The Korean TV drama....at first, I didn't understand what the rage was all about. Colleagues rushing home every evening to catch the show. Friends telling me about the buckets of tears they cried. The lengthy discussions about Jun-Sang, U-jinn, etc. I thought, haven't these people got better things to do with their time? How judgmental of me.
Months after the show ended, friends were still talking about it. In the end, my curiosity got the better out of me. I borrowed the VCDs from a from a friend who's probably watched the series about 20 times. The first two CDs were slow, but after that, I was hooked. HOOKED!! There were 20 episodes altogether, about 1 hour per episode. Finished it in 3 nights. Quite obviously, I too did not have better things to do with my time. Haha.
The series were basically about first loves. Jun-Sang and U-Jinn met in high school, where U-Jinn, a friendly and cheerful girl, met Jun-Sang, a cynical and mysterious boy. They fell in love, but their affair was cut short when Jun-Sang had an accident and died. U-Jinn painfully carried on with her life, made better by Siang-Chi, her childhood friend. 10 years later, on the eve of her engagement to Siang-Chi, she saw a man who looked like Jun-Sang on the streets of Korea. It turned out that the guy she saw was Min-Xiang, a guy she eventually had to work with in a project at work. Min Xiang and U-Jinn developed feelings for each other, and twist upon twist happened. Whether Min Xiang is actually Jun-Sang, whether U-Jinn and Jun-Sang share the same father, and so on. (I won't tell you the whole story in case you decide to watch it on your own)
I was almost sorry when it ended, 'almost' being the operative word here because by then I was losing a serious amount of sleep. I now understand the craze over Winter Sonata. It was a 20-hour emotional rollercoaster that constantly induces your curiosity. And of course, Jun-Sang's mysteriousness that every girl dreams for, paired with U-Jinn's vulnerability that brings the protector in every man.
For more on Winter Sonata, go to www.wintersonata.com
