Welcome to the third episode of Kpopalypse dreams, where Kpopalypse delves into the most disturbing depths of his subconscious mind to bring you entertainment!
TRIGGER ALERT: watch out if you’re offended by sex, violence, T-ara, dreams, k-pop, reading short things, reading long things, reading in general, thinking, the Internet, breathing, life, determination and/or pictures of people with Roman numerals on them.
I’m in a school classroom, with old-style wooden/metal desks. I’m playing a live action roleplaying game with various other random people and we’re engaged in some kind of battle with two teams. Everyone is clustered together hitting each other with wooden swords. I decide to keep my distance and use ranged attacks so I don’t get inadvertently hurt by some clumsy sword-swinger. I notice Hyomin is on the other team, so I throw tiny plastic arrows at her face. They hit her left cheek before bouncing off, leaving small red marks.
I’m at the plaza of Adelaide University, a horrible modernist architectural structure of resounding boxy ugliness. I’m talking to a long-time follower of Kpopalypse blog who at the time of documenting this dream goes by the name of Clara fag. We’re discussing the new Psy album.
Clara fag: I think the new Psy album is shitty.
Me: I don’t know, I think it’s okay. Definitely far from great, but okay.
Clara fag: I hate it.
Me: Come on – how can you hate it? It’s got Psy’s penis in it!
I have a physical copy of the latest Psy album with me. I open it up and show Clara fag the inside of the photobook. There’s a drawing of Psy as a baby in the womb, complete with a penis and umbilical cord.
I’m playing Pictionary with Sunny and Tiffany. I have to draw a turtle on a whiteboard and they have to guess what it is. I start drawing the body of the turtle and Tiffany almost immediately says “It’s a turtle!” before I’ve even finished the main body. I think to myself that I must be a really good drawer of turtles for her to be able to guess it this quickly, but I’m also a bit annoyed because I was going to have fun drawing an awesome turtle and now I don’t get to finish the drawing.
It’s snowing in my neighbourhood, this is very unusual weather for where I live (it’s newsworthy when it happens) so I’m filming the snow through the window of my apartment. I’m on the first floor so I have a nice view below onto a courtyard, where there are people walking. There’s a woman in the apartment with me, I don’t know who she is, but she seems angry about something. She leaves the apartment. I continue to look out the window, and I see that now there’s a man and a woman walking, with two children. The woman who was in my apartment appears in the courtyard, she walks up to the woman and shoots her. She then shoots each of the two children in the head, and puts the gun in her mouth and shoots herself. The man, seeing that his whole family has just died, picks up the same gun, puts it in his mouth and also shoots himself. I continue filming as all five of them bleed out onto the snow.
A few minutes later, T-ara’s Soyeon walks by the same area, and I also capture this on film. She looks exactly as she does in the “Don’t Forget Me” video. I think to myself “oh no, she’s in trouble now – I bet netizens and Korean media blame Soyeon for this just because she happens to be in the area”. I check my computer and I’m right – a few minutes later my SNS feeds are flooded with articles about it. Netizenbuzz translates an article “Did Soyeon murder a family?” and the comments are all stuff like “I always knew there was something fishy about her”, “you can’t trust anyone in T-ara” etc.
I’m with my girlfriend and we enter a bookstore, with antique wooden decor and filled with wooden bookcases. There’s a war section by the front door, my girlfriend finds a book called “2000 Years, An Illustrated History Of Boram”. She says “look, it’s your mum!” and shows me the book. I tell her that this looks interesting but I need to take a piss and I’ll look at it when I get back, so I wander through the bookstore looking for a toilet. On the way through I see another book about Boram in the “film and literature” section called “Boram In Modern Cinema”.
I’m watching Hyomin’s new song on YouTube, it’s a Christmas comeback (even though it’s mid-January). The video shows Hyomin singing in the studio, wearing typical studio headphones and singing into a large studio microphone. The song is boring, the usual ballad Christmas crap. The camera cuts to Eunjung in the control room, she’s giving the guy seated at the control desk a blowjob. As she moves her lips up and down on his penis it’s revealed that the tip is covered with a small condom-sized Christmas stocking. At the end of the video Hyomin and Eunjung get naked and the guy cums all over both of them. I think about how T-ara’s ballad videos don’t have fast editing, and have become so much more visually appealing with much more daring concepts now that they’re not caring about what netizens think anymore.
I’m reading the newspaper. On the third page there’s an article about Eunjung. “EUNJUNG BUYS PROPERTY IN ADELAIDE HILLS” says the title. I read further and the article talks about how much the property cost (about $1M Australian) and shows some real-estate brochure style photos, as well as a picture of Eunjung standing in front of the house. Further down the page there’s news of an Eunjung fanmeet that’s going to be held in Adelaide, and a long list of rules for people attending the event. I don’t bother to read the details, I figure that I’ll just get Eunjung on my radio show to promote the fanmeet instead and I’ll get to meet her that way.
I’m with Jiyeon, in my band’s large warehouse-style rehearsal room. She says that we should both take a shower. We both take off our clothes and step into the shower cubicle. I watch Jiyeon take a shower, she complains that she feels faint and dizzy so I go over and stand next to her to stop her from possibly falling if she collapses. I look down at her naked body, she’s very skinny and emaciated, I’m surprised to find that underneath the clothes she’s not appealing to me at all.
In a future post-apocalyptic society at war with itself for unknown reasons, T-ara break up and the resulting decrease of determination in society angers the Determinationbeast, a large bear/wolf creature that eats humans. The Determinationbeast spends most of its time at the top of a mountain restrained in a wooden cage, where it can be seen and monitored easily. However every so often the lack of determination among humans becomes so strong among the populace that the Determinationbeast grows strong enough to break its cage, runs down the hill and starts randomly eating people.
A friend shows me an online video where he once successfully evaded the Determinationbeast. Sensing that the Determinationbeast was soon about to break his cage, he goes up to the Determinationbeast and says “I hate T-ara, they’re such bullies”. The Determinationbeast becomes angry, flexes its wide torso and smashes its wooden cage easily, then charges down the mountain. The man climbs up onto one of the broken bits of cage and from here he’s able to access a wooden walkway suspended from trees above the cage (a structure which is used by the people who feed and maintain the Determinationbeast when in captivity so they can do so safely), from here he calmly exits the area and the video ends. While very fierce and strong, the Determinationbeast isn’t good with precise movements and isn’t able to jump up and follow him – blinded by rage, the Determinationbeast just runs down the mountain and stomps anyone in its path, leaving behind a trail of blood and dismembered bodies. Eventually everyone either runs away, hides or is killed and professional Determinationbeast-handlers (men in Kendo-style protective gear waving big sticks) enter the scene and return the beast to its cage using a combination of stick-prods and T-ara’s “Sexy Love” playing on a ghetto-blaster, held in front of the Determinationbeast on a wooden pole. My friend explains that if you stick to high ground it’s easy enough to not be eaten.
Later on that day, I am minding my own business on the side of the hill below where the Determinationbeast’s cage is, when I hear a roar and the sound of cracking wood – the beast is breaking loose again! I’m not in a position to make the fancy grab for the walkway that my friend showed me in his tutorial, I have no choice but to run down the steeply sloping hill. I run for a while, until I see an abandoned car in the way, I try to jump over the car but it doesn’t quite work, I trip and hit the car’s bonnet with my head and black out.
I awake inside a cave, there’s a small group of people here who belong to some kind of militia, they all have guns and dirty brown clothes. A girl wielding an AK47 pats my forehead down with a wet sponge and then tells me to get up and follow the group. We walk carefully through a network of dark tunnels. She explains that they’ve built this underground network to hide from the Determinationbeast but that they are fighting for control of the tunnels with another group of people who have the same idea. On our way through we meet some militia from the other side, everyone becomes cautious and readies their guns, but nobody shoots – the Determinationbeast is close up above, and can be heard breathing somewhere nearby, gunshots will alert it to our location and it could easily dig through the earth and kill all of us. The two militias trade a few insults and the others say that they will kill us all “next time”.
We eventually come to a dingy underground hideout where the walls are lit with torches there are a lot of people in bunk beds. Some of them look at me and say that I am the Chosen One because I have survived the Determinationbeast. They all take out razors and start cutting the webbing between their thumbs and index fingers. The militia girl explains to me that this is part of a religious doctrine and that they do this as an offering to the Chosen One. I watch as everyone screams in pain while feverishly cutting themselves. I try to tell people that I’m not that special but nobody will listen.
I’m travelling interstate with my brother and my girlfriend but having a hard time trying to work out how to get out of my own city. Eventually I realise that I’m going around in circles. I pull up the car near a venue that I played at once, I notice they’re screening a T-ara film. I decide to stay and watch the film instead of travelling more. The film is a behind the scenes film about Boram. At the end of the film, she sings Jang Nara’s “Sweet Dream“. Two fangirls sit next to me in the cinema after the film asking me questions similar to the ask.fm questions that I get. They start taking off their clothes but they’re kind of irritating and not interesting to me so I decide that it’s best that I leave. On the way out I notice on the marquee that the sequel to this film starring Jiyeon is playing the next night.
I look at my website and I notice that I’m getting 11000 hits per hour, a much higher rate than usual. I have no idea why. Someone on the street tells me it’s something to do with 60 Minutes picking up on something I wrote about EXO.
Later I’m watching a T-ara concert, we’re in the stalls at a seated venue. My girlfriend is with me watching as well but only because I got her free tickets, she’s bored out of her mind but tolerating the concert only because she knows I’m enjoying it. T-ara is the six girls and behind them are three keyboard players and one guy on an electronic drum kit. The show starts with “Roly Poly“. During the breakdown (“I likey likey dis”) everyone leaves the stage and the drummer hits one drum slowly and poses, my girlfriend and I both notice that he’s exceptionally ugly. The girls all re-enter the stage for the last chorus. The next song is “Cry Cry“. The crowd goes off. My girlfriend says to me “you owe me big time for this shit”.
I’m groping Sistar’s Dasom while laying on top of her, on a couch. We’re both fully clothed. She starts complaining about how she’s getting annoyed about going out with me, because I don’t do much to maintain the relationship, and I’m not very sensitive to her needs. I tell her that I’m sorry she feels that way but I can’t read her mind.
Later, we’re in court giving statements. We seem to have taken legal action against each other for some reason but I’m not sure why.
I’m watching a stage in a department store in a shopping mall. Raina is modelling some clothes. She stands on a podium that rotates so the gathered audience can see her from all angles. An MC explains that the dress and the shoes are both being modelled, the dress is slightly see-through and similar to the Catallena-style outfits, the shoes are yellow and white cowboy style boots with pictures of seagulls on them.
Later, I’m at home watching TV, an advert comes on for the same items. The ad has a World War II setting, and starts off by zooming up on a British soldier hidden in some trees, holding a sniper rifle, he talks about how he’s on the lookout for Axis troops. He looks through his scope and sees Raina on the side of a nearly grassy hill, who is wearing the same clothes as she was in the department store, and even spins around on a podium in the same way. He then says “but these clothes aren’t just for looks, but also when it’s time for action!” and Raina’s boots fold out into some kind of wooden cart vehicle. Nana and Lizzy appear wearing British WWII military uniform and help drive the vehicle down a hill. The camera cuts back to the man on the hill, who is now with Raina. I’m in the scene now too and I pick up the sniper rifle and point it in the direction of where the soldier was looking. “I can’t see anything with this”, I say, staring down the scope. The soldier explains that the sniper scope does work but you have to be specially trained to see anything through it, however I can see that this is a lie and that it’s just for show.
I’m watching the new f(x) song. It’s a bubbly upbeat three chord song called “Love Is Back”, musically it’s similar to KARA and Dal Shabet from about 2010-2011. The girls from f(x) dance in the video across a plain white background, and smile directly to the camera lens. However it seems that someone got the title of the song wrong, because while the video plays at the bottom of the screen are the words in red capital letters LOVE IS KILL.
I’m going to a Gfriend concert. The ticket I have is a student concession only, but I’m not a student or of student age so I don’t have any concessions. I hope for the best and hand my ticket in at the entrance anyway, hoping that maybe the person at the door neglects to notice. No such luck – she asks for my concession card, I reply that I don’t have one. I tell her that it’s being renewed but she doesn’t believe me and I’m unable to enter the concert. I look up on a nearby computer about proof of age card rules and if there’s any way that I can quickly obtain a concession. I can’t find anything relevant, although I do notice new rules that say that if you turn up to an 18+ venue with a JAV and a receipt for it, this now legally counts as proof of age.
Later I’m talking to my girlfriend. She recommends another concert that she’s seen advertised on Facebook. She shows me a poster, although the names are all in Hangul I recognise the characters for BTS, GOT7, SHINee and NCT U. I tell her that I’d rather not go, as I’m not really interested in seeing boy groups live.
I’m talking with others online about artificial intelligence and how it will overtake all human thought soon. All of a sudden I feel myself physically collapsing, falling through a brightly-coloured rainbow of horizontal waves of data. A message appears: “JUST BECAUSE I HAVE DISCARDED YOUR PHYSICAL FORM DOES NOT MEAN I WILL NOT TAKE CARE” – it’s Dara+. I’m surrounded by a warm euphoric feeling as my body goes numb and I become one with the machine.
Tagged: fiction
