Aim & Nam
Aside from Nan and Hongyok, there was actually at least one other sapphic ship/khu jin that was formed on the Thai reality tv show Academy Fantasia- Aim and Nam.
Unlike Nan and Hongyok, they never worked in the Y-industry together, so they're kind of another ship that's been lost to time. But I always find stories like this really interesting- they speak to an interest in sapphic shipping that was present throughout the 2010s.
Aim and Nam were contestants on the eleventh season of AF in 2014 (the one that aired directly after Nan and Hongyok's). Aim actually ended up winning the season, placing first. Nam's journey, on the other hand, was a lot more rocky (she dealt with more criticism from the trainers/judges, and also was at risk of being eliminated several times). However, she still ended up making it to fourth place.
If you're interested in learning more about Nam's time on the show, I highly recommend watching the supercut above- it gives a lot more context into the challenges she faced, as well as the structure of the show as a whole.
(I also want to shoutout the amazing Youtube channel Mantaray17, who has a playlist of AimNam related moments that are subbed. If you want to learn more about them as a ship/CP, I totally suggest giving that a try).
Similar to Nan and Hongyok, there's several edits of Aim and Nam on Youtube that have over 100k views- one of which even made it into the top 200 most popular videos in Thailand when it first premiered.
They also had a few couple concerts together, mostly between the years of 2015 to 2016.
So, there was definitely a substantial enough fanbase/audience for them back in the day, which is cool to think about.
I think that something else that I find interesting about Aim and Nam is how their journey is a product of the unique structure of AF- and how, unlike other survival shows, it really makes room for shipping.
During the show, they'll periodically have 1-v-1 competition rounds, where contestants will compete against each other. In some cases, the winning person will be safe and the losing person will be at risk of being eliminated.
Although these individual battles are supposed to be super competitive, in practice friends or possible romantic interests will sometimes compete against each other, leading to shipping.
For instance, in week 7 Aim and Nam ended up going head-to-head in one of the competition rounds. Their song had a choreographed sequence where one of them wraps their arm around each other in a moment that was intended to feel fierce or competitive. But onstage, it reads a little bit more sensual, and, combined with the intense eye contact they're making, it gave off a totally different set of vibes.
Because the show was also livestreamed 24/7, it allowed fans to see the contestants practicing together (such as them rehearsing the move several times before they made it to the stage, which must have been really exciting for fans).
In terms of other survival shows, I've seen discussions sometimes about editing occasionally pushing certain ships/pairs. But I think something that AF was really good at was leaving space for them to naturally form, before implicitly encouraging shipping (or enabling it) through the format of the show itself.
Anyway, it's no surprise that so many het and queer ships have formed on the show- sometimes even several in one season.
Aim and Nam join the ranks of a few other sapphic khu jin such as Tina and Aom and Namneung and Noey who had fandoms active from the early to late 2010s before the start of the GL industry.
It's really interesting to think about the connections between now and then, especially because I've come across several people on Twitter who entered into the Thai GL fandom through some of these early ships.
For me, I think that in a couple of different ways the trajectory of the current industry would've been different if not for some of these earlier pairs- so I always love being able to talk about them.
