claudya87

MY TASTE

My 1st favorite series was the classic A Journey to the West which was running on TV while I was young and while I jumped between my obsessions over the years ( manga, anime, live actions, Chinese novels, dramas), I always come back to xianxia & wuxia. Call me biased but good looking men in traditional Asian costumes are my cup of tea and I will never refuse a good drooling show. 

I've seen way too many series over the years (especially older ones 80s & up). Since 2005 I've started to keep a proper track of the series I'm watching but I'm still updating that list as MDL didn't have all my series listed when I began to use the site. Usually I will add them to my list while I'm rewatching a series or I randomly remember them.

MY MUSIC TASTE

I was asked this question a few times over the years and will write it here..I used to be a fan of different genres, had both girl and boy crushes and was a fan of different bands over the years.

After Sailor Moon was first aired in '97, I became obsessed with anime and manga. I lost count of how many I read and watched. I was also quite active in the forums as well and that's how I found out about live actions.

I watched all the classic ones like Sailor Moon, Gakkou no Kaidan, The Kindaichi's Case Files, GTO, etc. We didn't have streaming sites like we have these days..I lurked on torrent sites like D-Addicts and AsiaTorrents for my dramas. It took forever to download and I used to keep them on CD/DVDs to rewatch.

Japanese dramas were very popular at the time and I watched all the well known ones and then was also watching in between some Hong Kong/Chinese/Korean ones.

When you talked about Jpop.. Johnny's groups were the top but Jrock was extremely popular as well. I listed to Hikaru Utada, Namie Amuro, Ayumi Hamasaki (my girl crush for many years), Takuya Kimura (part of SMAP/Johnny’s ; my male crush), L'Arc-en-Ciel (HYDE !!!!), Dir En Grey, Malice Mizer (Gackt!!!), etc

I wasn’t that much into jpop boy bands though, for me Jrock had the sound and visual I liked.

Early 00s you can’t ignore Johnny’s anymore..they’re everywhere. I started to listen to them as well. Their end of year concerts were proper shows. SMAP, Arashi, NEWS, KAT-TUN, KinKi Kids, Kanjani8, Tokio all took turns at popularity in Japan.

Kimura Takuya’s popularity in 90s-through 00s promoted SMAP songs, he was well beloved internationally.

Jun Matsumoto although quite known after previous series in Japan, helped Arashi reach peak recognition after Gokusen, Kimi wa Pet and then Hana Yori Dango that got him known worldwide.

Kazuya Kamenashi is another one worth mentioning as he was very popular at the time. 2005 was his greatest year – Gokusen, Kindaichi, Nobuta wo Produce..

Yamashita Tomohisa was also on the rise in popularity, reaching peak in 2005.

Also at the start of 00s Taiwanese series get very popular. I start listening to Jay Chou, Fahrenheit, F4, Mayday, Ariel Lin, Rainie Yang, etc. Meteor Garden & Mars get known worldwide.

In Korea, we start to have hit series as well. We have BoA, Lee Hyori, Rain, Se7en, Jang Nara. Since the end of 2006 I got more into Kpop and listened mostly to YG acts - BIGBANG, 2NE1, Super Junior-D&E, Gummy, Se7en, Epik High,etc

These were the golden years when it comes to both Asian television and music as it gets recognized worldwide.

THESE DAYS

My attention span has decreased over the years and I don’t have as much patience as before, I rarely find a drama I like and I’m not an avid listener of Asian music anymore although I still check on my former Kpop favorite bands. Between life and work it’s hard to find a lot of free time.

—-Bored and want to watch something?—

Check out my YouTube playlist with MVs of series I saw over the years* : 

Scenes/ couples/ 2nd lead syndrome  

*watch at your own risk (might contain spoilers, mature and gore scenes)

I have quite a twisted mind so be warned (one MV could be cute fluffy romance and the next psychological series with dark themes or pure smut)

Or Songs I loved from the Asian entertainment

At the end I want to say that there were lots of artists at the time but the ones I listed were what I listened to. I'm almost 40 now..fangirling is not my thing anymore.