The first Koreans i met were a Supreme Court Judge from Seoul, a Law lecturer from a Korean university and a sweet young girl about my age called Kyung Hee who studied with me at the summer USA Law Program at UC Berkeley.
Kyung Hee and i hung out alot together, partly because we were the 2 youngest students in the cohort of about 100 people, and partly because we enjoyed each other's company! She was so sweet and demure, it was no wonder she had such a tall, dark and handsome boyfriend then serving in the South Korean army!
The only other thing i knew about Koreans were that they were fervent Christians...after all, who hadn't heard about the legendary Pastor Yonggi Cho? Stories of how the Koreans prayed ever so passionately and diligently abounded...and i was full of admiration for them! If only i could learn how to pray like them one day.......
Then the Korean TV craze hit Singapore...it started with All About Eve, which i happened to stumble upon one Thursday night (after a long day's work, if i was lucky enough to get home before midnight)... the show, which starred Jang Dong Gun (same surname as me! Yeah!!), Chae Rim, Han Jae Suk and Kim So Yeon, was essentially about how a hard-hearted, materialistic and scheming woman broke the hearts of her benefactor's daughter, boyfriend and his mother. This was the first time i saw somebody on screen who looked, acted and spoke like my stepmother (who was not unlike Kim's character in many ways) and that hooked me onto the entire TV series! For once, there was something on TV which had a credible but heart wrenching storyline, with actors and actresses who could act and great cinematography and music! (The last time i remember seeing such shows on channel 8 was when Chen Liping, Edmund chen and Li Nanxing were my age!)
Although another K-drama was showing on Friday nights as well, i didn't manage to watch or follow it since 2 late night shows per week would have completely drained me of my energy (and tissues!)...
