BIRTHNAME Cheng Ka Kei Karen (鄭嘉琪)
NICKNAMES
▪ Kay / Kei (the second character in her Chinese name is pronounced as such)
▪ KK (from repeating the second character in her Chinese name)
▪ Big headed prawn (Kevin and Grace call her this in reference to her being forgetful)
▪ Pinky (called for her love of the color pink)
▪ Jiajia (WJSN Chinese members sometimes call her this as her name is pronounced "Jiaqi" in Mandarin and they already use "Qiqi" for Meiqi
BIRTHDATE April 9, 1997
BIRTHPLACE Yau Ma Tei, Hong Kong
HOMETOWN Shek Kip Mei, Hong Kong
ETHNICITY Chinese
LANGUAGES
▪ Cantonese (Native)
▪ Mandarin (Fluent, Kevin made her learn it and she speaks it with WJSN's Chinese line)
▪ English (Fluent, she learnt it as a subject from elementary to high school)
▪ Korean (Fluent, she's been in Korea for 5 years)
FACE CLAIM Loona's Vivi
BACKUP FACE CLAIM Charlotte Lum
HEIGHT 162cm
WEIGHT 47kg
APPEARANCE
Karen is a petite girl with a pretty face and long pink hair. However, she doesn't have much of a figure and is stick thin with small s.

TRAITS (+) cheerful, optimistic, loyal, caring (-) sensitive, quick-tempered, hasty, impulsive (0) reserved, selfless, curious, sympathetic / INFP-T / Hufflepuff / Chaotic Good

ELABORATION
(+) Cheerful : Karen is someone who seemingly does not let anything get her down and is always laughing and smiling. When interacting with others, she'll try her best to remain enthusiastic.
(+) Optimistic : Karen always tries to look for the silver lining in any cloud and if she can't find it, she'll keep trying. She tries to keep a positive outlook on life because she believes there are so many ways things could go right, or things that don't go well can end up being in her favour. And even if things don't go the way she planned, she believes it would be better if she didn't get what she wanted.
(+) Loyal : Karen stands strongly to those she loves. If they're in trouble, she'll stand up for them. Friends and family are her first priority no matter what.
(+) Caring : Karen tries her best to make sure her loved ones are always happy and healthy. She's not good at expressing her feelings, but she'll make sure to praise them if she feels they've done well. She'll also try to show it through small gestures like buying them small gifts.

(-) Sensitive : Karen is easily upset by criticism or seeing others suffer. She doesn't understand why people would want to hurt others, whether intentionally or unintentionally, and feels that even if you wish to criticise someone in order to correct them, you should tell them so patiently rather than lashing out and using harsh words.
(-) Quick-tempered : Karen gets irritated easily and tends to lash out when annoyed. Also, if you've made Karen upset, you can expect her to be in a bad mood for a while. She won't talk much, but she'll sulk in a corner and give nonchalant replies if you try to speak to her.
(-) Hasty : Karen has a tendency to rush through tasks and neglect them once she thinks she is done with them. She doesn't like spending long periods of time on things, because she thinks if she's gotten them perfect, everything is fine.
(-) Impulsive : Karen sometimes says or does things without thinking of the consequences. However, this is mostly in the spirit of helping her loved ones. She's got good intentions, she just needs to work on her execution.

(0) Reserved : Karen takes time to warm up to others and tries not to draw attention to herself.
(0) Selfless : Karen tries her best to help others, but sometimes sacrifices herself in doing so.
(0) Curious : Karen loves learning new things, but sometimes when she ends up finding out things that she wished she didn't, she gets upset.
(0) Sympathetic : Karen is kind to people who are hurt, but ends up "absorbing" their sadness and making herself upset for nothing.

Karen's parents passed away when she was a baby, and she was raised by her uncle's family, spending lots of time with her older cousin Kevin. When Karen was a child and young teenager, Kevin often brought her to his on-location (not studio) filmings. In 2010, Karen got to know Elkie Chong when they met on the set of Ghetto Justice.

Elkie was a fan of many 2nd generation groups, and was looking to audition for Korean companies. She would show Karen her possible audition routines / clips between filmings, or send them to her via mobile messaging. As time passed, Karen became interested in K-pop too and started dancing with Elkie, and she enjoyed it. She even thought maybe she wanted to be an idol, and started auditioning for companies with Elkie. In 2014, both girls were accepted to Cube Entertainment. However, Karen left Cube Entertainment in 2016 and auditioned for Starship, and was accepted as a trainee.

▪ likes :
Disney
Cute things
Her family and friends
WJSN
Toast with peanut butter and condensed milk
Porridge (it's considered a food for sick people but she loves it)
Fishball noodles with lots of chilli oil and vinegar
Boba tea
Shopping
Twice
Gfriend
Nail art
TVB dramas
Japanese dramas
Anime
CLC
G Idle
▪ dislikes :
Smelly public toilets
Dirty places
Animal intestines
Alcohol, she can't stand the taste
Cigarettes
When people are unnecessarily rude because they think it's funny / cool
Hot weather
Elkie being compared negatively to others or people saying bad things about Elkie
▪ habits :
using her phone when it's too noisy / awkward
buying lots of cute socks
making peace signs in photos
eating oily food before something important (e.g a live show, since "do your best" sounds like "add oil" in Cantonese)
waiting for people to ask for her opinion before speaking up
getting flustered
calling Meiqi "Meimei"
calling Xuanyi "Xuanxuan"or "Yiyi"
keeping long nails
Facetiming Grace and Kevin
▪ hobbies :
learning other groups' choreography
taking selcas
taking ootd shots
watching dramas and anime
▪ fears :
giving others a bad first impression
germs
death
bugs
breaking her nails (it's difficult for her to play the guitar without long nails)
chipping her nailpolish while playing the guitar
embarassing herself
▪ other trivia :
Her shoe size is 216mm / US5 / EUR35-36 / UK3.
Her ultimate biases are Twice's Momo, Gfriend's Yerin, CLC's Yoojin, G Idle's Yuqi and WJSN's Seola.
She won a pet fish from a school carnival when she was in lower primary school but she killed the fish by "bathing" it (putting the fish in a cup of water and pouring the water between two cups) daily.
She used to forget to bring her powerbank, charging wire and earpiece out all the time. To solve this problem, she bought 2 sets of those items, one which she leaves at home / in the dorm and one which she carries out with her. (but she still forgets once in a while)
She goes to nail art salons often and loves having cute nail art done, and she usually gets gelish manicures because she's impatient for normal nailpolish to dry.
Favourite songs from her bias groups : Lucky and To The Sky (CLC), Love Whisper and Trust (Gfriend), What Is Love (Twice), Save Me Save You and Kiss Me (WJSN), Maze (G Idle)
Her favourite Hong Kong actress is Linda Chung.
Her favourite Japanese actress is Toda Erika.
Her favourite anime at the moment is The Promised Neverland and her favourite characters are Norman, Emma, Ray, Anna, Gilda, Alicia, Maya, Phil, Gillian, Barbara, Sonya, Yuugo, Lucas and Isabella. (basically everyone except Andrew and the demons)
Other anime characters she likes are Sailor Moon, Gasai Yuno, Yazawa Nico, Sakurauchi Riko, Kurosawa Ruby, Kazuno Leah, Tsushima Yoshiko, Ushigome Rimi, Maruyama Aya, Uehara Himari, Matsubara Kanon, Tsurumaki Kokoro, Udagawa Ako and Pareo.
She wants to try cosplaying and the first character she wants to cosplay is Ruby.
She and Elkie auditioned for Cube with 4Minute's Heart To Heart. She auditioned for Starship with Kimberley Chen's 愛你.

▪ Elkie Chong / 21 / CLC Member / Ex-crush
Karen is still hurt from being rejected by Elkie, but still quietly supports CLC and Elkie. She does hope for Elkie to be back in her life one day though.

▪ Kevin Cheng / 51 / Actor / Cousin
Karen and Kevin spent lots of time together when they were growing up, and he's like a father figure to her. Kevin usually sends Karen good morning / good luck / encouragement texts nowadays, and they facetime once in a while.

▪ Grace Chan / 28 / Actress / Cousin in law
Due to their closeness in age, Karen and Grace are like best friends. They usually talk about girly stuff together.

▪ Rafael Cheng / born in February 2019 / Preschooler / Nephew
Karen has seen her nephew in facetime and photos, but she can't wait to meet the little angel in real life.

▪ WJSN / 20-25 / Idols / Labelmates
Karen looks up to them as seniors. She is close to Meiqi, Xuanyi and Xiao.

▪ Ahn Yujin / 16 / Izone Member / Labelmate
Karen thinks Yujin is super cute, and is very protective and caring towards her.

▪ Jang Wonyoung / 15 / Izone Member / Labelmate
Karen treats Wonyoung like a younger sister.

▪ CLC / 19-24 / Idols / Former labelmates
Karen still supports them as she trained with them before, but sometimes gets jealous of them being close to Elkie.

▪ G Idle / 19-22 / Idols / Former labelmates
Karen trained with them for a short while and she supports them.

▪ Park Jiyoon / 21 / Trainee / Labelmate and fellow contestant
Jiyoon is the cutest and sweetest little angel ever, but that's the reason why Karen wants to keep her distance from the younger girl. She suspects Jiyoon has an ulterior motive for being so nice to her, and she's still not ready to fall in love again.