Second encounter (Part 2: Fanmeet) - T-ARA Thailand Fanmeeting (April 1st, 2017)

[chantellesyf]

Second encounter (Part 2: Fanmeet) - T-ARA Thailand Fanmeeting (April 1st, 2017)

 

After the mind blowing encounter with T-ARA at the airport, we decided to head back to our hotels and get some rest. Mind you, me and that Hahmchin were so in awe that we weren’t even mad nor worried that we weren’t able to get a GrabCar after 30 minutes of trying. Only when we were slightly out of our daze did we remember there were airport cabs. *insert Hyomin’s blur moment. Lol*

So, the next day, me and my friend got up bright and early to start the day. Also, I had a copy of a Sunbyung themed fiction that I had authored and I had forgotten to sent it for binding back home. I had printed it out for the Queen’s who gifted me that Sunbyung banner and I wasn’t about to hand that 184 page fiction in spare bits of paper to such a special friend.  We were supposed to have reached the fanmeet at 1pm but we got delayed and we reached only around 3pm because I had some problems searching for a bookstore that could do that.

But thank God, we managed to reach and redeem our tickets in time. During that time, we met up with some other Queen’s and hung around for a bit. I think some other Queen’s recognised my tattoos and there was a well-known Hyomin photographer, 69_simple, who gave me some Hyominidot cards and their Hyomin photo cards. I was supremely happy and then she asked me to follow her and I met the Queen’s who had been the one to arrange the Sunbyung banner to be given to me. She’s a total dear and had been following my Sunbyung stories on Asianfanfics, yes, I’m calling out to you water_rid. Hehehe.

In regards to the Sunbyung banner, I had posted it on Instagram and little did I know that Hyomin herself had liked my photo. I nearly cried tears of joy when I found out later at night. I’m honestly not too sure when she had liked it because my phone was being spammed with constant notifications and I kept clearing them without checking on the names. But here’s a look at that joyous post that makes every Sunbyung shipper have a field day then:

I handed her the fiction and she even asked me to autograph it. It was super flattering and a little embarrassing since I’ve never done it before, but, a big thank you water_rid for always reading my stories and I promise I’ll get the next one started as soon as I can. Soon after, we were told to head into the hall and I was still carrying Jiyeon’s gift bag. 

My seat was quite far away from my friends and I had secured one of the most beautiful seats in the house. A17, which meant front and dead center. I think I got the seat cause I was the first person to pay and purchase the tickets when the sales window opened, so that night of not sleeping was worth every second. I sat down for a bit and looked around me but didn’t recognise any Queen’s around me. But I think I garnered quite a bit of looks because my sleeves were rolled up (Thailand has an extremely warm temperature like Malaysia) and there were quite a few stares at my Hyomin tattoo. Even had a Queen’s come up to me and ask me if he could take a photo of it. (Again, I was embarrassed from the attention) There was another Queen’s from Australia who recognized me and we spoke for a bit before she went to her seat.

Was setting up my camera and stuff while waiting for the fanmeet to start and I’m not 100% sure what time it started but when the lights went dark, the crowd went WILD. The girls came out on stage and the cheering was absolute madness! They were supposed to open immediately with Tiamo but I think there was a technical error and the music didn’t play for a good two to three minutes. And they switched on the stage lights for a bit to check on the error, and there stood Hyomin, looking every bit like a goddess.

At first, she kept her eyes down as the technicians went to check on what was the error about but after an awkward minute or so, she looked up and sheepishly smiled and made small waves to the crowd. That was just a supremely adorable moment. Then the music kicked off and the crowd went wild with the Tiamo performance. The fanchants were beautiful and everyone enjoyed every single second of it. Here’s Hyomin looking absolutely sheepish and cute:

So, I won’t drag too much about what games were being played and what songs T-ARA sang since there is an abundance of it on YouTube and this site. I’ll just skip to the most memorable moments for me. Again, I apologize in advance if I sound like a total spazz for the next few paragraphs, the fan meet really made this Hyomchin weak in the knees. 

Warning: You may think what I’m saying is a figment of my imagination, but I’m just gonna share it anyway.

After Tiamo, the girls sat down and I watched Hyomin for the most part, taking photos of her and generally just gawking at the woman I adore. Hyomin as usual, scanned the crowd and then she spotted me. Then she stared at me for a long time, looking at my arm, my teeshirt and then back to my face. She had this cute little frown and looked deep in thought. Again, my teeshirt sleeved was rolled up and I think she recognized my tattoo since she had liked it on Twitter. The amount of eye contact shots I got from her was A.M.A.Z.I.N.G. I’m not kidding when I say I have hundreds of eye contact shots of her. 

Also, she kept grinning at me, I swear, there were many times I thought my poor heart would burst. Somewhere at the beginning, I pulled out the Sunbyung banner I had and held it up for a short while before placing it back on my leg to continue taking photos of her. During that time that the banner was on my leg, I noticed that she kept looking down at it, probably trying to figure out what it was. At one point, I remember her calling the female emcee over to her and whispered something into the emcee’s ear. And then emcee flicked her eyes over to my leg’s direction and she squinted for a bit before turning back to Hyomin and whispering something back to her. Hyomin then nodded and went back to looking at my leg for a bit before flicking her eyes back up directly into my camera lens. She had this little grin on her face after that.

I swear that smirk will kill my heart one day.

 

So I’ll skip most of what happened since you guys have probably seen it on YouTube. BUT, I will however place this video of the famous moment of Hyomin versus a mango:

We’ll come to the group photo session first.

My row was indicated to go up to the stage to take the photos first, and me being seated in the middle would mean.. I WASN’T GOING TO STAND NEXT TO HYOMIN?! My brain was panicking as I took those steps up to the stage and true enough, I ended up behind Eunjung. I saw a couple of other people wanting to switch places but they weren’t allowed. I was about to resign to the fact that I wouldn’t be able to stand next to Hyomin but then I realized, I was being completely blocked by Jungie who’s pretty tall. Didn’t help that the chairs they were seated on were pretty tall as well. I looked to my left and right but we were packed in quite tight and I couldn’t even peer in between Eunjung and Jiyeon. The Queen’s to my left also couldn’t move because they would be cut out from the shot or something.

I had wanted to ask if I could switch places because of that but I wasn’t sure if the emcee would understand me. Thankfully, the Queen’s to my right was super helpful and as the female emcee walked towards us from the back to arrange us, the Queen’s asked the emcee if I could switch. Initially she had said no but before she could walk off, I stopped her and showed her my spot of being completely blocked by Eunjung. Then the emcee considered it for a moment and agreed.

I ran. I ran as soon as she nodded to go next to Hyomin.

When I slid into the spot next to Hyomin, I think Hyomin caught the movement and turned around to face this Hyomchin that had a heart that was about to burst. She looked surprised and pointed at me, exclaiming surprise but my ears were shot at that time. My brain too. I merely dumbly pointed at my tattooed portrait of her and her eyes immediately flicked to it. She looked impressed and held her fingers in a “okay” sign said something like “Jal hae-“

As you can guess, I have no idea what she said after. I understand little to no Korean and I had hearts in my eyes.

Then I did the only thing I knew how to do and I am going to sound like a total dummy for it. I held up my hands in hearts and told her, “Neomu Saranghae” which translates to “I really love you.” *facepalms myself*

I think she knew that I hadn’t understood a damn thing she said and she gave me a thumbs up and said something else and I just dumbly nodded to her. I think at that point in time, she was sure I wasn’t Korean (maybe she thought I had been Korean the last time since I called her “unnie” in Seoul and seemed to understand what she and Qri had said) and the most beautiful smile broke out on her face. 

Suddenly she held up her hand towards me and I thought that she had wanted to high five me, so I put out my hand and then-She grabbed my hand. 

Not like a bro handshake or something but she interlocked our fingers and I was out of my mind with surprise. She then squeezed my hand and wiggled it around a couple of times. I stood there, staring at her, shocked out of my mind. At the corner of my eye, I could see security approaching us a bit but Hyomin completely ignored him. I’m not sure how long she held my hand but she only let go when the photographer called out for us to get ready for the group shot. And that less than a minute interaction, my beautiful friends had grabbed these mindblowing photos of it without me knowing. To water_rid and chong602, YOU GUYS ARE THE BEST!

After we had taken the group photos, I walked down off stage and I was functioning like a zombie. I was pretty shaken and it seemed like I had forgotten how to breathe. I sat back down on my seat, still shaken and the other groups went up to take photos. I got my brain back after a bit and continued taking photos of her. I took one of chong602 and Jiyeon unknowingly when I saw her on stage. Wanted to take a photo of my Hahmchin friend and Eunjung but I wasn’t fast enough and they left.

Then came the high touch session, and this time, it was my row that was the last ones. I put my camera to rest since they weren’t allowed on stage anyway and the thing is, the crowds of people were already in front of the girls. So when it came to my row’s turn, we walked to queue up on stage. I noticed that there was a foreigner (caucasian male) who was hanging back a bit before that and was holding a marker and some papers in his hand. 

The event people asked him to go up on stage as I reached the stairs and so he did. There were another 3 Thai Queen’s behind me and we were all that were left in the hall. So we went up and as we reached the girls, the guy in front of me asked for an autograph from Jiyeon. I think because there was no one left other than us, Jiyeon took the marker from him and had wanted to sign the papers. Then this female Korean manager came up and snatched it away from her, barking something angrily in Korean. The foreigner had said something to her and Jiyeon said something too. Pretty sure she was trying to ask the manager to just let her sign it. 

The woman barked something angrily and pointed her finger to the stage stairs. The poor guy didn’t even get to high five the rest and walked off the stage. The other girls who did not high five him had sad pouts and I looked at Jiyeon who had a look of extreme sadness on her face. Soyeon who was standing next to her looked mad at the female manager but before she could say anything, I felt a push on my back from the female manager, asking me to continue on to high five Eunjung.

Eunjung as usual had a bright smile, but tinted with a little sadness from what had just happened and the same went for Jiyeon. When I reach Soyeon however, something happened again.

Soyeon looked at me and exclaimed her surprise at seeing me covered in tattoos. Boram and Qri who was standing next to her had the same expression. And Soyeon pointed at my tattoo of Hyomin and said something to the others, who nodded their heads, mouths still hanging open. I turned to look at Hyomin.

There she stood, arms crossed and wearing the most smug grin I have ever seen on her and bobbing her head a little. My guess is that little monkey had shown the other girls my tweet and that’s how they recognised me. I high fived QBS, and then got to Hyomin. I was about to high five her when she grabbed my hand in the same manner that she had done on stage earlier. She was grinning widely at me and I was doing the same to her. She squeezed my hand for a bit and had wanted to say something but again, I felt a push on my back, asking me to get a move on. Before I let go of Hyomin’s hand, I could only say one thing to her.

“See you again.”

Now I dunno if she understood what I had said, but as our fingers slipped out of each other, she gave me some small nods before she turned back to the other Queen’s that had been behind me to high five them. I went down to collect my bags from my seat and saw the Jiyeon bag I still had on me.

I turned back to stage and saw the girls already walking off it. Lost, I turned to the Thai Queen’s who had been seated next to me. I asked them how would we be giving our gifts as I saw they had a couple of other things with them to give too. Bags of it from the looks of it. One of them told me they would ask the event people while one of the other girls called out to one of the guys on stage and said something in Thai to him.

I couldn’t understand him but he seemed to not want to take the gifts and I saw the Queen’s who was talking to him get a little mad. They continued saying something back and forth, until she took the Jiyeon bag from my hands and held it out to him and said something quite harshly. The guy then hesitantly took my bag and the Queen’s pointed to the other bags saying something, and then pointed her finger at the Jiyeon bag.

I may be wrong but I’m guessing they knew what was in my bag since I think some Thai Queen’s saw what was in it the night before and she had probably told the guy to get that bag to Jiyeon no matter what. If she did, I’m supremely grateful to you even though we don’t know each other. As I said before, THAI QUEEN’S ARE AWESOME!

Unfortunately, that’s the end to the excitement because most of us had been too tired to rush to the airport straight after and I missed seeing them leave the venue. But that night, I had found out Hyomin liked my Instagram post and I nearly died of happiness from it. 

 

=============

 

It was my third time meeting T-ARA and Hyomin in the flesh and I can tell you, the experience is nothing but PURE BLISS. I urge any Queen’s out there to try your level best to see them at least once in your life. Those girls are magical and were definitely a blessing to my tired soul. I aim to go to more of their events whenever I can, and the next one will be in Taipei! Until then, I thank you for reading my spazzing and apologize if I had said anything offensive. Peace out from this Queen’s and Hyomchin!

[johnnybbaseball]

I've really enjoyed reading your fan account!

i believe that they would have had to call an ambulance for me if I ever got to meet them!! Especially my Soyeonie but to be on stand high five'ing any of them would have me in need of a new heart because mine would have burst. 

 

[batButt_bb]

Again great to read these fan accounts  you must be so happy to see and meet them 

[chantellesyf]

5 hours ago, johnnybbaseball said:

I've really enjoyed reading your fan account!

i believe that they would have had to call an ambulance for me if I ever got to meet them!! Especially my Soyeonie but to be on stand high five'ing any of them would have me in need of a new heart because mine would have burst. 

 

Hahaha. I nearly needed one after the group photo session. LMAO

I just kept chanting "Keep your cool, keep your cool" in my head.

[chantellesyf]

3 hours ago, batButt_bb said:

Again great to read these fan accounts  you must be so happy to see and meet them 

Ah thank you for reading them. I think anyone who's met them will automatically feel happy. They are every Queen's happy pills.

[montiniiz]

Thank you for sharing your story with the girls. I'm enjoy reading them. 

I'm THAI-QUEEN'S , i also attended the event. Actually, it was my first time to see all the members. 

I'm JingChin. But Hyomin really impressed me when i had high-five with her. She is so friendly and considerate with the fans. 

By the way, Congrats on your achievement about those memorable moment with Hyomin. I wish i could have that similar moment with Jiyeon someday. 

[chantellesyf]

On 4/17/2017 at 7:43 PM, montiniiz said:

Thank you for sharing your story with the girls. I'm enjoy reading them. 

I'm THAI-QUEEN'S , i also attended the event. Actually, it was my first time to see all the members. 

I'm JingChin. But Hyomin really impressed me when i had high-five with her. She is so friendly and considerate with the fans. 

By the way, Congrats on your achievement about those memorable moment with Hyomin. I wish i could have that similar moment with Jiyeon someday. 

You never know. Just believe in them.