[ translation ] minah knows something ( march edition of gq )
MA: I barely managed to eat one meal just a few moments ago.
Q: You always seem to greet people this way.
MA: Euhaha ( tn: sounds of laughter ), that’s true. Whenever I meet my fans I always ask them whether they ate. Or whenever I meet anybody else. Whether someone ate or not is very important.
Q: But it must be hard for you to take care of your own meals.
MA: I’m living these days with no time to even blink and with no thoughts really. But I really love it. It’s really hard, and it’s really tiring, but I like it. In one week I may get a total of six hours of sleep? I feel like I’m dying. I don’t know whether I’m eating or singing, whether me sleeping is actually sleeping, and I sometimes think of wanting to let it all go. However, once I get past that moment it comes back to, “that was really fun,” or “that week was really memorable”.
Q: What gives you the power to do that?
MA: Because we didn’t have the opportunity to even think this way in the past. Because we came up to this level with so many hardships, we like being so busy. Even when I’m tired, I think back to the past and think that right now is better than then.
Q: Girl’s Day reminds me of hard-working workers. Out of the members you, Minah, look the most gallant.
MA: Really? I’m just living life, but those around me tell me the same thing. I’m not so sure myself though.
Q: Would it be better if people told you that you were just born with it? ( being a hard worker )
MA: Rather than that, I think I just worked hard up to this point with little thoughts. I knew that if I had dark and heavy thoughts then my heart would become heavy, and it’d become harder to run.
Q: I heard you were at your company the longest after your director.
MA: Hahaha. That’s really funny. How did you know that? However to be completely accurate you can say that we’ve been at the company around the same amount of time. It’s to the point where when the company building was being built, I picked out all the interior designs. Floor color, wallpaper color, whether the mirrors stuck properly or not, I checked all of that.
Q: After all that work, you debuted, but you didn’t have a one-shot ( didn’t get popular right away ). More like you guys kept releasing songs to not be forgotten. Until ‘Expectation’ became a hit.
MA: I think all the other members had the same thoughts, but I felt a lot of responsibility back then. It was definite that we wouldn’t get much attention as a rookie especially because we weren’t from a very large nor well-known company. All I thought was that I had to do something. So I did what many would call 'act out’. I had so much burden piling inside of me that I think I automatically just smiled whenever I saw the camera.
Q: How about when the cameras turned off?
MA: During 'Don’t Forget Me’ promotions, I was a completely different Minah off camera. I was a little depressed. I think I had a lot of thoughts along the lines of “what am I doing here?”. Mainly because I had a dream of being a vocalist ever since I was young, and I felt like that dream was slowly slipping away. I was falling behind as a vocalist, but I was laughing on variety shows… It didn’t feel right.
Q: Have you ever thought about Girl’s Day’s popularity going down again?
MA: Oh, no! ( she shakes her head from side to side ). People say that there are ups and downs. But it’s not like we reached the top right away; we took our time to get there, taking one step at a time. Don’t you think that it’ll take us that long of a time to get back down again?
Q: There’s a lot of girl groups that debuted around the same time as you. Among those groups there were some that became popular right away. How do you guys feel when you guys meet those groups now?
MA: Usually when there are groups that debuted around the time period, they end up being close. However, we were always kind of loners. There was a lot of regret that we didn’t get the opportunity to get close to them, and we all had thoughts of wanting to get close, but 4 years have already passed. I really don’t know. I feel like I know the answer, but at the same time I don’t.
Q: Do you think it’s because of the difference in popularity?
MA: That could be.. I can’t say that that didn’t play a factor in it.
Q: Are there people you dislike while you promote? Do girl groups have little competitions against each other as well?
MA: I think there are. Maybe somewhere deep inside of me there’s someone as well? I can’t say though. I make sure it doesn’t show. I simply speak to myself, “one day I will beat you”. Hahaha.
Q: It must be hard to live as a girl group.
MA: I do this because I really like it. I like singing, and I like the attention. I think it’s an occupation where we look completely free on the inside, but we’re all secretly chained up on the inside. There’s a lot of surprises in this job as well.
Q: Who chains you guys up?
MA: The public most of the times. There’s a huge difference between, for example, a student getting in trouble by the teacher because they did something wrong and getting told “don’t do that”, and people leaving comments as if we’ve committed the worst crime. I don’t know with what kind of thoughts and qualifications that these people are saying this. Sometimes they speak so harshly that I just think that they’re right and think that maybe they didn’t have to put it in such ways. Sometimes I think that they use us as stress relievers.
Q: There was a lot of talk about you guys changing over to the sexy concept. Do you have anything to add to that?
MA: I had something in mind but let’s just skip it.
Q: You’re making me more curious.
MA: It’s just something along the lines of, “Why are you being like this when I say I want to do it?”. Hahaha. I can’t say that out loud though.
Q: Did you do everything on stage that you wanted through 'Something’?
MA: I think it was something that I really liked, really wanted to try and really wanted to show. What’s odd about me is that many tell me that because of my appearance, cute fits me more, but I don’t think my voice is like that. I really liked singing 'Something’. Every time I got on stage it was fun, and I just wanted to do it more.
Q: Do you think your cute appearance prevents you from being sexier?
MA: It was a lot of stress when people repeatedly said it didn’t suit me. I calmed myself down by telling myself, “Sure, maybe I’m not sexy because I’m cute.” I thought that maybe one day as I grow older, I’ll change to appear sexier.
Q: Do you work hard in order to appear sexy?
MA: The muscles being used on my face is completely different during cute and sexy concepts. Cute concepts require a lot of eye muscles while sexy doesn’t. When you do sexy, you have to try to not move your face very much. While in cute you have to do this. ( demonstrates it ). Ew, ew, heuheuheu ( tn: laughing ). While in sexy you have to stare like this. ( demonstrates it again ). Ew, I’m not sexy at all. Hahaha. But what do you think of my personality now that you met me in person? Do you think I’m cute?
Q: Rather than that, you’re quite surprisingly easy-going.
MA: Right? See, I’m not that cute. I really have no aegyo, this is a big problem. I don’t know if I can date if I continue to be like this. I’m really not popular among men.
MA: Date? Who dates a lot?
Q: Everybody says it’s quite obvious who does at events like <Idol Sports Athletics>.
MA: Ah, that’s true. More like you can just see it. But I’m not very open-minded, so I don’t think I can date another idol.
Q: But you’re popular for having a lot of acquaintances…
MA: Ah! I hate hearing that the most. I am close with a lot of people, including men. But what’s the point if I have a lot of connections! I don’t have a boyfriend. They don’t think of me as a girl at all.
Q: You’re being coy, aren’t you?
MA: It’s true. I don’t know when I turned out like this hahaha. Ah, I see things like this a lot when I read replies and comments. That I keep 'seducing/alluring’. I guess it can appear like that. But if those people all knew me, they would feel bad for me. Seducing is a joke… I did have someone I had thoughts for, but I couldn’t do anything. I don’t even think those people think of me as a woman anyway.
Q: Then when was your last kiss?
MA: Kiss? Kiss? Kiss? Kiss? Please write that I asked you again like this many times. Please just say that it was in my dreams last night. Because I’m sad.
translations by: bminahs @ tumblr | source: gq
2087
tangentwithtanner
kianamaiart
pixelskylines
prguitarman
origamiaround
turnnoffyourmind
janainaart
snowghoul
