Spazzing over Ha Ji Won

My exams are finally over!!! Just in time for me to write a spazz post about my favourite Korean actress, Ha Ji Won to coincide with her birthday and the start of her new show, The Time We Were Not In Love.

I first watched her in Secret Garden which I loved, but mostly for Hyun Bin. I didn't care too much about Gil RaIm ><
Then in 2012, she acted in King 2 Hearts which had massive popularity on Dramabeans. I watched that, then followed it with classics What Happened In Bali, Damo and Hwang Jini, partly because these were so highly rated and partly because I wanted to watch more and more of Ha Ji Won. After watching all her dramas since Damo, I proceeded to watch almost every movie she's been in. I think her drama hits are more consistent than her movie hits - I loved Duelist and Closer To Heaven, but hated 100 Days with Mr Arrogant.


I think HJW is a very good actress - she's not the best (that title belongs to Jeon Do Yeon) but she's great in my opinion. And I think she's very very pretty, but there are many other pretty Korean actresses out there. But what sets HJW apart is that she picks great projects, especially dramas. Every one of her dramas has gotten me obsessed and my top 10 dramas of all time feature a lot of her dramas. And she's a ratings guarantee - even in the past year where drama ratings have fallen such that breaking 10% is considered a hit, Empress Ki managed to consistently break 20% and even hit 30%. I personally don't think ratings is a reflection of the quality of the drama, but that her dramas always do so well IS a reflection of her star power and how much the Korean public enjoys her work. 1 million movie admissions are considered hits for other people but a flop for HJW. 

The legendary "아프냐? 나도 아프다" scene in Damo.

A lovely edit showing Hang Ah's badassery in King 2 Hearts.

More badassery, this time from Seung Nyang in Empress Ki.

As the slightly bitch Hwang Jin Yi. My parents could hardly believe this was the same actress who played Gil RaIm! A testament to her ability to transform herself. 

My favourite pic of RaIm-JooWon. My favourite HJW ship is probably SeungNyang-TalTal of Empress Ki but this picture is just everything.

                                     Beautiful sword fighting scene in Duelist that was more like a tango.

In addition to her impressive filmography and picking up a ton of awards with a few daesangs here and there along the way, HJW is also active in charity, recently becoming the ambassador for Operation Smile. She's also the ambassador for South Korea-New Zealand relations and was awarded a prize for being a model taxpayer (LOL). She has now also expanded into the beauty care business with the release of the J.One line. Damn, this woman is really amazing.

Giving a speech in English for Operation Smile.

What I love most about HJW is that despite being such an A lister, she's so genuinely friendly and nice to EVERYONE. You can tell from her interviews that she's always genuinely happy to be there, and that energy really transmits across to the viewer. And despite being in the entertainment industry for 17 years now, she hasn't had a scandal at all. That's incredible management right there. JYP recently said "You'll eventually get caught no matter how careful you are. The key is to become a person who doesn't need to be careful." And I think that HJW's clean track record is testament to this - she doesn't need to be careful at all because she's an upright and wonderful person all around. I love that she's under her own agency now so she's really steering her own career now. Although I don't think celebrities dating should be called scandals, they are anyway by Korea. Nevertheless, I hope she gets married soon if she intends to have kids!!

Ha Ji Won came to Singapore twice, and I went to the airport both times so I've seen her a total of 4 times!
Her first visit was in September 2014 to promote Empress Ki. I didn't find out until a few days before her arrival that she was coming on 25Sep2014. Despite having school the next day and living on the opposite side of Singapore, I still went. And luckily I did, because it was an awesome experience. I reached at 7.20pm but she only came out at 8.30pm. Changi Airport always puts up barricades for a direct route for the celebrity to walk to the car so I was standing along those barricades. But there were quite a lot of people so I wasn't at the front. When she walked past, I quickly followed to the car. After she entered the car, she rolled down the window (!!!!!) and everyone started screaming and pushed me to the front until I was literally right in front of her. OMG. Mind blank haha. I couldn't say a word and just kept waving though. TOO GORGEOUS.

And then on 27Sep2014, she was at Plaza Singapura to promote Empress Ki. I reached quite late and barely made it into the barricaded area, but I was still rows behind. And I'm not tall so I struggled to see her a little. I thought I was video-ing the whole thing but I realised I forgot to press the button for the first 15 min ._.
Anyway, the place was really packed, which surprised me a little. The whole proceedings can be found on youtube so I won't go through what happened. She was so friendly throughout the whole thing and kept waving, and also tried her best to speak as much English as she could. My favourite part was when she announced her fanmeeting and said 'I have a big news.' LOL.
Also, after this event, I proceeded to marathon Empress Ki in a week haha. Review can be found by clicking on the Empress Ki tag below.

One of my very few decent pics of the event since I was really far and had to zoom in alot, and was taking a video at the same time.

The fanmeet was originally scheduled to be on 9Jan2015, but I think her management realised it was a Friday and people had work so it was rescheduled to 10Jan2015. Before the tickets went on sale, the SG1023 had taken orders for VIP tickets to secure the best seats for the fanclub. I tried applying for that but the management only gave 6 seats so I didn't get it. But it's okay because when tickets went on sale, I was the second person in and managed to get a front row VIP ticket anyway, just beside the 6 already sold. Benefits of having experience from the intense battles for KPop concert tickets haha.
And before the concert, the organisers also opened the sales of merchandise such as folders, lightsticks, lip balms etc. Being a kiasu fan, I went down to the organiser's headquarters to buy them before the concert, just in case they sold out haha. But I didn't have to worry at all since they were all for sale on the day itself.

Ha Ji Won arrived in Singapore on 9Jan2015. Fewer people were at the airport that day as compared to the first time, probably because it wasn't as well publicised? I recruited my parents (who were actually there just to fetch me home but came to join in the fun haha) to help me film her because I was holding her At This Moment book and tried to get an autograph. I stood nearer to the exit to the car, which I totally regretted because when she first came out, she signed for those in front, but she ran out of time and the staff were rushing her so she couldn't stop to sign anymore. So when she saw my book she waved very apologetically haha. It's okay, I still love you! And she was GORGEOUS and striking in that yellow trenchcoat.

Finally, 10Jan2015 arrived. The fanmeet was held at Singapore Conference Hall. Because I had donated some money to the Singapore 1023 fanclub, I could take a polaroid and write a message to HJW haha, so that was nice. I arrived wayyyy too early so I sat at the Toast Box outside to do work because school work is never ending. And around 6.30pm, I collected my special package for VIP ticket holders and entered the theater. First row!!!! I was slightly to the left of center, but still got a brilliant view.

While waiting for everyone to get seated, they played a couple of famous OSTs such as Yoon Mirae's Touch Love from Master's Sun OST and All For You from Reply 1997. The squealing was pretty amusing haha. I also made friends with the lady on my left who is also a Gong Hyo Jin fan :) Which was nice because I was alone.

And then it started!!!! HJW came out in a purple dress singing That Woman from Secret Garden's OST. Her singing is pretty mediocre. She has like no technique since she wasn't trained in it, but I still love hearing her sing because I'm a delulu fan lol. And I was SO CLOSE omg. I decided to take fancams of the entire thing since I had such a good view but one part got deleted while I was trying to make space :(

She spoke as much English as she could. Even though it wasn't grammatically correct most of the time, I really appreciated her attempts to connect with her audience. The host was really good at livening up the atmosphere and HJW was pretty amused by her. At one point, HJW even walked to the host to pat her shoulder and tell her to calm down because the host was fangirling so hard. The translator, on the other hand, kept interrupting Ji Won and even translated stuff wrongly!! Luckily, since most of us are such die hard k-drama fans that have inadvertently picked up some Korean from watching too many dramas, we managed to understand what HJW was saying without the translator. And HJW was very impressed by our ability to speak simple Korean like kamsahamnida LOL.

We also watched videos of her revisiting filming sites of Empress Ki and Secret Garden and she had some really hilarious comments. Like when Gil RaIm came out, HJW was like 'she's pretty yeah?' hahahaha.

Then it was games time, based on her shows. The first was Secret Garden, and it was about the cappuccino kiss so we thought HJW was gonna kiss the contestants hahaha. But no, it was about which contestant could get the most foam on his/her lips. HJW, being an absolute sweetie, felt bad about choosing one winner so she decided to take a polaroid with all the contestants. And LOL she misheard a contestant's name as 'Joo Won' like her male lead in SeGa. For the second game, it was about shooting arrows like Seung Nyang in Empress Ki. While demonstrating the second game about, she posed very coolly, poised to shoot the arrow, and then walked super close to the target and promptly shot the arrow straight at her manager's face LOL. And being a sweetie as usual, she helped the contestants to load the arrows and all.

After this was a Q&A session, and then she went backstage to change and performed a super cute mandarin song.

Then went to change again into a red glittery dress! Argh this was the part I accidentally deleted. She talked about how much she loves Singapore food with her favourite being laksa, and that she can cook!!! 'Ddukbokki, kimchi fried rice.....yup that's all' LOL. If you've watched her Family Outing appearance before, you'll know she can't cook for nuts. I haven't watched her travel show to France but by all accounts, she still can't cook despite trying very hard hahaha. All my idols can't cook for some reason.

She also took out her selfie stick and walked around the theater to take the fans and she was soooooo close OMG. Unfortunately, I can't find that moment anywhere on youtube :( 

Anyway, she sang The Show by Lenka and then said her goodbyes and left.

But we were like ENCOREEEEE, and I knew no way she wasn't gonna sing Now In This Place. Sure enough, she came back on stage really quickly to sing it and omgahhhh. I love the song, and the live was really goood. Totally screamed the SARANGHAEYO part because tbh that's the only lyrics I know haha. She started tearing at one point so some fans started singing it for her. And this time she said her real goodbyes :( The 2.5h passed by in a flash and it was just an amazing experience.

But the best part is left to the end. Every attendee had a chance to go on stage to hi-5 HJW. Originally, the VIP ticket holders could also take a picture with her but they removed it :( Anyway, VIP ticket holders had to wait until the end so I was one of the last few. I wanted to give her my hand sanitiser since she had touched like 500 people's hands haha, but decided against it in the end. When it was finally my turn, I stammered out a 'Thank you! I love you!!!' to her and she said 'I love you too!' back and I just DIED.
And then I went to receive my souvenir which was a soap thingy with her signature, and thank the host after that for doing a good job.

I was really really impressed by her manager especially. He stood beside her during the hitouch session and bowed to every single person who came. And of course, Ji Won who managed to be so nice to everyone during the hitouch session all the way until the end. She's really the nicest, sweetest person ever.
Also, somehow not many people had the lightstick. Since I was sitting in the front row and waving the lightstick (a little too) enthusiastically, especially when she was singing, she waved in my direction a couple of times :D

Here's a pic of all the goodies I collected from this fanmeet.

The tshirt, NorthCape & Crocodile Ladies brochures were a VIP package, the red soap was for all attendees and I bought the lightstick and folders.

It's really really worth it. It's a pity that the theater wasn't filled. I'm so annoyed that organisers didn't even promote it properly with a TV ad or something!

Thank you, Ha Ji Won, for being such a wonderful and gorgeous person inside and out. I love you loads.

All fancams can be found at youtube.com/mylastwishes95 :)