11 Saturdays and K-Pop

Week 9 - Korean History 

November 18th 2017

I kind of afraid that I might not enjoy this session at the beginning but it turns out to be one of my favourite week! Brigadier Brian Parritt was the guest lecture and he was a part of British army who fight alongside South Korea for the war in 1953! I don’t actually realise that until he shown us the slides of his picture that he took during the war. And from a photographer myself (amateur one lol) it’s a really good picture! Every picture that he took has meaning and it just struck me, like literally. Plus he was so kind and nice, not just being a really good story teller, but also he wrote a book and signed it for all of us <3

The activity we did was watching a Korean War film. I watched the first hour and continue the rest at home. It’s called ‘The Front Line’. I personally love it as it’s a really funny film yet meaningful. Try to watch it when you have time!

Last week will be our last week and I prepare something for our graduation. If you by any chance follow this post of mine then you’re lucky to see this before anybody else (LOL!) I’ll post it on my next post so please look forward to it!

So yeah, that’s all for this week’s diary entry! Please look forward to my next week diary!

November 11th 2017

Soooo... no. I didn’t attend last week class because of my shift that finished late. I’m so expecting this week as it is located in British Museum (where I used to live for the past year) and I never know about having a room for Korean arts. I tried to ask Yasmin about last week class but apparently she didn’t attend the class as well :( so I only can look at pictures and others diary entry about what they did last week and it was stunning! I saw they have miniature of Korean palace (?) 

I wonder if I will have a chance to go to the place without needing special occasion because I might visit them myself sometime next week.

Ps. I’m not a trainee anymore yey!

Song Cover - My Old Story (IU)

This is something that I never done before. I really have a bad voice and to be honest, if you by any chance found this please keep the feedback by yourself okay? It took a lot of courage for me to do this, but it’s not that I have any choice due to tight schedule and barely slept in the past 2 weeks, so I’m doing something that can I can do within an hour or less. 

I actually covered 2 songs, this and Modern Times by IU. But somehow I can’t sync with the song properly and accidentally my boyfriend found out that I covered a song (I was so embarrassed!!) though he said that he will help me to masterize the cover and send it to me next week (ah yes, he’s a sound director slash sound editor slash composer). He even said that he could make my voice sounds like IU (I’m laughing so hard at this) but anyways, I’ll try to post it next week once he send it to me.

Once again, as this cover really matter for me (I feel like this does relate with my privacy life kind of thing LOL no jk) please do not use this for any other use but just to let you know how much I love IU and her songs :’)

Week 7 - KPop Dance

November 4th 2017

Here with me again! Updating you about last week meeting for KPop academy. Last week class was probably one of the most classes that everyone’s looking for. It’s a dance class (and it’s a KPop dance wohoo!). After 3 weeks of vote (I guess? I don't actually remember) Winner’s Really Really dance was chosen to be covered. I personally never listen to that song until I’m about to making my way to the class, it’s not going to be good if I don’t even know the song right? Though apparently I’ve heard of that song couple of times in Korean restaurant or any other places but never know the title LOL!

Anyways, the class was conducted with Tammy Jane, who’ve been covering so many kpop dances and joined competitions internationally as well (omg she’s awesome). I’m having a great time, sweating, learning new dance after I have to stop covering kpop dance a few years ago. My first impression of the song is, the dance is not going to be hard. Well it is, except of one part of it. And the craziest part of it was, the activity of the week is making our own group and covering the dance (and you’re allowed to add creativity etc). I don’t expect our group to be win to be honest (and I’m sure all my group mates are too as we saw the other two groups dance so great and it just make us feel small lol). But turns out that we win! I still don’t understand why but I’m so happy (thanks to everyone’s ideas about how to make the dance more creative). 

It’s my first (and probably the only one) win during the week / homework since everyone’s are so good and dedicated while I’m getting more and more busy and cannot even update my diary and working on my homework on time anymore. So last week had the best experience because I won something haha

So yeah, that’s all for this week’s diary entry! Please look forward to my next week diary!

Week 6 - Taekwondo

October 28th 2017

Okay so I don’t know what happened but all my post last Thursday (the diary update + the homework) is gone! I remember to post it but I can’t find it anywhere (sigh). So I’ll just make a new one here :(

Firstly, sorry for being so late. It was supposed to be posted last Thursday but like I said, it’s not there. Anyways, let’s get back to the diary post for our 6th week of K-Pop academy! 

So yeah, exactly as written on the title, it’s about Taekwondo (yay!). With master Jongho Kim who have been doing Taekwondo for more than 20 years, yet he said he’s still not categorised as senior ones (I wonder how long does it take to be considered one). With his assistant that helped me a lot as well as I’m struggling to remember the movement though I’ve done martial arts for 2 years during primary school. 

It was so fun and I even forgot to take my own pictures and had to asked Yasmin to send me our pictures that she posted on Instagram (thank you you’re my saviour!). I’m an introvert yet I have to shout while doing sparing with people. I have to put my courage to be able to do that (and I’m glad that I did). Because it’s not just about the movement, but also your brain and heart have to work together to do Taekwondo, something that I really admire from it.

So yeah, that’s all for this week’s diary entry! Please look forward to my next week diary!

If you find this recipe different with other recipe that you find in other website, just to let you know that I never make food following a recipe, I cook all my food based on how I taste it (if you’re curious why lol).

Hello! This week was such a hell week for me. I had so many issues that I need to deal & coping up with + I almost passed out yesterday during work. So apologies for the late post (sob). Anyways, after managed to get up from my bed this late afternoon (and realise that I need to eat something) I started to look on my cupboard and drawers and see what I could make with all available ingredients for this week homework. Thankfully I have appropriate ingredients to make tofu soup (though I need to get out to get the vegetables in the end but it’s only 2 minutes walk to nearest shop).

I personally never made this one, but I’ve been wanted to since months ago (that’s why you might spot some ingredients that people barely use but for this particular dish. Making this kind of soup suits my condition as well since I need something warm (and of course you can make this food as it’s winter is coming up soon!).

Week 5 - Hansik

October 21st 2017

Free meal of the week! (oops)

This week is the chance for me to learn how to cook Korean cuisine. with Hyungsoo Yim (Korean Food Researcher) as our guest lecture, he explained and demonstrate 4 Korean cuisine from meat (my favourite!) to kimchi. I was so amazed on how he could finish prepare and make all the four types of food in an hour while still engaging with us. But this week class feels a bit noisy, probably because they’re having the same feeling as I do (like muttering the words and talking to each other on how could that be possible) well, we’re talking about someone who owns a restaurant in New Malden so there’s no doubt that he can cook in such a professional level.

I have a big interest with cooking (but not pastries since I couldn’t make any of them lol). So I’ve been looking forward to this class ever since I applied for K-Pop Academy. Since I’m working as a kitchen staff in Japanese restaurant which serves Korean food as well, plus I cook my meal by myself it’s such a great opportunity to finally cook Korean food myself (as in, the only Korean food I ever made was bibimbap, which probably the easiest food you could ever make). And this week activity was making our own Korean food! We formed a team of two (me and Ildi worked together at this time) and we made seafood pancake and tofu salad!

Though sadly we didn’t win this week’s activity but I’m having a lot of fun! Working with her was such a bless too since she’s really good at platting while I’m really suck at it lol!

For this week homework, I decided to do something different and do something that interest me the most, creating my own Hanbok. The theme for this Hanbok is pretty unique, which is ‘K-Pop Academy’ so I decided to combine the traditional (such as clothing shape and the colour) and modern (embroidery and printing motives) concept on this Hanbok that I created.

Week 4 - Hanbok

October 14th, 2017

I almost late for this session (thankfully I didn’t lol). After had a year end party (annual party from my course ; we celebrating the final project / dissertation before the graduation basically) and went home at 6am, I overslept until noon ish and I have to rush preparing myself (was about to not take shower but I’m not going to do that because of this week’s activity LOL).

So yeah, this week we learned about the History of Hanbok or traditional clothes from South Korea with Dr. Jungtaek Lee (Dept. of the History of Art and Archeology, SOAS).  The most interesting part of this lesson is finally I get to know what are the differences for each hanbok that resembles the class and the occasion (been wondering about this since ages ago). Also, the transition between hanbok in 15th century to nowadays; plus I get to see how this traditional clothes manage to collaborate with modern clothes and make it suitable to not just in special occasion but also for daily clothes (the reason why I decided to work on the design your own Hanbok for this week’s homework). During this week, I learn and gain another interest related with Korean traditional clothes, which is the motives and the printing on the clothes ; include the meaning behind the colours (never thought that they actually have certain meaning for each picture and each colour, and that is super awesome!)

This week activity excites me the most because I can try on Hanbok (finally!). I took the most pictures on this week (probably the upcoming week too!)like I mentioned before, I have my own hanbok at home from my friend who lives in Korea but last time I wear it was when I was 90kgs; and now’s my chance to wear it again with my new weight (been lost almost 30kgs now heh). But again, I’m a bit worried because I’m still considerably big and tall, I don’t know if I could find any hanbok that fits on my body and height. Since I'm on the second batch to get the Hanbok (and there’s barely any choice) I just pick the one that looks big enough and change with it straight away. Turns out I took the most complicated & special one (LOL!). I ended up wearing a wedding dress in Hanbok version. There’s 5 layers of it (plus my shirt under because I’m too lazy to take it off) and I got the wig like those lady you can see on the royal family (you’ll see what I mean by that by watching the video). It was great fun though! Except it was so hot but other than that I’m glad that I pick that one; probably the most extravagant clothes that I’d ever wear throughout my whole life (except my real wedding that I don’t know when).

All the compilation of the polaroids <3 

And me with the wedding dress + the wig

“Hangul [n]  \  ˈhän-ˌgül \ : the alphabetic script in which Korean is written”

This is the second part of K-Pop 101 (Which also a part of my homework). Last week I talked about Culture and Cuisine. This week will be about Hangul or Korean Alphabets - Do not mistake this as Korean Language.  

History

Before this letters created by King Sejong in mid fifteenth, Korea used Chinese characters to write. As Chinese characters are widely known as one of the most complicated letters to write, not many people in Korea know how to write; Only people with certain class (usually middle high class or government level) who can write. Even so, there’s barely people who mastered all Chinese characters back then. The fourth king of Joseon Dynasty, Sejong the Great decided to create a new alphabets in order to let people from every class to learn and understand how to write faster and easier than learning Chinese characters. The alphabets was completed in 1443 and published in a document titled ‘Hunmin Jongeum’ (훈민정음) or The Proper Sounds to Instruct the People in 1446. Even so, this new alphabets still not used as an official letters until the independence of Korea after world war II. 

Week 3 - Hangul 

October 7th 2017

Another class that I’m looking for the most! (this might be my opening sentence for every diary entry to be honest). In this week, we learn about the history of hangul with Prof. Jae Hoon Yeon (Dept. of Languages and Cultures of Japan and Korea, SOAS). 

I could say I learned a lot in this week. I learned about the history of Hangul a little bit after watching some colossal k-drama, which seems to be one of my favourite drama genre in k-drama. (Jewel in the Palace, Sungkyunkwan Scandal and Scarlet Heart: Ryeo are my favourites. I recommend these drama if you have time to watch it!). But I’m glad that I get to know more about the origins of Hangul, though it’s a bit overwhelming at that time since there’s so many information that we received and I’d like to know more but again, one hour is really a short time to cover all the information. So I would suggest to have this session extended or limit the information that is going to be deliver - focusing in a specific area and discuss in depth about it. It could be more interesting if we’re involved with writing during the lesson as well; As I notice that not all people in this program understand how to write Hangul.

The activity is pretty interesting, though! I finally able to saw traditional palette along with the stone to mix the ink (though we’re not using the traditional ink but it’s pretty awesome) and we got the calligraphy’s paper! (I love it) but since it’s all about creativity (and I’m really bad at it) I just write my name on it and I don’t know what else to write :’) but at least I experienced writing my name in hangul with brush and ink than my pen or pencil. I talked to more people too (not all but at least I get to know more people). Sadly I have to leave earlier than the others, I hope I don’t missed anything though! Next week entry will be about Hanbok ; Oh my god I can’t wait to wear one here! I have one back in my country but I remember how fat I was until last year (still fat though, LOL!) so hopefully I can get a nice pictures on the next meeting! 

“101 [adj] /ˌwʌn.əʊˈwʌn/ : showing the most basic knowledge about the subject”

I wish I have more time to actually make a proper and full guidance for this but this entry will give you some insights of what to do and where to go (specifically in London and its’ surroundings) if you would like to have a Korean-related experiences. 

I probably don’t have as much knowledge as people who originally from the UK but I can share you places that I’d like to recommend from my one year experience in the UK

Introduction

There is no doubt that Korean culture has gone to every countries that I ever visited, including UK. Eventhough the crowd doesn’t seem to be as big as Asian countries, but it’s pretty amazing since I know Korean Artist barely visit countries like Europe and America as it might be too far from them (plus with harder competitor in the music industry as well). However, I’m pretty surprised that there is K-town in London (which I’ll explain about it further). I don’t think there is any Korean town in any countries that I visited except UK (and I travelled a lot, too!). Also, it’s not hard to find Korean restaurant in the UK as well. Plus, having a culture centre in central of London has given another prove how big the influence of Korean culture throughout the world right now. 

Week 2 - Hallyu

September 30th 2017

Technically this is my first class (since I didn’t attend the first week) and I came 1.5 hours too early, before I decided to just go to a café across the street and enjoy a cream tea. It’s quite delicious (especially their plain scones) and considerably cheap as well (£10) click here if you’re interested to visit the place. 

So the lecture starts at 14:00 with Dr. Haekyung Um (Dept. of Music, University of Liverpool) as a guest lecture for this week. This week, we learned about K-Pop history, which probably one of the best topic to be brought on this program. I’m more than happy because of the fact that by learning the history of K-Pop, it gives people broader insights of Korean music industry. As a K-Popers from second generation, sometimes I feel bad when people who acknowledge themselves as a K-Pop fans only care about one specific boy band / girl band and don’t put any respect with other groups or singers just because of they are coming from different generation. And that ignorance sometimes create a fan war, which I couldn’t appreciate at all. I wish this kind of lectures or topic could be brought up sometimes to be introduced to especially international fans so that they know how hard it is to be an idol or singer and start to give more appreciation towards everybody that associates with K-Pop industry.

We had a very interesting (and really fun) activity afterward. We have to create our own K-Pop group (insert laughing emoji here). We are divided into 5 groups of 6 (though there’s one group consists with 4 member and my group consist of 5). We wish we could have more time to work on it (as 15 minutes clearly not enough - but time is just too limited so we can’t help it). Mine’s probably not the winning group (but the winning group presentation was so awesome though) and there’s only two of us left to do the presentation from my group, but it was a pure fun and I feel like it’s my first ice breaking since I don’t know anyone (and I sat at the back corner as well) so it allows me to interact and introduce myself (finally!) to them. Probably not all, but hopefully I can do that on the next meeting (I can’t wait to finally learn hangul though!)

Week 1 - Introduction

September 23th 2017

In the end I missed the first meeting! When I’m super excited and looking forward to it a lot.It’s the introduction week and I missed it due to my trip with my family in Europe (well, the trip was awesome though). 

In this week we’re expected to do a little presentation about ourself as a part of introduction. since I couldn’t come, I decided to make this ugly poster while describing myself as simple as possible and ask Ruby’s help to show this to everyone who attend (Thanks Ruby!). If you’re interested to look at my full biodata regarding K-Pop, click here!