Highlights of my Day... Thursday, March 4

1. Headed out for a mid morning run around Dankook lake and ran into a couple of my former students. Kept my hat rim down low and continued on.

2. Did some shopping downtown with Snickers. There’s only two clothing shops in Cheonan wear I shop, so the girls and managers there all know me. I haven’t gone clothes shopping in quite a while the manager at the one shop we visited today was all questions and smiles. And, like the rest of the Koreans whom I’ve told I’m now married, she too asked me “When are you going to have a baby?”

3. Was scheduled to meet up with my casting agent and the rest of the extras crew at 5:30pm in Seoul, so I caught a 3:20pm bus out of Cheonan. When I arrived, I was greeted by my agent and the other foreign extras. I was told there would be 13 foreign extras and 50 Korean extras. What they didn’t tell me though was that out of the 63 extras there’d only be three of us females; two Russian girls and then me.
4. After our initial meeting in Seoul, we then loaded a chartered bus and traveled about an hour out to the set. Once we arrived, me and the two other girls were taken to another bus where we then got our hair and makeup done. It was in the makeup bus that I really got a feel for the situation. The crew on set were all Korean and they definitely outnumbered us extras. There were about 63 extras, the Wonder Girls, and about 80 crew members doing everything from working the cameras and lights to doing makeup and wardrobe. Anyways, back to the makeup trailer… so there I sat, getting my makeup done when I started up a chat with the makeup artist. We chatted for a bit and then she asked me if the two girls beside me were Russian. I told her that I hadn’t actually met them yet but thought the one girl looked like Urma Thurman. I happen to think that Urma Thurman is gorgeous but apparently the Russian girl didn’t really agree and so she peeped up… in Korean!

5. Joke was on me. After specifically picking out a beautiful skirt suit for the commercial filming, low and behold what should happen but they asked me to change clothes. I ended up having to wear what for the rest of the shooting I referred to as a ‘potato sack’, and a potato sack is exactly what it looked like.

6. The commercial we were all working on was for KIA’s new car, the Forte, and it starred the Korean group the Wonder Girls. Only us three girls and the random Korean male extra posed as reporters and the rest of the guys posed as camera men. It was supposed to look like it was set back in the day, maybe late 50’s/60’s, so we were all dressed in old school clothes. I thought the guys looked sharp with their hats but we all joked, saying some looked like all they were missing were their tommy guns.

7. My first encounter with the Wonder Girls was when they stepped out of the car on set and I, along with the rest of the extras, had to run up to them and ask them questions. I was shocked at how well they spoke English! I was really impressed actually. I know they had spent a year in America but considering the poor Korean levels of many foreigners who have lived a long time in Korea, I didn’t want to assume they’d know English. Ended up chatting a lot with two of them in particular, Seon Ye and Ya Un, both of which I thought were so beautiful and not just because they are physically attractive but because they were very sweet to me and didn’t sport a ‘head up in the clouds’ like one of their members.

8. As for the Korean extras, I scored big points with them by sharing my food and water with them and they tried to make me laugh by blurting out random English phrases during shoots. In one of the scenes they had told us to yell out things to the Wonder Girls as they walked by us and so one Korean extra had me practically in tears laughing when he continually blurted out “Wonder Girls, please. Me hungry. Me rice please!” I turned around and in Korean I asked him, “What? Only rice, no kimchi?”

9. I scored lots of attention when word got around that I was a professional boxer. Seon Ye (Wonder Girls member) was impressed and my agent was loving it but one of my female coworkers certainly wasn’t. It was obvious that she didn’t like the added attention I was getting and so some of the Korean guys joked, telling me to punch her out. “I’m professional and plus, she can’t afford my fees” I noted. I wasn’t about to let one chick who was full of herself to get me down. The male foreign extras I was working with were a blast to work with and I had so much fun talking to the Korean extras and taking pictures with them. Many of the Korean extras and crew members recognized me from TV, one even noted that he had attended one of my fights… very cool!

10. We had arrived on location around 7pm but didn’t start shooting much later. We shot all night and giggled all night too. There was a lot of standing around and waiting on set but it really was quite an awesome experience. I proudly rambled on about Snickers, which only made me miss him so much. My so-called ‘potato sack’ had no pockets, so I wasn’t able to sneak in my camera or cell phone, but near the end of the shoot I did manage to sneak in my camera.

QUESTION OF THE DAY...
Nobody, nobody banjew! [translation note: banjew = old Korean word for underwear]

QUOTE OF THE DAY...
Nobody, nobody but you.
-- Wonder Girls