i. Admiration

Admiration (n): respect and warm approval; high regard; appreciation

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when Eunhyuk chose Yoona as the prettiest on an interview from 'Star Date: All SMTOWN crew got together'...

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"What's the best thing in your agency?"

When Eunhyuk heard the question, his thought process immediately absorbed it. It might seem as though he was biased, but in his honest opinion, there were truly a lot of factors that made the SM Entertainment the best. However, to incite a bigger reaction from the audience and the interviewer, himself, he decided to give a witty answer that had a greater impact.

"As you can see, everybody's so handsome and pretty," he said, smiling and looking smugly at the camera.

Like he expected, the interviewer snorted. Whether he found Eunhyuk's response absurd or he was just expressing his indignation from having anticipated the response that Eunhyuk gave was none of his concern. His point was that he succeeded in inducing the given result.

To range over the topic, the interviewer gave another question following his answer. If he was asked who he did think was the most handsome, it would surely cause quite a stir. He would say his name, of course, but being too bold and shameless might actually earn him a lot of haters that time. Besides, there was a Siwon who's always been the power visual of SM. There was also a Donghae who he thought was getting more and more handsome as he got more mature. Also, they had those juniors who were young and fresh. 

However, fortunately, he was asked who he did think was the prettiest. This was also a bit conflicting as there were plenty of candidates to choose from. But if he was to give his genuine opinion and unbiased judgement, he already had someone in mind. 

"은혁: 윤아가 최고의 미인" (Direct Translation is "Eunhyuk: Yoona is the best beauty")

"Yoona is the prettiest," he said concludingly and everyone seemed to be satisfied with his answer as they all agreed in unison.

The interview proceeded smoothly after. They all displayed their own kind of wit and sense of humor and by the end of it, every representative was either smiling or laughing, proving how SM Town family members could make a simple interview more fun and humorous.

-

After a few minutes, as Eunhyuk was busy looking at a piece of paper, sitting at the couch and having various voices of other SM members talking and chatting as his background noise, he picked up the sound of someone calling him. When he glanced forward, it turned out it was Yoona.

"Eunhyuk oppa, you chose me as the prettiest?" Yoona asked with full of doubt while checking at Eunhyuk's expression. She walked towards the couch he was sitting on with the cameraman following her steps. There were only a few rare moments when Eunhyuk lost his words but that time, he was seriously rendered speechless for a slightly second. Should he play it cool and admit it or should he and deny it? He was deliberating how to react so instead, he escaped and pretended that he didn't say anything like that.

"Me? I did?" he asked the cameraman, trying his best to keep a straight face.

"You really did, (the PD-nim told me). Why didn't you tell me?" Yoona asked him as she giggled in delight, clearly a bit too happy with the newly found information. 

Eunhyuk just looked around, still trying to figure out how to pull through this without giving away how he embarrassed himself. In the end, as he couldn't think of an amusing attack to counter Yoona's obvious satisfaction, he just let her win like that. He didn't admit it, but he didn't deny it either. He thought that was already an enough answer.

To be honest, he truly got a bit embarrassed back there. As he was listening to Yoona's giggles and laughter, his eyes were wandering around and his lips were about to form a smile. He just didn't expect the person behind the camera to tell on him. Telling someone directly that she was pretty was one thing, but telling someone she was pretty behind her back and then having another person reveal it was an entirely different matter. But well, what's done was done and what's said was said so that's it. Besides, what he said was the truth anyway so it's nice that it was conveyed to the person involved since Eunhyuk saw how happy the kid was.

In retrospect, there were a lot of juniors and female artists that were really pretty, not only from their company but also from the whole entertainment industry. But from Eunhyuk's perspective, and from all s' (he was quite sure), Yoona was easily considered the most beautiful. What made the Girls' Generation member stood out from others was that she never pretended to be pretty (on some shows, maybe, but that's just for laughs). She was pretty but she didn't act like one. She was not afraid to ruin her image and she was always true to herself, laughing loudly and acting all mischievous and frisky. She always liked to hang out with the Super Junior members while forgetting the fact that she was the Girls' Generation center and visual, but even then, she still looked pretty without even trying.

Eunhyuk had always thought Yoona was elegant, from before and even now. He liked looking at her because she was simply captivating. And because he was very fond of her, he tended to focus his attention on her every time she was doing something. She had a certain natural grace ingrained in her person in which whatever she did, she did it with poise and great finesse. A lot of people, fans and fellow celebrities alike, thought and believed she was the prettiest, but what Eunhyuk could say was that only the people who knew her in real life could tell the true beauty that she possessed. No camera and video recorder could ever capture how truly beautiful Yoona was. Not only that, she also had a beautiful personality that suited her beautiful face. It was only one of the reason why many people liked her. Eunhyuk was comfortable with her even though her presence was a bit overwhelming. She was humble and very down to earth that's why they were able to maintain their close relationship.

So as a person who admired true beauty, Eunhyuk was proud to say that he was one of Yoona's closest friend and dearest senior in the industry.

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--krissyoong--