Being an international fan of my favorite groups is hard. But being an international friend is the most difficult job I have.
When I first got into the Korean pop scene, I thought the worst thing I would have to deal with was the physically and financially draining job of being a fan. I lose a lot of sleep running on Korean time and most of my money is spent on CDs and DVDs. It’s highly possible I won’t ever get to see my favorite groups live. But the task of liking groups that aren’t famous in America pales in comparison to having friends I can’t see all the time, if ever.
Over the past few months, I have become friends with Julia and Emmi, whom I met through Tumblr and a shared love of Kpop. It doesn’t matter that Julia is 13 and in the Philippines, or that Emmi is 18 and in Finland. We’ve bonded and I consider these two girls some of my closest friends.
I look forward to talking with Julia and Emmi every day. At first, we just communicated through each other’s ask boxes on Tumblr. But we’ve since moved on to Facebook Chat, Windows Live Messenger and even Skype.
I’ve seen Julia and Emmi’s faces – I know they are not some perverted old men pretending to like Kyuhyun to attract girls. I don’t know why someone would go through that much work anyway, so I knew they were both legit from the start.
Emmi, Julia and I are triplets with a 10-year age gap and multiple time zones between us. It’s almost scary just how much I have in common with Julia and Emmi. It makes me wonder how many potential friends exist for me.
My sister hates how I’ve found girls just like me. She can’t believe there are more Brennas. She thinks one of me is enough.
I recently got a new cell phone and I’m so excited that Sprint is adding a $10 unlimited international texting plan. Julia and Emmi better watch out. I will blow their phones up. This will give us a chance to talk even more, because it’s hard figuring out times to talk online.
I can’t tell you how much it hurts knowing I may never get to meet these amazing girls in person. We’ve clicked just through the Internet. The fun we’d have in person is unimaginable.
Julia recently said to me that it doesn’t matter where you live or how you manage to communicate. People are people and people talk and get to know each other and develop relationships. The fact that we all became friends through the Internet only shows how important technology has become to this generation.
