SHINee 7th Anniversary Picnic

Prefacing this post: I wrote a large portion of this the day of SHINee's 7th Anniversary Picnic cruise after I got home and rather than editing it I'm just going to leave as it is and then add on the end ^.^ Here we go:


I feel like I've probably never had the time to sit down and write a full blog post about an event immediately after it happened. Maybe that's why I don't write as many as I mean too. There have been a good dozen events I've meant to write posts about and never got around to it because the feelings and the memories fade a little and are less easy for me to get written down. For SHINee World Concert 3 we literally did 3 nights of concerts and went straight home, ate, showered and streamed SHINee's album, downloaded and watched SHINee on Blue Night and then I got up and went to work the next morning. SHINee's Anniversary weekend we did Music Core recording, Dream Concert, Inkigayo and SHINee's Anniversary Party all in one weekend, so there was absolutely no time to write anything and then for most of View and MTTM so far I've been twitter fan accounting and leaving my blog to sink under the weight of rules, rants and kind of depressing stuff. No more~~ SHINee's 7th Anniversary Picnic post is here to save the day~~

So I actually had a pretty packed weekend on top of the picnic event. I'm currently on a very conveniently timed summer break (thank you SHINee for coming back while my kidlets are holidaying~~ No teacher Min, It's full time fangirl Min here). So last week looked a little like this:

Friday: Woke up at 5:30am caught a taxi to Music Bank
             Wait Wait Wait Wait
             9am SM check all our cds and print outs and SHINee swag to see if we're worthy and give us a number
             11am Recording, SHINee performing the mttm choreo in front of fans for the first time
             11:45 run out of Music Bank like hell demons are on our heels cause there's a check in it Inkigayo at 12. Taxi!!!!!!!!!!!
            12pm Inkigayo check in
            2pm SHINee's Inkigayo Recording
            2:15ish the information for Music Core came out. Frantic rush to taxis to make the list for Music Core

Saturday: 4am wake up
                6:30 am SM official check in
                8 am SHINee Music Core recording
                9:15 recording finish, go home sleep
                5pm Winners list for Seokcho fansign came out - I got in~~!
               I went to my friend's house to stay the night so we could travel together in the morning

Sunday: 6:30 am wake up ~sleep in~ Went to Seoul Bus Terminal to catch a 8:59 bus to Seokcho
              12pm Arrive in Seokcho - head to the hotel where SHINee's fansign is at and do make up and make myself pretty
              4pm SHINee fansign
              5pm finish and head to Seokcho Inkigayo Festival to line up
              8pm Festival start
              10:30 finish, head to bus
              11:20 bus to Seoul
              1:50 am arrive in Seoul
              2:20 am arrive at friends house via taxi, pass out.

I spent Monday sprawled on my friend's couch cause I'm on holiday and I could and the winner's list for the Summer Picnic came out 3pm on Monday afternoon.
           
I was really pleasantly surprised to find my name on the list. I've had a string of bad luck with applying for events, fansigns etc so I was really really pleasantly surprised that I got into the Seokcho fansign AND the SHINee Anniversary Picnic. The winner's are chosen via lottery at random. I was also lucky enough to have 3 friends who were also picked for the Picnic/Cruise thing so I felt less alone and weird being sent out to sea on a cruise ship with SHINee.

Skip the boring bits~ We arrived at Incheon Terminal where we were meant to meet and check in with our IDs and receive our name tags and board the cruise boat. I pulled a number at random and my luck for the year must be totally depleted because I pulled Table 1, seat 7 which ended up being the front of the front table, absolutely nothing between me and SHINee. Absolutely beyond amazing. The cruise boat that was waiting for us was pretty ordinary except there was a gigantic black Married to the Music flag mounted on the front of the boat like a glorious pirate ship. Started immediately having fantasies of a pirate SHINee concept. Get on that SM please.

We all got shuffled onto the boat table by table and we were bowed onto the ship by the captain and the crew. I was discussing this with a friend, but it was a really bemusing experience to be treated so politely by the staff. Honestly as fans I'm used to being yelled at and sneered at by surly security guards who think we're likely to start foaming at the mouth and biting them at any given moment, so being treated like a human being by staff assigned to dealing with us was refreshing. Everyone was very kind and helpful.

The interesting part about this is that because we all pulled our seats at random we couldn't sit with our friends. Now for me just about everyone in the room was a somewhat familiar face. You start going to enough of these events and you get to know everyone by face at least. But that doesn't mean I talk to all of them. There were 7 girls at my table, 1 Japanese girl, 5 Korean girls and me. We were sitting around at our table, it was steamy and hot and gross because the air conditioning wasn't all that great and honestly...none of us had any idea what was going on. We were told next to nothing about what was going to be happening except there would be a talent show for fans and at some point in the day SHINee would be stamping the papers we were given at the beginning of the day. That's it.

SHINee (minus Minho) eventually appeared through the front door to the boat and smiled and waved and greeted us and then were promptly shooed way by the staff upstairs. Cue the most bemusing, weird lunch I think I've ever had. I was kind of sitting laughing to myself as the staff handed out pre made lunch boxes to all of us, because nearly the entire room of girls was quietly eating, watching the screens where they were playing One Fine Day re runs and texting friends at different tables. The room was pretty quiet because we were all just confused and didn't know anyone we were sitting with. SHINee had dissapeared onto the second floor and the staff still weren't telling us anything about the plan for the day. I think it was 45 minutes later after they'd cleared all the lunch boxes away that SHINee reappeared. I have no idea what they were doing upstairs, but there was a tonne of cameras absolutely everywhere they went so I have no doubt they were filming something up there.

When SHINee came down it was pretty magical though. What had previously been a pretty awkward subdued event instantly livened up. It was really funny because even SHINee seemed really confused about what was going on. They all got to say something one by and I think it was Taemin who asked us if we knew what was going on and we were all like:......nope and Taemin was like: ......me neither. Basically all 4 of them said they had no idea what they were doing either and no one had given them any plans past doing greetings?

Never the less the staff were at least a little bit prepared because while we were eating they handed around post it notes and asked us to write questions for SHINee. This kind of thing is pretty common at fanmeets and things and in the past I've never written a question because I could never think of anything cool or funny and because I was always worried I would screw up my Korean. I've studied Korean for a long time now, but I think I still have a lot of work to do in my confidence. I hate screwing up and making a fool out of myself and even though I force myself to speak Korean whenever I can, I still sometimes find myself avoiding doing little things like writing questions for SHINee because I'm afraid of looking like an idiot. But this time I decided I had a question I wanted to ask them and I was going to give it a try. One of the Korean girls at my table very kindly lent me a pen and I sat trying to remember the verb for what I wanted to say.

Initially what I wrote was: '눈, 코, 입 중에서 하나만 빠저야하면 뭐 빠질거에요? 왜요?

Which I knew was wrong because it's 빠지다 is 'to fall for' as in fall in love so I asked the girl next to me to correct it for me and she did. Success~!

Min from the future here - I wrote all this the night after the 7th Anniversary Picnic and then never finished it because it was really late in the night and I had to go to a recording for Show Champion the next day ^.^;;; I'm going to finish writing based on what I remember since what happened next was actually very special to me.

So the girl next to me very kindly gave me the correct verb for what I was trying to say. Essentially my question was: Between your eyes, nose and lips which would you choose to get rid of and why? She corrected my mistakes on the piece of paper. There was a girl sitting next to me on the other side who asked to see what I'd written. She took the paper from me, read what I'd written, mistakes and all, snorted and threw the post it on the table. I'm not trying to talk shit about this girl or anything, I'm only mentioning it because it actually made me feel awful. I mentioned above that this is the first time I'd ever tried to participate in a fan event and despite how long I've lived in Korea, my language ability is still nowhere near where I would like it to be. I can have conversations and talk to people and explain things and ask questions but I wouldn't say I was fluent. Learning a language is so so hard and I also wouldn't say I'm the kind of person that language comes to me naturally. Basically I'm thick and I need to study more. Despite knowing all this about myself, it still hurts when someone else throws it in your face.

So, feeling a little embarrassed and down, I passed my post it to the fanstaff anyway, not suspecting my question would get picked. When SHINee did come out, I was so strung up from being so close to them at my prime spot front table seat that I completely forgot I'd even written a post it. I was watching Key very closely though. Key was being very quiet throughout the Q&A session and diligently picking questions from among the post it notes, mostly letting the others answer the questions. Eventually he picked a post it and was frowning and reading it carefully for awhile. Turns out he was reading all my mistakes and the cross outs and trying to figure out what was going on.

Key read the question out and, I wrote this in the original fan account on twitter, there was generally a lot of chaos. All the members were asking for clarification, Taemin said he would get rid of his lips and all the fans complained because it's one of his most recognizable features and so pretty I guess. Onew said he'd get rid of his ears and then Jonghyun was like: nope, can't, that's not one of the options. Key read the question again, telling Onew he could only choose between eyes, nose and lips and so Onew was sort of mumbling to himself: can't get rid of lips because then I can't eat. Then Taemin was wondering if I meant aesthetically or practically. As in something they wouldn't mind missing from their looks, or missing for it's function. Key was a little incredulous and sassing Taemin a little by saying: I don't know, I only know what's written here.

This is where it got really surreal and crazy. All the girls at my table knew that I was the one who wrote the question and suddenly Onew was turning to the crowd and asking who had written the question. They were all searching the audience and I was right at the front and going completely crazy. Onew was frowning and saying: she's not here? she's not going to admit...? and then the girls around me made a little bit of a fuss because I'd put my hand up...okay I'd actually only put one finger up, and suddenly SHINee were all looking at me and...well I don't think there's anyway to describe how that feels except I couldn't breath. One of them was like: Ah a foreigner (Jonghyun or Key?) and then Key was like: ah I was wondering what all this crossing out was. He then proceeded to read out the mistakes I made, giggling. Honestly I was pretty pleased that Key was giggling over it; he seemed really tired throughout this whole event so I'm glad my little mistakes amused him. He wasn't being at all mean-spirited about it and I didn't feel offended or laughed at. It all felt in really good spirit. I was really flustered and embarrassed though to have all that attention centered on me, so I was hiding my face in my hands and just peeking out at SHINee from between my fingers.

Obviously I have no idea what was going through their head at that time, but Onew might have thought that I was upset? Who knows honestly but he said something to the effect of: It's really hard when you can't say what you want to say. Referring to my language situation and his own situation with his voice perhaps? Onew went through a few months post surgery when he wasn't able to speak at all while he was healing, so I think when he said this, that situation was summoned to everyone's minds and there was lots of sad noises and sympathetic murmurs from the fans. Then Jonghyun asked, completely directly, in Korean: What would you get rid of? I mentioned this at the time as well, but I really really respect that Jonghyun didn't try to speak English or baby me. He just straight up asked me in Korean and trusted that I would know what he was saying. And I did because I tapped my lips and Onew was like: ah she'd get rid of her lips? Taemin chose lips, Onew said he'd get rid of one eye (cheeky boy), Jonghyun chose eyes I think? And then Key was playing around and covering his eyes, nose and lips with his hand and wondering which he'd be unrecognizable without. Jonghyun said he's pretty recognizable no matter what and that was the end of that. The whole thing was such a magical experience and I was so excited and happy and honestly considering I'd previously felt a little like my question was stupid and I shouldn't have bothered, it was really amazing that Key happened to pick my question and erased all those bad feelings.

Something I didn't fan account a the time was that the MC hired for the event, seemingly someone from the cruise ship company, was kind of awful. He didn't know much about idols or SHINee or fangirls and his personality was just coming across very arrogant and pushy. After SHINee left the first time, the fans went back to being pretty unimpressed and quiet and he was all like: Wow, I've never been treated like this by women before wow. I think he was trying to joke around but he got a pretty cold reception from the fans in the room, especially as everyone was college age and above. He actually said to the room at large: what was that question about the eyes, noes and lips? Who asked that? That's so weird and random. and then he got quite a dressing down from a very unimpressed group of SHINee fans who informed him that SHINee lost their eyes, nose and lips in the Married to the Music music video. He quickly retreated.

Now at this point you'd think there's absolutely nothing that can top that right? Well, you'd be wrong. They wrapped the Q&A event up and I really wish I'd written more about this at the time because I can't remember much else about that part other than feeling like I was in total shock. SHINee disappeared back upstairs, and the cruise ship pulled into dock. We actually had absolutely no idea where we were. It wasn't time to go home yet since we still had the talent portion of the cruise to go so a lot of us were wondering if we were going to do the talent portion on dry land.

The other interesting tidbit is that Minho was missing and rumors had been going around that he suddenly left the sports event he'd been at for an MBC Idol Sports recording. We started getting excited, thinking he might be coming to meet us, only to hear not long after that he'd been spotted at the sports venue doing an interview backstage. We were lined up according to our table and told that SHINee were going to stamp our attendance sheets and then we waited around in the lobby of the building for awhile, all complaining about how awful MBC was for taking Minho away. Basically he'd been signed to participate in the MBC Idol Soccer recording which was the same day as the cruise, but had injured his foot/leg at a basketball match a few weeks before. I guess SM assumed Minho wouldn't have to go because of his injury or maybe they planned it all along, but MBC insisted that Minho play coach for one of the teams and so he wasn't able to be at the cruise. Everyone was beyond angry because the cruise was plugged as a 7th Anniversary event and I think Minho fans had applied for the event and gotten in, only to cancel and go to support Minho at the soccer recording. Having a SHINee anniversary event without a member is just.....wrong. Can't do it.

They had us wait a really long time, no doubt while SHINee did press stuff inside, before eventually we were led into this tiny tiny movie theater room where SHINee were sitting at the front and there was a side door so we could be lead straight out. There were press and security and managers and staff everywhere and I could barely see SHINee through all the madness initially. I was table 1 so I was one of the first to go in and I still remember this moment so fondly that I can't help but smile just thinking about it. A security guard suddenly stepped out of the way of the table SHINee were sitting at to reveal Minho sitting at the end with a huge, cheeky grin on his face. All the girls in the room immediately gasped really dramatically, clapping hands on their faces, squealing, eyes wide, cheering and laughing. Minho lapped up all the attention with a huge grin and I'm sure the press were a little sad they couldn't take photos of the fans because it would have been completely hysterical footage. I was shaking and grinning like a maniac and when I got to Minho I think I was just murmuring his name over and over again. He has these huge beautiful eyes and he said hello really politely and happily in Korean and I said it back and I was so excited and crazy that he laughed at me.

There was much of the same with the others. Taemin was in a crazy good mood and was enjoying all the insane reactions girls were having to Minho, Key was still just tired and being polite to fans and chatting and stamping, but otherwise the poor thing just looked really checked out. Jonghyun and Onew were all over each other and one of the managers had to get Jonghyun's attention when I went up to get my stamp because he was too busy fooling around with Onew. Onew was too cute as well because he was just slamming the stamp down immediately after Jonghyun and grinning like a big kid. The whole thing was only made more hilarious and fun by the fact that girls were leaving the room and all you could hear was fans yelling and jumping around in excitement, screaming Minho's name, grinning, squealing and hugging friends. It was completely amazing. I had a handful of friends at the event and we were all laughing and hugging each other, like it was some huge victory we'd won by seeing Minho. It was a really magical moment.

Basically all that was left in the day was the talent show. The talent show was a complete mess to organize because no one really wanted to participate and it was such a weird idea. It ended up being mostly really amazing. I won't go into details about the girls who performed because I wrote a lot about it on twitter at the time as did a tonne of other people. Basically SHINee were just...complete angels the whole experience. They walked this really thin line between being endlessly kind and cheeky. They were asked to give criticism or feedback on the various girls' performances and rather than saying really contrived sugary praises, they joked around and made silly criticisms with big shit-eating grins and scolded each other. Minho told one girl she got full marks because her husband is a fan of soccer and gave another girl really low marks because she performed Taemin's solo song and it didn't have him in it. Taemin told one girl she seemed like her brain was on a different plain or something and then Onew and Key were laughing and apologizing to her because Taemin's brain clearly wasn't all there.

I mentioned earlier that the MC was a bit of a douchebag and Jonghyun and Key and even Onew especially would quickly step in when it seemed like the MC was pressuring the girls too much or being unkind in his attempts to be entertaining. One of the girls special talents was that she could cry in under 30 seconds while listening to Ring Ding Dong. She couldn't do it in front of the huge audience, but SHINee were so happy and entertained by the concept and making a lot of noise and being really excited by her attempt. She was also a spitfire and really witty because when the MC gave her a hard time for not crying even though she said she practiced she was like: well I didn't practice in front of SHINee. The boys found this endlessly amusing and nearly died laughing. It seems Key was a little worried about this same girl because at the end of the event when everyone was moving around and there was a lot of chaos, he made eye contact with her and gave her a thumbs up and some finger-hearts.

Overall the whole experience was once in a life time and really bemusing and weird at times. I really really enjoyed it, not only because of my own special experience with SHINee but because SHINee themselves took the event, which was frankly badly organized and a little messy, and just rolled with it. They said they were happy to spend time with us and all the laughing and dancing and craziness in the end at the talent show in particular was honestly one of the most special moments of my life. It was really magical and even though there were reporters everywhere, SHINee were still there same genuine selves with us. Minho's joy and enthusiasm for the event was especially moving. I'm still completely awed and happy and surprised that he rushed from Goyang City down to Incheon by car to meet the boat and surprise us. We complained so much about him not being there and were so disappointed and sad and he pulled through for us.

A huge thank you to Key and SHINee for picking me up when I felt like absolute crap. It's amazing how when I feel at my worst they always seem to pull me out just when I feel my head going under. I'm still completely mind blown that things turned out like they did. I'm hardly the only person to have this kind of encounter with SHINee either, which honestly just makes them more admirable; that they continuously treat us with respect and kindness despite the fact that we must drive them completely nuts some times. Thank you thank you thank you, you beautiful human beings~<3