“It’s too early,” Maria is complaining with a yawn and places her head on the table in the recording room. “And it’s in Japanese; I’m freaking out.”

5 Pieces are in the recording room early in the morning to record the Japanese version of [I Love You]. Since all members have practiced Japanese for a while, they will start their first actual Japanese challenge – the song. Julia isn’t there because she is filming a program, but the other members are tiredly sitting in the room and practicing the lyrics. The recording was originally supposed to be in Japan, where their Japanese agency is, but due to their schedule they don’t have time to go to Japan and record it.

The man who translated the song to Japanese is with them to help the girls together with the Korean producer, to make it sound right.

Though Maria is heard complaining a lot because it is so early, she doesn’t complain in a way that is rude to the staff that has come to help them. She asks for help when she is learning her first part.

“Watashi o mite,” she repeats her lyrics, not singing it but just saying it. “Watashi no kokoro no… nakami o miru.”

It is just a lot of Japanese being said as the girls are trying to learn their first parts.

Hannah knows the most Japanese among them all thanks to her dramas that she filmed in Japan. It was already planned when they decided about the Japanese debut that Hannah would somehow get the main spot just because her Japanese is good and she has already debuted in Japan as an actress. Truth is that all members admits that people know more about 5 Pieces just because of Hannah.

“Who will start?” the producer asks.

“Hannah,” the girls answers. They have already decided in which order they will go, so Hannah takes her papers and walks inside the recording room. She takes her thumb up when she is ready and the music is starting.

*[Hannah/ハンナ] これまでにないような私はクスクス笑い

私は何をすべきかわからない

私はこれまでにないよう顔を赤らめる

I CAN’T 自分自身を制御することはできません。*

Her members are quietly watching Hannah do her part from the first word to the last word.

“I should’ve been in a Japanese drama too,” Emelia grimaces and leans back with her arms crossed over her chest. She is also good at Japanese, but not as good as Hannah – and Emelia can’t be cute when she speaks Japanese (maybe because the first few words she learnt in Japanese were swear words).

“Well done, Hannah, now let’s do the giggling part right away,” the producer tells Hannah who smiles by hearing she doesn’t have to re-do it right away.

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“We are pieces of one-”

“5 Pieces!”

5 Pieces is sitting together on a row for a Puzzle interview for their re-packed comeback. Since M Countdown was cancelled this week, the girls came to do the pre-recording for next week and then they were told by their manager that SM had arranged a meeting with 5 Pieces official fan-club Puzzle. The Puzzle fan-site will upload the interview and 5 Pieces will also hand out ten signed CDs for the winners of a competition they had on the site.

They are sitting in their stage outfits; jeans shorts filled with scribbling of the same different colours that the girls are wearing on their tops. Maria has a top in yellow, Emelia’s in green, Carolina’s in pink, Julia’s in grey and Hannah’s in a darker purple than the group’s fan-club colour. It is their individual colours that they have had since their auditions days when they performed a song where they got to have these colours on their sweaters.

“Our first repacked album [One and Only] has been released,” Carolina informs and the girls lowly claps their hands as Carolina starts to talk right away. “It includes three new songs, which one of them is in English. It is our first time doing an English song, so we have been very curious to how our fans would react to it.”

“[One and Only] is a song about a girl who wants the boy she likes to confess to her,” Julia says, “it is a cute song and I think we are showing more of our hidden charms with it.”

The girls are doing the interview in their way. After introducing the new song they answers questions, explaining why their English is so good (people have commented that 5 Pieces are good in English after seeing Ellen DeGeneres and hearing the song) – their English isn’t especially good they say, but they have learnt it in school – and they also talks about the fashion concept and some other questions are given too.

They also talk about that on Monday, it’s been three years since 5 Pieces had their first official debut performance. That means its three years since debut. So the interview goes in on how it has been adapting to the Korean culture and how their lives in Korea have been so far.

“I guess the Korean language isn’t such a big problem anymore then?” the interviewer asks from where she is sitting next to the camera – not being filmed.

“I think we still have some problem with the language,” Carolina answers honestly with a smile. Hannah is nodding in agreement. “Since Korean and Swedish have nothing in common it was really hard in the beginning to know how to place words and the pronunciation since words are very familiar to each other in Asia, and also the writing was difficult in the beginning. Even if we are really good compared now to then, we still aren’t fluent in Korean.”

“Instead of having problems with words, most of us have problem with the polite and impolite language,” Maria adds. “Since there are no formalities in Sweden, we have a lot of problems with how to address people and how to talk.”

The others agree.

“There are times we don’t know how to address people, so it happens that we accidentally offends someone,” Carolina adds. “We are still learning.”

“Our friends here in Korea doesn’t use the formal grammar, so it happens that we learn from that and accidentally uses informal way to talk to people who are higher (position) than us,” Emelia says.

“But those around us are very understanding when we mixes up polite and impolite talk,” Maria is fast to say.

“When we meet a senior for the first time they also very understand,” Hannah adds, “since they know we have only spoken Korean for three years.”

The woman asking the questions is from the fan-club. She is just above 20 and is the one who often keeps fans on the site updated with the latest of where 5 Pieces will appear, if it is on a radio program or an event, this woman is the one who informs the fans about it. She is sitting with a laptop in her knee, given direct questions from the fans on the site to 5 Pieces.

“There are a lot of international fans who are asking if you have any plans of going to Europe,” she asks the girls. “You didn’t attend SM Town in Paris, so there are a lot of European fans asking if you have any plans of going there.”

“Actually,” Carolina starts to answer and glances at her members, “we have also been very disappointed that we haven’t faced our fans in Europe since we do know there are a lot of requests coming from there. And we are from Sweden, so we really want to go there and promote as well. That we couldn’t attend SM Town in Paris made us very sad as we saw how disappointed our fans were.”

“We were actually told recently that there are a lot of fans in Europe asking us to come there, especially since we released [One and Only],” Emelia reveals. “Nothing has been confirmed, but there is a chance that we will go to Europe and see our fans very soon, but we can’t promise anything.”

They finish the interview and the woman shakes hand with each member, thanking them for taking the time. They go to another room to take pictures for the fan-site and also for Puzzle to hand over gifts they had prepared for this meeting.

“Fans from all over the world have sent their fits for your three year anniversary, so I hope it is okay you get them a few days earlier,” the woman says when they enters the room.

Hannah can see big black bags filled with gifts, sorted out for each member and also for the whole group together.

“And there is a gift we have prepared together for you,” the woman says with an expression that says she is excited to show but nervous for the reaction. She walks back to the door to tell someone to come inside. One of her friends that had come along for the meeting walks inside the room, holding a small kitten in his arms. Maria’s jaw drops.

“So cute!” she bursts out and walks over to the kitten, not caring about anything else.

“Since we know how much you all wanted a pet, your fans helped out to pick out and buy this Ragdoll kitten for you. He is only 13 weeks old,” the woman says.

Their jaws drop to the floor by her words, and even Maria who is already face to face with the kitten in the friend’s arms, looks up at the woman with wide open. Hannah looks at their manager.

The reason why their manager tried to avoid the subject about getting a pet was because he knew that Puzzle were preparing to give 5 Pieces a kitten as anniversary gift, which the woman explains. Because 5 Pieces often mentions that they want a pet, fans couldn’t think of a better gift on the three year anniversary.

Maria gets the kitten in her arms. You can see how restless she is, so happy and restless because the kitten is really cute.

“His name is Ace,” the woman tells them. Hannah keeps a distance from the kitten while the others are interested in it, repeating that it is really cute. “Puzzle named him that, thinking that since 5 Pieces is number one in everything, he should be called Ace.”

“Whoa,” Maria smiles at the kitten in her arms.

“Tough name for such a cutie,” Emelia cuddles with it over Maria’s shoulder.

It’s easy to tell that they love the kitten and the name is – like Maria says; a match in heaven. Everyone gets down on the floor when they lets Ace run around. Hannah sits down too and Ace comes up to greet her.

“He’s cute,” is all she says, carefully lifting up her hand when trying to caress him.

“Don’t be so awkward,” Julia laughs at Hannah who just smiles at the kitten who’s trying to catch her hand.

“He’s so small, I don’t know how to touch him,” she defends herself.

“You don’t like cats?” the woman sounds worried.

“No, it’s not that,” Hannah finally looks up, looking kindly at the woman. “I’m just used with a big Golden Retriever dog.”

Ace runs up on her legs and Hannah lifts her hands up, unable to touch him. She isn’t afraid of him, she is just worried she will hurt him because he looks like a little cuddle toy.

They spend a lot of time in the room thanks to Ace. No one seems to want to leave because Ace is just cutely cuddling with everyone. They also go through some of the gifts given from the fans, gives their autographs on the CDs, takes pictures and they also writes personal thank you letters for Ace and the gifts.

It’s true. 5 Pieces now have a kitten. Ace is adorable and 5 Pieces is fast by taking their own pictures of him to upload on twitter and their blog, writing that it is a gift from their amazing fans. Emelia also shows her love to their kitten’s name – she loves Ace.

5P_EM: Guess who this is?? (picture) Our Ace! Though he seems to turn his head away from me now, we will be good friends ;)

5P_CAROLINA: (picture) You wish to be our cat now, right? Maria can’t stop hugging him! I want to hug him too~~

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Headline 03rd: 5 Pieces’ Says They Still Can’t Use The Horrific Language Properly

Headline 03rd: 5 Pieces Reveals “Those Around Us Understands When We Mix Up Polite/Impolite”

Headline 03rd: 5 Pieces Shows Off Their Present From Fans For 3 years Anniversary – They Got A Kitten!