Imagina: January 2009

Part 3

Written by satovic

Translated by flowerbossa

Next, the part you've been waiting for! A close documentary of the 14 days BYJ spent in Japan in June. The first part of the film mostly covered YJ's departure from Incheon Airport to his arrival in Kansai Airport taken by a camera crew on his side - though there were some new scenes of him leaving the hotel for the Kyocera event, most of what we saw were things we expected having already watched the documentary aired by TBS. But the only part we were really able to see him speak was inside the car riding on the highway. He held his camera towards the window and murmured "this is the first time for me to come to Osaka..."

Oh, is that so... I thought when he smuggled himself in, oops I meant when he secretly visited Japan a few years ago, there were rumors that he went to places like Shikoku and Osaka so I was rather surprised to hear that it was his first time there.

YJ pressed the shutter button continuously, overcome by the beauty of the sunset clouds. Yes, the sky is certainly beautiful. You told us in an interview that since you began taking photographs, you came to observe the sky , clouds and various things in nature, and you were able to overcome stress.

Blue Sky Joony... if we imagined that we were connected by the sky we can believe that we are always together...

Sitting next to him was Bae Sung Woong-ssi, so this was probably inside the car from his way from the airport to the hotel. But guessing from his words, "the place I'm familiar with in Japan is Saitama! (hey, people from Saitama rejoice!) The 2 places that have left the strongest impression are Saitama and Kyocera Dome, and I don't know the other places at all. There must be so many places with good food and great scenery...". Perhaps he is going somewhere after his performance in Kyocera.

Or, were these words prepared for this documentary?

Hints can be found in his words "it rained yesterday" and BYJ and Sung Woong-ssi's attire. Anyway, I had always thought that he was able to enjoy some parts of Japan during his secret trips to Japan, but I guess it wasn't as much as we imagined... I would love to take him around places like temples, onsens (hot springs) , festivals... my mom's a great cook you know .... I sure wish I could have him over....

YJ says "I hope I can see more of Japan this time". And he follows it with a joke -"But maybe it would cause too much commotion. Or maybe if I just came here more often and made a home here, people would get used to it and it would be OK."

After the VTR was over, Kim Tei-ssi faithfully gave a great comeback on this point.

"If he did anything like that, it wouldn't help us get USED to it, but he would be making our lives harder, right everyone? If Yong Joon-ssi lived next door, we would have to make ourselves up 100 percent just to take out the trash!"

She sure made us laugh.

You couldn't be more right, Kim Tei-ssi! She could probably talk to YJ closely, and she most likely doesn't adore him in the same way we do, but she is always so good in understanding our feelings as she leads the show as an emcee. The lines she gave here might have been written by a script writer, but in many instances at Kyocera Dome when the sound effects got all messed up and we were not able to hear the interpreter, or at times when we were not able to see the stage well, she did her best to put herself in our shoes and did all she can to make things better. She asks the questions WE would like to ask, an shows us the things WE would like to see... Tei-ssi Kamsahamnida!

Also, probably because the director and script writer did research on us family from our point of view, the next section opened with these words:

"Now, I would like to ask you, can any of you recall having seen a certain movie again and again... as often as you saw this one?"

She's talking about "April Snow" of course.

And she continued "and it wasn't enough for you to see it so many times, but you passed out tickets to your friends who didn't even know about Yong Joon-ssi and asked them to see it to support the film..."

Many in the venue let out a chuckle.

Which meant, almost everyone in this dome had probably done the same thing^^

I asked a friend from college to see it with me, and I met a sister who the original 65 times and later the director's cut version too. How many times could she have seen it?!

Then Woo Song Min who sang the main theme of the film was introduced, and the prelude of the film began.

♪　da da da di da da~ ♪

The whole arena at once was overcome with the gloomy atmosphere of Samcheok^^

The mirror ball started to turn, and the lighting gave the snowfall effect, and the audience began to sway their pen lights. Not exactly my taste. He sang 2 songs.

Because they were showing scenes of him recording the songs, I decided to excuse myself for a toilet break^^

Woo Song Min-ssi had made a sensational debut at the Saitama Arena, but he has turned quite

an ahjussi ...oh excuse me... a mature man since then^^; At Saitama, when Kim Tei-ssi moved back on the stage in order to avoid standing in line with him, he moved back with her, and they kept moving back like that... Tei-ssi gave us that heart warming story. Ah such was the event!

When she asked him "have you come to understand Insu's feelings?" he answered, "I seem to be too young for that" and it was somewhat funny.

Just when we were thinking okay, enough of the past, we want to see HIM, they brought out the latter half of the documentary in a timely manner.

It's 10 after 6, and the opening of "ANOTHER STORY".

I was a bit worried that I might be in the film ( as a reporter in the NHK press conference), but they cut all those parts which were previously introduced on TV, and the documentary turned out to be quite an impressive one, made up of footage and interviews we had never seen before.

(to be continued)