Note: This short story will provide a bit of background on who I am haha. SHINee was the first K-Pop group I stumbled across, falling in love with their promotions. Another fact to keep in mind, is that whilst I call Australia home now, I'm originally from New Zealand - working in my current occupation with an array of different people from different backgrounds (including Korean) has made me realise people who don't speak English as a first language have a lot of trouble understanding my NZ accent...

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"Wow, seriously, you must have done something extremely good in your last life *Y/N*" your best friend trails off..."If only I could attend with you...". Somehow or another, you had managed to get into a SHINee fansign. The competition for fansigns is huge, even some fansites don't get in, however you had a lot of backing behind you from friends and friends of friends in Australia who also wanted to buy SHINee's latest album anyway, and were happy to have you organise their purchase. Despite all this, you still had never believed that you would actually get into a fansigning so seeing your name on the list was still a massively welcomed shock.

In the week or so before your departure, your close friends had tried to prep you as well as they could for your trip, helping you brush up on your Korean and giving you numerous calming techniques in an attempt to help you to not embarrass yourself in front of these big name idols who you had been following for years, and of course there was a lot of "Y/N, FIGHTING!".

The day of your flight was a blur, your best friend had dropped you off at the departure gate, a long with an extremely detailed list of things that you should bring back, should you wish to be left in peace upon your return. Once on the plane, you attempted to sleep, however nerves got the better of you. In 3 days time, you would be standing in front of Taemin, Minho, Key, Jonghyun and ONEW! Some time during your flight, you realised that the calming techniques your friends had taught you were going to do nothing to stop you from shaking like a leaf in front of them. How will you even remember to breathe?

After a not so long flight (the cramped seats made it feel longer however), you were able to stretch your legs again. Going through airport security was a breeze as you only had carry on luggage with you, as the plan was to purchase a suitcase once you were here and go shopping! It was morning when you arrived, which meant a full day ahead of you. You were able to purchase a travel pass, and even though everyone in shops and cafe's spoke, or had attempted to speak with you in English or would fetch an English speaking employee for you, you weren't the kind of person to make them feel uncomfortable, and used your average Korean speaking skills where possible. It was still 3 days before the fansign, however that meant you only had 3 days to find the perfect outfit. With this in mind, after breakfast at a cute cafe in the airport, your first task was to find your Hostel & put your belongings down so that you would only need to carry a few essentials.

Finding your hostel was quite easy with the help of your informative Taxi driver ahjussi. Mr. Taxi driver also helped a little with your pronounciation, which you were greatful for. You had mentioned to him that you would be seeing SHINee to which he chuckled and said if he had a daughter, she would probably be a fan as well. Your discussion went smoothly with him chuckiling here and there at your foreign accent, however for the most part, you were able to understand each other all the way to your hostel.

Your hostel was clean, fresh, and modern, a great difference in what you had been expecting, given the condition of hostels back home. The owner had left the key for you in a previously mentioned place. You let yourself into your room, and put away your belongings. This room held 2 bunkbeds, so 4 people in total could stay. However it looked as though no one else had arrived just yet, so you made yourself at home, choosing one of the bottom bunks. By this time, it was about 1pm, so it was still early enough to go exploring. However after your flight, you were still a little tired, so just checking out the local shops would suffice for now. Everything was in walking distance, and as you browsed the shops, and attempted to convert KRW to AUD your stommach rumbled...time to eat then? 

After a light meal in another cutely themed cafe, you got down to business and actually did some shopping. You purchased some hair products, a cardigan, a cute skirt & a few makeup items your friends would be pleased about. After browsing, buying & squeeling over cute things was done, it was time to head to the convenience store & get some dinner. You'd always wanted to try a convenience store meal whilst staying in Seoul & theres no time like the present! Ramyun would be the safest and easiest option, so you purchased a familiar brand, along with a couple of things to go with it, and headed back to your home for the next few days. Of couse using the stores well equipped preperation station would have been fine as well, but, come on, lets not embarrass ourselves shall we. Much safer to bring it home & enjoy it safely without doing something silly like scolding yourself on hot water. After enjoying your Korean noodles (in Korea!) and a quick shower, it seemed that all the traveling may have caught up with you, which called for an early night.

2 DAYS LATER - The Fansign

You had prepared yourself as well as you could. This was it. You had an outfit you were happy with, your hair actually had behaved for once & of course most importantly, you had your album & pass ready to go. Ready to enter the room. Ready. Ready. Wait! We're you actually ready?! Who could be ready for this! Who could be ready & completely prepared to meet SHINee! SHINEE! The princes of K-pop, your knights in SHINee armour! Fansites were there of course with their amazingly huge lenzed expensive looking cameras. In fact, most of the group of 120 or so lucky attendees seemed to be a part of a fansite, or at least, had one of those huge cameras. You quickly heard the familar language of English and made your way over to a group of 4 girls from all over the world. You learned their names, & where they were from. An annoucement was then broadcast over the PA system that SHINee would enter soon - for the most part, you wondered how all these people were so calm!

Their enterance was a blur, for the most part, all you could hear was the clicking of cameras anyway. At this point, you realised, every word of Korean had flown right out of your head as you sat their in amazement nodding at whatever it was Minho was saying. Taemin was then speaking and you knew he was saying words, and they sounded familiar, but you still had no idea what they were. When your number was called, you somehow managed to 1. Remember it, and 2. Understand Korean temporarily. You had watched some other English speaking people proceed a head of you, so this gave you hope that you would be able to at least communicate with one member of the group. This was it, this was your moment. The first member, thankfully, was Key. What a relief, you had seen so many variety shows to know that Key knew enough english to hold more than a decent conversation. He held your hand with his free one as he signed your album, asking you where you were from. Explaining you had come from Australia to see them, he was surprised and thanked you for your support giving you the most prize winning smile you had seen, yet. Next was Taemin, and this made you nervous. Again, from previous variety show viewings, you knew Taemin's language skills were quite average. Still, you managed somehow to have a conversation with broken English & extremely nervously broken Korean. Next to Taemin was Minho, his warm smile was so geniuine & again, he asked you where you were from. He loved the fact that you were from Australia and had mentioned that if they had another oppourtunity to visit, he wanted to meet some Kangaroos. You laughed, maybe a little too loud, and Taemin was laughing as well (the person behind you had still not moved from Key). You said goodbye and thank you to Minho who gave you a high five as the line moved along again. 

By this time, your nerves seemed to have settled, and had become a little more comfortable with the whole thing. Moving onto Jonghyun, it seemed that you might get through this without embarrising yourself! Jonghyun & Onew had better than average English skills so it seemed you could comfortably forget whatever it was you were going to say to them in their native tongue and continue in English. Jonghyun had signed your album, you asked him in English if he was doing well today which he beamed "Of course! Look at all these pretty SHAWOLs I get to meet!" You blushed, who wouldn't. Then you asked him what his favourite song of the moment was (apart from their current promotions) or if he had any reccomendations. He looked at you puzzled, so you repeated the sentence with a few more challenging words ommitted, however, he still could not understand you. You stammered a "Ss..sorry, my accent is a little hard to understand sometimes..." "Excent? huh? Sorry what do you mean by Excent?" Jonghyun replied, completely puzzled. I tried to explain it as best as I could in English, and then gave up. English was not a happening thing with Jonghyun today. Onew was still smiling and talking with the person next to me, which told me I still had time to try again with Jonghyun. How best is it to explain an accent without saying accent in English. In the end, your years of Korean teachings paid off somewhat and you managed to stumble out a few sentences. Jonghyun then understood somehow what you were trying to say in English and explaimed cheerfully "Ahhh!! New Zealand accent!" nodding your head in agreement vigourosly, you both managed to laugh a little before the line moved a long...

-The End


What do you guys think? Haha I know I didn't get to Onew, but thats when I woke up (despite being Onew biased). I may write Onew in here one day but for now, this will work :)