Well, I’m on an airplane flying all the way to South Korea by myself, not what a normal teenager usually does. Let me fill in the blanks, my name is Kate, 18, I live in New York, and I auditioned to be a trainee for SM Entertainment…and I got in! I never thought that this could happen to me since I don’t really look special…just long black hair, super short, and I’m not Korean (instead Native American, Italian, French, English, African American, and Irish, but mistaken for being Asian), but I’m going and I’m super excited! Before auditioning, I trained myself for a year studying Korean, practicing my dancing and training my vocals. For the audition, I danced the choreography to Lucifer by SHINee and sang the song Obsession which is also by SHINee. I love Korean pop and it’s all thanks to my friends Stacey, Sun, and Renee. They’re all Korean and got me into the culture. I’ve always loved to sing and do it professionally, but never knew what genre, until I heard Korean pop, I knew instantly I wanted to be a part of it.

 The group SHINee instantly became my favorite; they just have amazing songs and dances! My bias right away became the guy they called The Flaming Charisma Choi Minho and I automatically knew why they call him that. From watching a show they did called Hello Baby to seeing all the performances especially the solo performance of OMG, I thought and still think he’s amazing…all the SHINee members are! Anyway, I don’t think I’ll see them even though I’m in the same entertainment company, I’m just a trainee. ‘I wonder what is going to happen, I’m nervous, but I can’t wait for what’s going to happen!’

My thoughts get interrupted by an announcement on the plane, “Please fasten your seat belts. We’re going to be landing momentarily.” It’s both said in English and in Korean, but with my intense lessons I understand it in both languages. The planes lands and I walk to get my luggage, and then I need to go meet someone who is supposed to drive me to the SM building. It was easy to find my luggage since mine happened to be the first one to come out. While walking to the entrance I see a bunch of people holding signs, most likely people who are waiting to pick someone up, so I look for my name. As I scan through all the signs, I then see my name. I walk towards the guy holding the sign and I also see a woman with him. They spot me and the guy walks up to me and grabs my luggage while the woman bows to greet me.

“Annyeonghasaeyo, Seunghye imnida. I am part of the SM company to pick you up. Later, I will give you a tour around the building, but first I will take you to the dorms so you can unpack and get comfortable.” She says to me obviously in Korean. ‘I guess from here on, I’ll have to speak in Korean. I’m so glad I spent the time learning it.'

“Annyeonghasaeyo, Kate imnida! Manneseo bangap seupnida!” I say to her in a cheerful tone, but she didn’t really react. 'I guess she’s just here doing her job, whatever.'

We walk to the van and I see the guy, which I assume is the driver, putting my luggage in the back. He then opens the door for both me and Seunghye. The ride I found enjoyable being able to look out the window and see some of the sights of Korea. I made mental notes to remember which places to go to for sightseeing, hopefully I get some free time as a trainee. We pull up to the dorm and the driver opens the door to let us out then goes to get my luggage. Seunghye leads me to my room with the driver carrying my things.

“This is where you will be staying in the dorm; I hope you enjoy the room.” Seunghye says while opening the door and handing me the key while the driver puts my things in the room.

“Gamsahabnida!” I say to her while bowing.

“We will come back later around 4pm to pick you and bring you to the SM building, the head of SM Entertainment would like to speak to you.”

I nod to her letting her know I understand and with the last bows, I enter my room. I turn and look at where I’ll be staying from now on, it’s great! ‘I thought I was going to stay with other trainees…hm strange. I guess we all get our own room.’ The room isn’t really a room, more like a mini apartment. There’s a small kitchen, bathroom, living room and a bedroom. ‘This is so….great!!’ I plug my iPod into my iPod speakers and blast High High by GD&TOP dancing all around the room. I stop when I realize its 12pm and I only have three hours to unpack, take a shower, and change before they pick me up. ‘No time to have my own little party, I should start unpacking.’ I look around the apartment again taking everything in once again and I whisper to myself, “I can’t believe I’m actually here.”

Three hours passed by quickly, but the reason could be because I was dancing more than unpacking, took an hour in the shower, and took forever deciding on an outfit to impress the head of SM. It’s now 4pm and I’m expecting Seunghye and the driver to come soon. I hear the doorbell ring and it’s Seunghye. ‘Wow, she came here at 4pm exactly. She’s definitely serious about her job.’ We say quick greetings and head downstairs to the van. While heading down, I just had a quick thought, ‘Wait…if this is SM’s dorm…does that mean all the artists from SM live here!? No way! There must be another dorm for them and this is the trainee dorm.’ We arrive at the SM building and I’m amazed seeing the building in person. We enter it and it looks even better inside. Seunghye guides me through the building ending up in front of a room.

“Please wait in here while I get the head of SM.” I say ok and she leaves to fetch the head.

I enter the room and I immediately recognize what room this is. “This is…the practice room!” I say to myself in shock. This is the room that has the cloud background where SHINee, f(x), Super Junior, and Girls’ Generation practice. I slowly walk in taking in everything because everything up until this moment didn’t seem real to me, it felt more like a dream. I felt awkward standing in an empty space so I decide to sit in a chair that’s against one of the walls. I lean back and close my eyes relaxing while waiting for Seunghye to come back. I get lost in my thoughts thinking about what has happened up until now while in Korea, not much, but I still think it’s a lot. Since I’m so into my thoughts, I didn’t hear the door open or the footsteps that enter the room and walk up to me. It’s not until I hear someone talk that I open my eyes and shoot up out of my chair, only to hit into someone and fall back into the chair.

“Oww…that hurt...” I say quietly to myself rubbing my forehead since I collided my forehead with someone which caused me to fall back.

“Another case of the Onew condition!” I hear someone say through laughter. ‘Wait…Onew condition?’ I look now to see who’s on the floor and the person I bumped into. I became speechless because the person who was on the floor was none other than…Onew! I then see the people standing around him…and it was the other members of SHINee! ‘How hard did I hit my head!?  I must be seeing things.’ Just then I feel someone touch my arm and I look to see who it is.

“Are you ok?” The person who says this to me and who’s touching my arm is…Taemin! I would’ve answered, but I’m still in a state of shock seeing SHINee in front of me and one I butted heads with! I see Taemin’s worried expression looking at me and so I try to reassure him with a nod. It seem to have helped because then he gave me a small smile which made m heart skip a beat. I look over to the others and I see Jonghyun and Key laughing not even trying to hold it in. I then look and see Minho trying to hold in his laughter. ‘This is…not real. I…but…NO WAY!’ I shoot up out of my chair again and shake my head to see if I’m just imagining things because of the bump on my head. It's not my best idea since I just feel dizzy which makes me lean on the person closest to me, its Taemin.

“Are you sure you’re ok? You should sit back down.” He says to me sounding worried. I finally snap out of my shock and give him an actual answer than just a nod.

“Oh no I’m fine, don’t worry about me. It’s just another Kate moment haha.” I say to him giving a slight chuckle, but then I see his clueless face. It hit me that I just responded to him in English instead of Korean. ‘Great…nice one, Kate.’ I say the same thing to him, but this time in Korean. After that I see his face change into a smile and chuckle a little. I see Onew finally get up, so I turn to him and walk over.

“Mianhamnida! I wasn’t paying attention and got surprised.” I apologize while bowing.

“It’s ok. I’m actually use to falling down haha!” Onew says to me smiling.

“That’s for sure haha!” Jonghyun agreeing to what Onew just said and laughing again. Onew hits him on the arm and Jonghyun then has a straight face on, but can still see him trying not to laugh.

I see Key then walk forward a few steps and say, “Anyway, now that we’re done with this commotion, do you mind telling us who you are and why you’re in here?”

“Oh right! Kate imnida! I’m a new trainee for SM. Mannaseo bangap seupnida! I’m here waiting for the head of SM because he wants to talk to me.” I respond to Key’s question.

“Ah, I see.” Key says with an “Aha!” expression.

“Mannaseo bangap seupnida!” Onew then says right after Key.

“Welcome to SM!” Jonghyun says following the other two.

I get a good look at them now and they’re all so tall! Even Jonghyun is tall compared to me! I’m not even near Minho and I know I would look like a midget next to him. ‘Oh yea…Minho.’ He’s been so quiet that I hardly noticed to him until now. I take a look at him and my heart automatically starts beating a little faster. He’s looking over at Key and Jonghyun who are now playing around with each other. ‘I never thought I would see him, or even SHINee!...but now they’re right in front of me, he’s right in front of me…’ The JjongKey moment ends and he looks back over to me and I quickly avert my eyes away from him.

“So where are you from? You spoke to me in English before, so I’m guessing you’re not from here.” Taemin sweetly says to me with a grin. ‘Kya! He’s too adorable!’

“Oh, yea haha. I’m from New York, so I’m a native English speaker. I needed to learn how to speak Korean.”

“How long did it take you to learn?” Jonghyun asks.

“Um…about a year.”

“Wooooow” all of the members say in sync with a surprised look. I couldn’t help, but chuckle at how in sync they were and their expressions.

“That’s so impressive!” Taemin says excitedly, but then his face changes into a slight upset one continuing, “I still have trouble with English.”

“Aw it’s ok! English is really hard to learn. I’m grateful that it’s my native language because if it wasn’t I would fail miserably learning it haha!” with that, Taemin cheered up and I continuing saying directing it now to all the members, “I want to see how well your English is.” They all look at each other with hesitant and worried expressions, but then Key steps up to be the first person to test his skills.

“Alright then, tell me something about yourself.” I tell him in English.

“Ok. I am known as the Almighty Key! I’m the member who is known to have the best fashion sense and I agree that I do.” He says perfectly in a proud tone. ‘Yep, can definitely see why he’s called the diva of the group ha!’

“Great job! Next?” I then see Key grab on to Jonghyun’s arm right away and push him towards me with of course Jonghyun resisting. ‘I remember reading somewhere how his English is the worst haha! This should be fun.’ Right when I was about to ask Jonghyun something, the door opens and I see Seunghye and the head of SM walk in. I could hear Jonghyun let out a huge sigh of relief and that made me do a small chuckle.

“Ah I see that everyone is here.” Seunghye says walking towards all of us. This made me confused, ‘She called SHINee here too? Why?’

Seunghye continues to talk, “Kate, this is the head of SM Entertainment.”

“Annyeonghasaeyo!” I say to him while bowing.

“Annyeonghasaeyo. I’m sure you are all wondering while you’re here in the practice room. Kate,” the director turns towards me, “I would like to see your audition again, this time in person. Sing the same song and also dance the same dance as in the audition DVD. Since both are of SHINee songs,” he then turns towards SHINee, “I would like SHINee themselves to be the judges.”

My eyes get so big that they look like they can pop out. ‘SHINee…is going to watch me dance to Lucifer and listen to me sing Obsession…deciding whether I’m an official trainee or not!?’ I feel like hyperventilating this moment because my nerves shoot up so fast. ‘No Kate, you have to calm down and concentrate! Think as if there’s no one in the room, but yourself. You can do this.’ The singing is first, and as the SHINee, Seunghye and the director takes their seats, the music starts to play Obsession by SHINee.

In that moment, when I start to sing, I get lost in the music and it flows. I hit the notes I need to hit and put as much passion into it as I can. I really think I’m in my room, singing alone, and for fun. The rap is coming up and this is the most difficult part for me, but I’ll try my best. It starts and I hit every point successfully. As the song ends, I hear clapping and I open my eyes without even realizing I closed them at some point because I got so into it. I see SHINee and the director clapping for me. I can’t help but do one of my signature excited jumps where I have my hands in fists and hide my face with them while jumping up and down in one spot.

“Good job, we’ll hear what SHINee has to say after you do the dance.” The director says gesturing me to the middle of the room. The music starts to play Lucifer and I automatically start dancing, again getting into it. I hit the tutting parts right even though it’s slightly off timing, but I recover in the next part of the dance. It took me so long to do this dance accurately and now it’s paying off, every move feels effortless now. It’s up to the rap and I’m still feeling confident with no slip ups yet. It’s the final chorus and I plan on hitting it hard. The last line plays and I finish off with the final stance. I again hear clapping coming from SHINee and the director. It wasn’t until I start to walk that I notice that I’m out of breath and sweating.

“Alright then, you did a great job, Kate. It’s now time to hear what SHINee has to say about both the singing and dancing.” The director tells me looking over to the members. I see Jonghyun stand up and I assume that he’s the member who’ll speak about my singing.

“I was the one who wrote that song and when hearing you sing it, it really was suited for your voice. All of us think you did a really good job!” Jonghyun says to me with a big grin at the end with what he was saying. Next, Taemin stands up while Jonghyun sits back down. ‘Taemin is the best dancer, so it’s to be expected he’s the one to talk about my dancing.’

“The Lucifer dance was hard for all of us to learn and was one of our most difficult dances. I’m impressed that you danced it so well! We all think you did a great job!” He tells me excitedly with a huge grin. ‘I’m so happy that SHINee liked them, I was so worried that I would screw up or they didn’t think it was good.’

“I heard from the group members and I myself enjoyed both the song and dance. So Kate, congratulations! You’re now officially a part of SM Entertainment. We will discuss your debut date later on in the month.” The director says.

“Gamsahabni- MWOAEYO!? I’M DEBUTING!? I thought that I was just accepted as a trainee!”

“Well, we’ve wanted a solo artist for a while now. I saw your audition and thought that you didn’t need that much training and would be able to debut in a couple of months.” The director explains calmly.

“Omo! Chincha!?” he responds with a nod. Before I could react, I feel someone almost tackle me putting their arm around my shoulder. I look to see Onew congratulating me and that the other members are too.

“Now, there is another reason why we called SHINee here.” This time Seunghye speaks up. She continues, “There seems to be some kind of mix up with your room Kate. The dorm is not finished with the renovations. The water line is not working and the electricity isn’t either. It should all be fixed in about a week.”‘So that’s why the water pressure was so low in the show and it took me an hour! Sigh, smooth move Kate.’

“So where am I staying until then?”

“Well sadly, there is no room in Girls’ Generations’, f(x)’s, or Super Junior’s dorm. Which means that you will have to stay with SHINee until your dorm is done with renovations.” She calmly finishes.

“MWOAEYO!?” SHINee says in sync again, but this time I join them. ‘This all has to be a dream! This must be a crazy dream! OH MY GOSH!’

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Learn some Korean~! ^^

Annyeonghasaeyo - Hello

Gamsahabnida - Thank You

Mannaseo bangap seupnida - Pleased to meet you

Mianhamnida - I'm sorry

Mwoaeyo - What?

Omo - Oh my gosh!

Chincha - Really?