Dearest Youth,

Halloween

This was my first time spending Halloween in another country. With my friends, I went to Hongdae to walk around and see people in costumes. There were not as many people dressed up as I expected and most of the costumes were pretty basic compared to Halloween costumes in America. It was somewhat underwhelming. 

Doyoung Concert

              NCT 127 has been my favorite artist for roughly 5 years and I finally got to see one of the members. I attended the first day of the encore for Doyoung’s solo concert tour and it was definitely my favorite concert that I’ve been to so far. Like all of my other ticketing experiences, I was unsuccessful in purchasing tickets during the membership presale, so I had to check the ticketing site daily to find a refunded ticket. The ticket that I got was at the back of the standing section, in which it was somewhat difficult to see during the concert. Just like the Kiss of Life concert, the seat that I chose during ticketing gave me a number that indicated my placement in line to get into the venue. For some perspective, my number in line was 184 for the Kiss of Life concert and 725 for Doyoung’s concert. 

              What set Doyoung’s concert apart from the other ones that I’ve been to was the attention to detail. For instance, one of the merch items for the concert was a fragrance set, and somehow, they made the entire concert venue smell like that scent. The theme for the merch was also four-leaf clovers, in which during the final song the confetti that fell on us was four-leaf clover shaped and scented like the fragrance. Further, there were multiple different events during the concert. Typically, the only fan events are when the audience sings along to one of the songs before the encore and raises their slogans to show the artists a message. However, along with the slogans, while entering the venue we were also given glow sticks that we waved for one of the other songs during the concert. 

In my experience, Korean audiences are on the quieter side and spend most of the concert sitting/ standing still and filming. But, at this concert, it genuinely felt like everyone in the audience knew all the words to the songs and were actually singing along, screaming, and doing the fan chants together. 

              Even if I couldn’t see that well, this concert was so special to me, and truly just being in the presence of Doyoung was unbelievable. Doyoung put on such an amazing performance, and it definitely was one of my biggest “I can’t believe I’m in Korea” moments.

Evnne Fanmeeting

              The fact that one of my favorite K-pop groups held their fanmeeting just a 15-minute walk away from my dorm is actually mind-boggling to me. Evnne’s fanmeeting was held at the Yonsei Centennial Hall which is in the middle of Yonsei’s campus. My friend purchased this ticket for me during the general sale period as we were unable to obtain memberships to get pre-sale access and the ticketing for this fanmeeting was held at the same time as NCT Dream’s concert pre-sale ticketing (spoiler: I didn’t get tickets for that). When going to K-pop events, it is important to understand the difference between a fanmeeting, a fancon, and a concert. With this being a fanmeeting, roughly half of the event was spent with them performing and the other half was talking and playing games. What made this fanmeeting special was that after the show there was a hi-touch event for all members of the audience. 

              This was honestly the craziest 15 seconds of my life. High-fiving these people whose music I love so much and who had previously only existed through my phone screen was absolutely unreal. Definitely a moment that I’ll think about for the rest of my life.

Thoughts

              With there being only about a month left of the semester, my brain feels overloaded with keeping up with my assignments, preparing for trips (stay tuned!), and making sure I go to all the concerts that I want to. Wish me luck. Thanks for reading <3