blog <3) so I’m going to write about fandom itself, the fans that is.

Once upon a time I was slightly afraid of even taking a step closer to the word ‘fandom’. The only times I payed attention to this word was through the horrible headlines about fans that had taken a step too far and the so called anti fans, not to mention that word ‘netizens’ that not only fans feared but also the celebrities themselves. Back then, even though I loved Super Junior; I wouldn’t have called myself an ELF. The three letters ‘ELF’ was something I only saw, knew and associated with things that came out in the news..

But later on, as I got more and more into the Kpop fandom, I began to realize what it really is and what it can stand for. Here we are, people from across the entire world who represent a very wide age range; just human beings going along with their own lives, facing their own problems with their untold past and unknown future. And even though we would’ve never acknowledged eachothers existens, we talk, laugh, smile, even cry together, all thanks to this word that I used to fear; Fandom. Because all of these fans (whether you’re a fan of a band, a movie, a book) have something in common and therefore something to share.

What I think is amazing about all of this, is that our past, religion, believes or quirks wont seem to matter in the same way as if we would’ve met under other circumstances. Something else that has touched me just through the last year is the amount of support I’ve gotten just by sharing an interest like this, I’ve gained a handful of people who would care for me even outside of fandom and that’s something amazing, isn’t it?

Now I never meant to get all cheesy or sentimental here, let’s remember that it’s almost 3am in the morning (and that my GD!dance mood has now changed into some sleepy drama Ost), but I guess those were the words I wanted to get down.

Now there is no way that I could contact everyone that I’ve felt touched or supported by during the last year, and only a few are going to stumble over this blog (maybe even less will read it to the end), but for those who did read it all and have shared or can understand this experience of fandom, to you, my Ever Lasting Friends; Thank you.