The other day SarangKpop interviewed Korea-fans, largest Turkish K-Pop community. This time, we sat on the other side of the table. Yeah, they interviewed us and put it on their E-magazine, ‘Dongyul’. We just like to share it with you guys!
Go to see the interview @ ‘Dongyul’ (Page 110~113).
1) As the founder of Sarangkpop, briefly introduce yourself first.
Hi Donyul & Korea-fans readers! My name is Sanghwa Lee. I live in Donghae City, a small city in Korea, and I work for a little company near my house. Of course, I love K-Pop!
2) When did you create Sarangkpop and what were your goals?
The beta version of Sarangkpop came out on December 26, 2010 and it was fully launched on March 2th, 2011. Yes, the site is still fresh and new. There are many K-Pop websites and blogs created by non-Koreans are out there and we Koreans are grateful for their K-Pop love and passion.
However, sometimes we find a big gap between Korean and international fans in accepting and understanding K-Pop news. I wanted to bridge the gap. Secondly, there are currently just a handful of English language Hallyu websites based in Korea even though there are a lot of English K-sites on the Net. Most of them are based outside of Korea. Besides, it is hard to find a Korea-based Hallyu website created by Korean netizens. So I, as a Korean netizen and K-Pop fan, wanted to make a web place based in Korea to communicate with internatinal K-Pop fans.
Lastly, almost all the English K-Pop sites focus on publishing about K-stars. I was more interested in K-fans rather than K-celebrities. I wanted K-Pop fans to shine through Sarangkpop just like the slogan "Sarangkpop is where K-Pop fans are the heroes and heroines" says.
I plan to create another website(kpopsarang.com) to publish about K-Stars within this year, which will be a sister site of Sarangkpop.
3) What do you think is K-Pop?
It is a tough question. It has even been a huge question in Korea since the Korean fever started and I think we Koreans are debating over it.
There are three big different ideas about what K-Pop is in Korea. One is to focus on people. You can call it K-Pop as long as Koreans are involved in any way. Therefore, a Korean singer singing a song in Chinese, Japanese, English, or Turkish, can be part of K-Pop.
Another is about the Korean language. You can call it K-Pop if Korean is involved in any way (so a Turkish or a Japanese singer singing in Korean can be part of K-Pop). The other is to focus on both people and language, which means you can call it K-Pop only if both Korean people and the Korean language are involved in a way. In this case, a Korean singer singing in Korean can only be K-Pop.
What do you think? I think the K-Pop phenomenon includes all three ideas and a lot more. The world is getting smaller and countries are getting closer thanks to Information Technology. New things come out, old things fade away. Everything changes. If we go back to K-Pop’s early days, those three ideas could be worthy of consideration. But now, we Koreans are facing something that we haven’t experienced culturally. Hallyu has gone far beyond our expectations and become a global phenomenon.
It is very hard to guess when and where the Korean wave stops, which makes it more difficult to answer the question. What is K-Pop? All I can say is it is a lot more than we have discussed so far.
4) Which are the most popular K-pop bands and singers in Korea?
SM, YG, JYP, DSP, CUBE artists. IU is very popular now too.
5) Which countries like K-pop outside Korea?
The Korean wave first started in Asia. So it would be quite obvious that K-Pop is very popular in China, Japan, Taiwan, Thailand, the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia , etc. The Korean wave is rapidly picking up popularity in other parts of the world too: USA, Canada, Brazil, France, Australia, etc.
6) Did you prepare any activities as Sarangkpop? (Nationwide like as meeting)
At the moment, I am putting all my energy into making a solid foundation of Sarangkpop. It is still new and has got a lot to improve. Therefore, I don’t have any special plans in the near future. But I plan to have a meeting for Sarangkpop members in Summer or Fall after the first major upgrade of the site.
7) Do Koreans know about Turkey?
As I wrote in the article, many Koraens recall two things right away when it comes to Turkey. One is the Korean War. We know that a lot of Turkish soldiers fought and died in the war. We never forget it. The other one is the 2002 World Cup. As you know, Korea and Turkey met at the third-place match and shared a beautiful friendship. But, I think Koreans have kind of limited information on your country due to lack of access to Turkish things. Nevertheless, I think most Koreans have positive feelings towards your country. When I reviewed your Sarangkpop’s interview introduced to Korean online K-Pop community boards, I often ran into a comment like ‘ Turkey, you are our brother country!’
8) Turkey and Korea are brother country. What do you think about that?
As I mentioned above, Koreans think about your country positively. We feel a sense of closeness with your people and country. One thing I’d like to say here is that many Korean netizens feel the same way when you said ‘We also would like to see them in our country and host them in our homes’ in the article.
9) K-pop has a great mass in Turkey, what are your opinions this matter?
I, as a Korean netizen, am really grateful for your K-Pop love and come to think that K-Pop already does not belong to only one country anymore. I hope to see more communications between K-Pop fans of the two countries in the near future.
10) As Sarangkpop, anything to say to Turks, say it to them here.
Sarangkpop was created to be a bridge between Korean and non-Korean K-Pop fans. Your interview was meaningful because it encouraged Sarangkpop to step forward.Sarangkpop will do its best to bring Turkish K-Pop news to Korean netizens continuously.
Thanks a lot!
We SarangKpop thank Korea-fans & Dongyul for giving this opportunity and promise that we will do out best to be a bridge between Korean and international K-Pop fans.
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