Jaejoong Analysis (Real Life) - Friends, Cooking, Childhood
Description
“Imagine that we had no eyes. If we had no eyes, we would feel the ‘warmth’ of the sunlight before the dazzling light made it unbearable, we would experience the ‘scent’ of a flower before it’s beautifulness, and would understand the ‘heart’ of a person before we formed our impressions of them from sight.“ -Kim Jaejoong (twitter update 2013.07.13)
Foreword
Note: I suddenly got scared that what if one day tumblr fails and all this analyzing went to waste because it was wiped out? I spent a long time on it lol so I'm just gonna put it here too.
(Here's where you can get the links for the quotes)
(written in 2013 but still relevant...)
Jaejoong on his own image:
(Now)
“Imagine that we had no eyes. If we had no eyes, we would feel the ‘warmth’ of the sunlight before the dazzling light made it unbearable, we would experience the ‘scent’ of a flower before it’s beautifulness, and would understand the ‘heart’ of a person before we formed our impressions of them from sight.“
-Kim Jaejoong (twitter update 2013.07.13)
“When I was younger, I wanted to show everyone my handsome and strong image, but now I’ve realized that it’s best to be free." Jaejoong
“Since the beginning, I was responsible for the strong image in the group, thus as compared to domestically, I received more love overseas. In the past, there were many who were prejudiced against me. Even though it might not be that much, it was what I used to feel. As I continued to have activities overseas, what I felt the most are that about people met with me with no prejudice. Those who met me in a different culture and language, showed their liking towards me as Kim Jaejoong. Under such situation, showing off myself and saying out my own story, it made me felt comfortable. Though there is a language barrier, we interact with our true hearts, resulting an enjoyable friendship. At the same time, to be able to share such sentiments with those who happily love our music, it made me value and like their culture.” JaeJoong (via stansgtfo)
“Though I know it’s impossible not to look at someone’s appearance, I’d like to ask people to take one more look at me to see what’s inside. ‘BolMae’ (A person who gets more charming the more you look at them) is a great quality to have, right? Soybean paste smells quite foul, so who would try it the first time they see it? (Like soybean paste) I want to be a person who ripens over time and brings joy to others.” x
-
This is our Jaejoong now. A Jaejoong who knows the prejudice against him and doesn’t try to be anything he’s not. He is comfortable with who he is but still advocates to look deeper inside people to truly see them.
-
(Past)
“Why so cold…? Why is Hero JaeJoong always so cold? Why? Firstly, I’m not sure why, but many people feel that I look very cold. Maybe it’s because of my facial features… My eyes give a colder look and I don’t smile much. Actually I laugh a lot. I asked our members. Even I myself am unaware of this. One year after our debut, they told me that they hadn’t seen me smile that whole year, regardless of where we were. I personally think that I smile very often. Because for them, when there is something funny, they will laugh out loud but for me, only my expression is laughing. Maybe that’s what they feel too. In the future, I will give them a better impression; smile more. I don’t really know the way to smile. I shall learn how to smile nicely, then smile more. Because all the people around me say that, so occasionally I do think about it. Sometimes after I finish bathing, I look in the mirror, really look so cold… sometimes I do find it a bit cold. I will silently acknowledge that fact. In the future, I’ll show more of my brighter side to everyone.” Jaejoong
-
This is the past Jaejoong. Jaejoong who used to not smile and wanted to smile more not because he wanted to be happier but to be able to show everyone he was happy and show everyone a better impression, a better impression because they thought he was so cold and expressionless. This Jaejoong was much more insecure and thought a lot more about how others see him and fixing himself to the expectations others have for him instead of being confident in who he was as a person.
~*~*~*~*~*~
Jaejoong’s friends:
“Recently, feeling depressed, I was drinking by myself at 3AM and I called Jaejoong hyung. He said he was also drinking alone and came to me. Hyung is someone who will understand me even when I don’t say anything so I feel like we have similar emotions.” - Junhyung (via yeahtvxqquotes) x
“I met Hyunjoong for the first time, and I felt a bit sorry for him. He looked fine, the way he’s shaped, but he looked a bit like a loner. (laugh) So my heart went out to him even more.” Jaejoong
New to Korea, there was nothing Hankyung could do to adapt to the new environment and communicate with others at first. When it came to picking which room Hankyung would sleep in, Jaejoong was the first one to say, “Let’s use the same room.” It was Jaejoong who took the first step to teach him everything patiently, and appointed himself as Hankyung’s Korean teacher, and the two of them would always be seen at home studying with a Korean dictionary. x
Those who have switched schools know—just how awkward it is at first. The very first friend Oh Jaeyoung made was Kim Jaejoong. x
“I’ve recently become close with my sunbaes in DBSK. In the past there used to be a lot of unseen rivalry between different agencies but since we’re both in groups we all have a lot in common. Hero JaeJoong hyung approached me first. After that I naturally became friends with Yoochun hyung and Junsu hyung and I realised that I could be the dongsaeng too.” - G-Dragon from an interview to Asia E (2010)
-
Jaejoong went to be with Junhyung at 3AM because Junhyung was feeling depressed. That is the friend that Jaejoong is. The one to call when you feel sad or lonely is Jaejoong because he will be there for you in those moments.
Jaejoong, who is apparently pretty intimidating, has learned he must usually approach others first. What I found interesting about G-Dragon is that he also deals with the loneliness. G-Dragon had said that same year ”I am most afraid of loneliness, I cannot survive alone.“ x. I hope you can see an emerging theme here. Jaejoong naturally becomes very close with people who have similar feelings of loneliness or people who are alone. This is the person Jaejoong is.
-
“He definitely has that persona where he’s down to do whatever, as long as everyone’s having a good time. He’s very good at making strangers feel comfortable.”
Shane Yoon,the mc for jyj US tour about Kim Jaejoong (viailovekimjaejoong)
-
Now-a-day’s he is able to make everyone comfortable, and it’s important that ‘everyone’ and 'strangers’ are included spoken about because that just shows, Jaejoong makes sure no one is feeling left out. But it was hard for him to get to where he is now. He struggled a lot with his 'cold’ image in the past that caused him to feel isolated sometimes. But he’s overcome that and is now this stronger person. It’s important to see a Jaejoong who’s attached to people who are lonely is a Jaejoong who tries to make sure everyone feels included and not left out.
`*`*`*`*`*`
Jaejoong and Cooking:
YH: Since we are from Korea, we need to eat real Korean food, which revitalizes ourselves.
YC: No more food by HERO.
YH: We’ve reached the limits. We suffered too much from the food HERO cooked.
JJ: Look! What’s wrong with mine?
“He made kimchi stew for me because I said I got hangover~ Such a diligent guy”
Lee Sang Gon about Kim Jaejoong, (4/11/2013)
"Jaejoong has a warm heart. He sometimes calls me and says “Mother, please eat your meals regularly.” Sometimes when we are texting each other, he would ask “what would you like (to eat?)” When I answer, “I will think about it,” he called right away and asks me if I like crabs. When I answer “oh, I like that” he invited me to a fancy restaurant and treated me to a great meal.”
-Park Yong Ha’s mother (2011)
“When cooking, salt and sunshine are important, but Yunho is very important,too”
- Jaejoong X
Junsu said, “Of everything he can cook, I recommend Jaejoong hyung’s kimchi fried rice and japtang jjigae,” while Park Yoochun praised, “As we don’t live in a dorm together anymore, we don’t have many chances to eat Jaejoong hyung’s food full of his love and sinceritybut he’s really good at it. Even when it looks like there’s nothing to cook with, he always makes tasty food.“
Junsu added, “He can make food tasty, even without any artificial flavoring.”
“I’ve seen Jaejoong cry . He made soup for me, and he cried when i said it didn’t taste good”- Jung Yunho. X
Changmin: Sometimes he cooks for us. But even though I’ve said I’m not eating, he’ll make my share and say, ‘Eat this!’
Jaejoong: For supper, Junsu and Yunho usually don’t eat it. And I don’t like it. Isn’t it more enjoyable when everyone eats together?
Changmin: He doesn’t think about other people’s feelings and insists on cooking.
Jaejoong: Bit it was delicious, right?
Changmin: Yes.
Occasionally when schedule ends, I will bring the staff home and cook for them. They usually say, “a simple kimchI soup will do”. I don’t know if I cook too well or they are too hungry, but they gobble up without any image. *satisfied smile*
J: I like to cook delicious food using very few ingredients! It makes people think that ‘there’s only these ingredients yet it can produce such tasty food’. It’s not skills if you follow the recipe’s instructions to put in the ingredients, but it is if you can whip up something tasty without needing many ingredients (laughs). I will cook when I am alone at home, of course I will also make something simple when friends visit me. I hate it when I need to wait for the food to be served when I’m already hungry (laughs). So I always try to cook something quickly yet tasty for my friends.
Jaejoong love to cook for other people. The most important thing to him is having people to eat with and share with.
It’s easy to assume the statement that Jaejoong loves to cook and eat with and for other people. Jaejoong believes food tastes better with other people. More than insisting he is very passionate about it. But it is in the next section we see why Jaejoong feels so strongly about eating with others and being with other people who are feeling sad or lonely.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Jaejoong and his past:
Older Sister: Ne~~ver could he possibly come home after being beaten up (by others). The eighth (sister) is only one year apart from Jaejoong and she was in the same grade as Jaejoong because Jaejoong was born in the early months of the year (T/N: in Korea, if you are born in the early months of the year, you go to school with children who were born the previous year), and so although it was often that they would fight at home, when Jaejoong would get a blow at school, she didn’t stay put. Even if it took grabbing onto his hair and shaking him, Jaejoong never got hit.
Really… I shouldn’t say this on air but there were talks about Jaejoong’s sister being a gangster, they really were afraid of the sisters to that degree.
Jaejoong, under the protection of his sisters, probably didn’t get hit, at least but we know he was at least teased enough that his sister had to defend him a lot. His sister protected him from being bullied. She had to protect him so much she was rumored to be a gangster.
-
Q: Was there a time in your life when you cried the most?
JJ: In elementary school, I was very lonely and sad whenever I ate alone. I remember crying all day and not eating. Even though I was young, I think the fact that I was alone was so sad.
X <– I swear this is not fake, I read it from a magazine translation but I lost that link so I just googled it to find another link
-
This last quote is the root of it all. At school you eat lunch together with your friends but he said he would not eat all day and cry because he was lonely and sad. He knows from a young age what it’s like to feel that sad. That is why he especially pays attention to other people who are feeling similarly. That is why he eats with or cooks for people who are going through hard times. That is why he personally tries to emphasize on eating together with everyone and cherishes eating with other people so much, because he knows how it feels to eat alone and yearn for companionship.
This struck me so much because something some people would see as a small event in a persons life (an elementary school child crying and not eating because he’s sad and alone) helped shape a person so much and moved him to take so much action to make sure others don’t feel the way he felt when he was a child. I think that is so amazing. I am very grateful for the thoughtful Jaejoong we have now and I am so happy that he can take a negative experience and make a positive influence on other people.
I should add:
Jaejoong's friend fell asleep on Jaejoong's floor once and Jae didn't want him to sleep alone on his floor so Jae brought his blankets over and slept next to him on the floor
Junsu said once that Jaejoong brought home a guy(stranger!) who was drinking by himself. (personally I think that Jae is too much sometimes)
Comments