Castles, introductions, greek letters, lingo change

September 29, 2010


Day 7 (Monday, September 27, 2010):
Early morning Alisha and I headed to the International Office where they were giving us a little introduction on what life in the UK and studying at Cardiff was going to be like. There, we ran into a bunch of internationals and Americans (yay for new friends!). A couple of us exchanged numbers and such, with promises to plan travels together.

A couple of differences between the UK system and US that I learned from the meeting:
- an "A" at Cardiff means above 70% whereas (obviously) 70% means a C- at Penn
- in the US, we throw around the word "professor" to anyone who teaches at a university (more or less), whereas in the UK the word "professor" is reserved to those who are the highest in their area (apparently we won't be encountering any of these during our studies here); the normal level "professors" are called tutors or lecturers.

After the meeting, Alisha, Alana (a new American that we met) and I headed to the National Museum at Cardiff (which is pretty much on campus) but it was closed since it was a Monday. We decided to instead head to the Cardiff Castle!

We got the Premium Tour, which cost around £2 or £3 more than a regular tour, but it got us into more rooms in the castle with a tour guide! The Cardiff Castle was pretty awesome.

A view of one of the buildings in the Castle

The winter room, where the men used to gather to play games and pass the winter

The nursery walls!! This was pretty awesome - it had drawings from famous children's stories such as Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast, Cinderella, Jack and the Giant Green Bean, etc

The ceiling in the Arab Room - it was absolutely mesmerizing!

The tour lasted around 50 minutes - it was pretty spectacular! After the tour, we hit the grounds where we pretended we were Repunzel:

That's me pretending to be Repunzel, can't you tell? ;)

Funny story - the tour guide pulled me aside once the tour was over and asked me, "Ok now, what is this going on the back of you?". I was wearing my APO track jacket, and I guess he was curious as to what these random Greek letters meant ;)

The track jacket looks like this:

Anyway, the three of us had quite a funny time trying to explain to him what Fraternities / Sororities mean in the US. He basically understood it as kind of a drinking society (HAHA). When I told him it was a Community Service Fraternity, he asked me what we do. When I answered that we do "service to the community" he asked if these services were in bars (HAHAHA). I loved it. It was too funny.

As I was wondering around the library after the tour, he came up to me again, instructed me to turn around and showed his co-worker (another tour guide) the letters. Yay for APO recognition in the UK.

On the tour itself, we ran into a bunch of Americans (who were here for some...golf tournament or festival going on?) and it felt like a glimpse of home, I loved it. A guy on the tour with us was actually from Philly!!!! It was kind of cool to see someone who actually knows what Penn is.

After the Castle visit, we went to grab a cup of coffee/hot chocolate at Costa:

Yummy and cozy. I love it. It's almost a representation of Cardiff - it's so small and cute with really friendly people!

I only had enough time to come back to my room and drop off some stuff...then I was back out again for a CU event.

The CU at Cardiff held a Freshers' Pub Quiz Night - I got to meet pretty cool people there so it was all good! Until then, I had been engaging mostly with other Americans or Internationals and had wanted to experience more of the locals, so it was very nice. I kept thinking how different the culture was here - RCF (my fellowship back home) would never hold a bar night! (The thought of that is so outrageous that it makes me laugh). Granted, the legal drinking age in the US is 21 and all, but here it's so free and loose. I have never been asked for my ID (although when I was buying at knife at Tesco, the cashier asked me if I was a "university student" because they're not allowed to sell knives to people under 16 years of age...I was like "what?? do I really look that young??" It's kind of funny how I almost got carded to buy a kitchen knife but not ever for alcohol)  - it's awesome.

Right now, I'm sitting at the coffee shop that Alisha and I discovered on our first complete day here and updating the blog with British accents surrounding me - it's almost like a scene from a movie or something.  You know, the little Asian-American college student in a completely new surrounding, drinking coffee and writing...Everyday, I go home absolutely exhausted and drained but I love it! I love being busy and seeing new things.

I've been getting some of my "module" stuff (module = classes) sorted out the past few days and so has Alisha, so we didn't get to to go Bristol as we had planned, but I'm heading off to London on Friday so I'm stoked for that!

On a separate note, I'm starting to pick up the lingo here - instead of saying "What??" or "Hmm?" when I don't understanding something, "Sorry?" and "Pardon?" come out first out of my mouth. I realize that the people here take offense with the whole "What?" business because it's much more direct - they're so much more polite here with their language. They're always like, "cheers!" and "no problem at all, love". I think that's one thing that I really like better here. :)

I'm a day behind in updates, but I really didn't do much yesterday (Tuesday) so hopefully I'll get to blog about it later today!

Tesco my life

September 27, 2010


This is a complete overload of information / entries, but I'm starting to forget things already so must update!!

Day 4 (Friday, September 24, 2010):

The American flatmate (Alisha) and I ended up waking up early yet again and heading off to the Student Union (the walk takes FOREVER) to check out the International Students Fair. We just ended up getting a bunch of pamphlets, including information on the HOST programme, which both of us are determined to be a part of. The HOST programme pairs up each student up with a family host for a weekend all across the UK. I LOVE the idea of it and can't wait to sign-up!

We dropped by the Student Union store, where both of us got hoodies...I debated for a long time whether I wanted the Cardiff Uni hoodie in English or Welsh - I ended up getting it in Welsh!

At noon, we headed to a cafe to meet up with Lauren, who is this super sweet girl that I spoke to online prior to coming to Cardiff. Lauren's a pianist (YES, this is super awesome since I played the piano at Hami) and studying at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama (can someone say AWESOME)?? Lauren took us girls on a trip to the Cardiff Bay which was absolutely gorgeous.

On the way there, we got a glimpse of the Royal Welsh College and it made me SUPER nostalgic for Hamilton. :( I miss being around talented and passionate musicians all the time.

Anyway, here are some pictures of the Bay:

Starbucks actually serves like a cafe here, with real cups and everything:

It was so nice to just sit down and cuddle for a chat!

The Bay had these super cute shops and I ended up spending on the cutest scarf there!

After the Bay, we headed toward town centre where I bought some boots (yay for spending)! 

We had just enough time to head back home, drop our stuff, and then head back out to the Student Union, where they were having an International Students' Welcome Party. They taught us Twmpath dances, which are traditional Welsh dances.

Here is a picture of it:

I'm not much of a dancer, but it was all in good fun! We had to dance with a bunch of different partners, which is always fun. The "afterparty" following Twmpath was okay - nothing too special or anything. The SU bar has limited alchy!

Day 5 (Saturday, September 25, 2010):

I got to sleep in a bit, since the first thing on my agenda was at noon. Alisha and I grabbed brunch at a coffee shop and then headed over to the International Information Session, where they bombarded us with information - after, we went to Tesco's (yes again), where we literally shopped for 2.5 hours! That place was CHAOTIC. So many people!!

I ended up drinking with the other flatmates and was going to go out with them, but I had not bought a "fresher's wristband" (since I didn't think I wanted to party with the freshers very much) and the tickets for the night was sold out, so I couldn't go out with them. Instead, Alisha and I hit up a pub - it was nice bonding time as we had a great chat. OH, and at the pub they played S CLUB 7's S Club Party - I used to be in LOVE with this band in elementary school so it was pretty awesome to hear it! The entire pub sang along to it, I loved it.

Day 6 (Sunday, September 26, 2010):

Almost all caught up in the entries! Whew! I woke up at around 8am and headed to the SU again - the CU (Christian Union) was holding like a "try a church" event where church representatives were there to talk about their church. I was interested in three churches primarily (out of the 10-some that were introduced), but for some strange reason I ended up going to a Chinese Church (no, I'm not Chinese). The people were really sweet and it really showed that they had a small but close-knit community - although I had to tell everyone a hundred times that I wasn't Chinese and that I didn't speak Chinese. :) Afterwards we went over to grab lunch at a Chinese restaurant, and the people were quite friendly.

The sermon was gospel-centered, and something that was challenging - a part of me was concerned that the preaching here would be different from what I'm used to, but it was all good. The church was tiny though compared to what I'm used to in RCF and such, but it's so wonderful to know that God is moving in Cardiff :)

I was supposed to go with Alisha on a double-decker tour of Cardiff since there was a discount for us, but I ended up not coming back from church until like literally 4pm, so that went out the window.

I ended up meeting Kristin for dinner (she is also from Penn and had studied abroad the year before me - she loved it so much and is now here for her Master's!) and another American graduate student. It was really nice - we went to City Centre and grabbed some Italian food. The food was great, and I had an Irish Coffee for the first time which was pretty yummy as well.

I ended up getting TERRIBLE cramps by the end of the night and we had to cab it home, but after napping I felt a lot better :)

Alisha and I were looking into planning a daytrip to Bristol and I think we'll be set on going there on Tuesday :) Whew, all caught up!!

All-nighter, byebye flatiron, exterminators, welsh quiz night

September 27, 2010

I'm so behind in these entries! I'm scared that I might end up not remembering everything that had happened, so I'm going to try to update it all tonight! (It's 2:37am again - why am I always posting so late?)

Day 1 continued:

After arriving at the uni, we had a little reception with some warm coffee, tea, cookies and small snacks. We were also given little goody bags that had snacks and drinks for us. We were then divided into our residences and driven over there.

I'm staying at Talybont South, which is quite far from the main campus, but I have my own room and bathroom (which is nice). Our flat consists of 8 girls - we share a kitchen together. To my surprise, I found out that another American was living in the room right next to me in the flat - we quickly became good friends! :) Thank God, because I was SO worried before leaving to Cardiff.

My room at move-in

I started unpacking a little bit - and then the American flatmate and I decided to go to Tesco's to shop for essentials! Tesco's is kind of a big deal here - it's like Walmart/Target type of store. We got lost three times on the way there and it took us literally forever, but we made it in one piece! We stumbled on this super creepy dark road by the lake and walked down it - it seriously seemed like a scene from a murder mystery!

After shopping for things, I came back to unpack everything. I was done unpacking everything and started making the bed when...I lifted up the mattress to find BUGS!!!! I flipped out and grabbed the flatmate and we diagnosed that the bugs were not bed bugs (THANK GOD) but silverfish bugs. Although silverfish bugs aren't harmful, it's still CREEPY.

Since it was past midnight when this happened, I ended up calling the "nightline" - the lady on the phone was so sweet and nice, but obviously there was nothing she could do at the moment. I found out later that the nightline was more for counseling purposes (oops) - she basically told me that she was "there for me" and that I can "stay on the phone with her all night" if I needed to (hahahaha). It's not like I saw a ghost ;)

ANYWAY.

So I ended up staying up all night. Yeah. Literally ALL NIGHT LONG. 10 hour flight + 3 hour bus ride + unpacking + jetlag....throw in an all-nighter there and you've got a recipe for disaster. I hadn't slept properly from Tuesday 7am (LA time) to Thursday 2am (Cardiff time). I just did the math and that makes it 38 hours! Granted, I did sleep a couple of hours on the plane and about an hour or so on the bus, but it was still ridiculous.

The view from my window - this was taken at around 6am.

OH, and in this midst of this fiasco I ended up busting my flatiron. The voltage difference in the UK was too much for my flatiron to handle. I was really upset about it, but I'm so over it now.

Day 3 (Thursday, 9/23/10):

I waited until 9:30am when I went down to the office to complain about the bug situation. Thankfully, the exterminator came relatively quickly (he was such a jolly Welsh man ;D) and sprayed down the whole room. I haven't seen any since *knocks on wood* and although it was such a bad first night, it's all settled and good now!

We headed toward Tesco again (this time not getting lost) and bought some more essentials. There, I finally got my mobile phone SIM - they call it "top-up" - which means basically "pay as you go" type of thing. It's kind of neat because if you input a certain amount of money per month, it comes with free boosters - you get to choose boosters that fit the best for you. I ended up getting the Orange SIM card and chose to get 240 free international call minutes for topping-up £10 per month!

We also picked up our ID cards. The line to pick them up (or the "queue" as they say here) was ridiculously long - it took about 1.5 hours!

At around 7pm, we headed to check out the Christian Union's Welsh quiz night event - I met a lot of cool people and my team totally failed at the quiz night, but it was all in good fun. There were yummy pastries as well, so it was very nice!

Money, Planes, Farmland, Cardiff

September 26, 2010

Oh my gosh. I left for London on the 21st, landed here on the 22nd...it hasn't even been 4 days and what a crazy 4 days it's been!

Quick recap...here we go!

Day 0 (I'll count the 21st as "Day 0" since technically I was on the plane/airports the whole day):
I had a quick breakfast with the parents at Paris Baguette and then off I was to exchange money from dollars -> pound sterling. The exchange rate SUCKED SO BADLY ($1.66 -> £1). After napping at home for a little bit, I headed out to LAX. It was SUPER confusing because my airline was not flying out from the International Terminal but instead flew out from Terminal 2. But we got it alright at the end. LUGGAGE costs SUCK. They actually made me check-in my carry-on luggage because it was over 15lbs (which has never, ever happened to me before)...but the check-in lady was nice and didn't charge for the big bag (which was over the check-in weight limit). After all this chaos I finally made my way to the gate where....

This really cool fashion designer sat next to me and chatted to me the whole time we were waiting! He was Italian, super friendly, had traveled to over 120 countries in 20 years and was heading toward London for a fashion show. Can you say awesome? He had really interesting stories to tell and interesting advice to give - he was analyzing my personality throughout our conversation and told me that I don't have to worry about a career at all. He said I'll be making big money and that I need to be constantly around people to be happy. :) He also said that I have a good heart but sometimes people tend to overlook that. I smiled my way through his comments (because I didn't really know what to say), but honestly because of that super cool fashion designer my nervousness about heading to Wales was forgotten! I love good conversation with random people.

The plane ride SUCKED really badly because I was cramped in there for 10 hours and just wanted to scream my head off. One thing - Virgin-Atlantic has really great service! The stewardesses were super friendly with their British accents. :)

Day 1: Arrival in Heathrow
Arrived at Heathrow around noon - immigration & customs weren't too bad at all! I was super worried about it, but it was all really fine since I already had a visa. My luggages were waiting out for me when I headed out to the terminal - awesome. I had some trouble looking for the Cardiff U representatives who were there to greet me but ended up finding them (thank goodness). After waiting about an hour or so, we were put into a shuttle en route to Cardiff...

The journey to Cardiff took around 3 hours. On the way there, we received welcome packets and a SIM card with enough credit to make 1 international call (which I utilized to call my mom).  I had made a quick friend at the airport who borrowed my camera to take pictures of our route as we headed to the Uni. I ended up falling asleep for a good chunk of it. Here is one of the pictures:

Pretty countryside!

We finally arrived at the Uni:

Although I didn't know at the time this picture was taken, this road ended up being one of the main roads we take to get to many of the buildings

There's about a hundred things more to say about the first day/night alone, but I'll save that for tomorrow as it's around 3am here now and I have to be up early!!

Here's a little teaser as to what's to come:
- the American flatmate
- getting lost 3 times on the way to Tesco's
- "mobile" phone (cell phone) confusion
- BUGS IN MY ROOM
- all-nighter on the first night here

A lot of people have been asking this - am I homesick? No, not homesick yet, but I miss (almost) everybody at Penn! :)

N O | C O N T R O L

September 21, 2010

Ever so often, I look back upon my past entries on this blog. It helps me to refocus - to see how far I've come.

I came across this particular entry which made me laugh.

Isn't it really awesome when you think that you have something completely figured out only to have life throw you something completely different?

I wrote that particular entry nearing the end of spring break, thinking that I had regained the control I so desperately sought. By the end of the semester, the little control that I had over the situation was completely lost and I was at His hands, crying out for mercy again.

I love it when I try to trick God and myself into believing something only to have Him stop and shake His head at me.

Ironically, right now I am in the complete opposite situation as that blog entry. I have absolutely no idea what's going to happen during my time abroad in Wales. I don't know how my first day is going to turn out, the characteristics of my flatmates, my class schedule, where the shopping market is, how I am going to eat, what the campus looks like. I have been extremely worried and anxious the past week rather than excited. But now that I'm reflecting on everything that happened in the past two years at Penn, I can't wait to see what God in store for me in Wales. May new relationships flourish, new sights seen, and new knowledge gained! :)

I am so proud of myself that I was able to reduce my luggage to just barely this:

Yay for pink luggages!

Isn't that ridiculous? Compared to what I brought to Penn during my freshman year, this is nothing! I don't know how I am going to survive without 4-other-suitcases worth of stuff in the 3 months I'll be at Wales. I just hope I won't have an extra luggage to bring back home when I am done!

Goodbye, Summer 2010.

September 20, 2010

"There are two ways of spreading light: to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it."
- Edith Wharton

This little notebook was my sidekick throughout my adventures(?) during the summer of 2010. This book marks the three different chapters of my life (although "chapters" is not the precise word to note my summer since all three parts took place simultaneously). It's kind of serving as a "time capsule" for my hectic summer, and I think it'll be a nice tradition to uphold throughout the different stages in my life.

I'm the type of person who loves scribbling notes - although I am basically inseparable from my computer (sad, I know), I prefer to brainstorm and write notes down on a piece of paper rather than on a word document. It's just the way I do things.

The book is pretty much finalized now (although there is absolutely nothing final about it) - and here is a little glimpse into what is in each tab of the book (and therefore a glimpse into the three different parts of my summer):

Chapter 1: My internship with GAP

The first tab indicates the first internship that I started with a non-profit autism organization. On the right of the picture is a page from that tab...my incredibly messy notes from one of our weekly meetings in WeHo. A lot of my job involved contacting organizations for sponsorships as well as getting word out about the event. Although the actual day of the event was fun (as I went kayaking for the first time ever!), I don't think I'll do it again if I were given the chance. We really lacked the resources we needed for our efforts to be effective - things were just so disorganized all the time!

Enter Chapter 2: My internship with the ICI

A glimpse into my internship

My second internship over the summer was really awesome. The two pages above show the variety of tasks I was given in a particular week - everything from researching Internet tools for the Institute to use to managing a blog was fair game! It was a really amazing experience. Everyday, my critical thinking levels were challenged as my meetings with the Director led into discussions about society, culture, communication, the Internet...I realized so many things about the Internet, non-profit world and relationships among people through this internship. Love, love, love. I found that this internship was really perfect for me - I would love to do something like this for a career.  Above all, I think I really need to be around people who analyze culture almost instinctively - I love having interesting conversations that trigger thoughts in my head to such an extent that I am reminded of it throughout my non-work everyday life.

Enter Chapter 3: Part-time job at TLC

A glimpse into everyday life at TLC

And finally...Chapter 3: TLC. As I have noted in my previous entry, I worked at the same Learning Center for 3 consecutive summers. I won't go into much detail about my experience there (as I have multiple blog entries about it), but here is a glimpse of what my days were like while teaching! On the left is my little "grading sheet" that kept track of where each student was in terms of grammar packets (some kids came later, that's why there are so many blank spaces...others were on different levels, some always came late and never did grammar packets). Note the big "LOST" on one of the spaces. It's so typical of them to lose packets...*sigh*. The page on the right shows an agenda that I had planned on a day-to-day basis as well as a seating chart I had to implement due to high levels of noise. The seating chart is incomplete though - I had way more kids than that at one point! It was quite tricky to break-up "pairs" of friends on completely different parts of the classroom - oh the life of a teacher.

Throughout the summer, I was very rarely found without that pink notebook in hand. Now, I put the pink notebook away and along with it all the memories of this summer. It's been an extremely long break (I can't believe I have been home since May 18th!), but it was very productive. Now it's time to enter Fall 2010 - hello, Wales!

Is it really...over?

September 10, 2010

the last stack of papers

I can't believe it's all over.

My two internships and part-time job - they're all finished. Completed. Done.

This past Wednesday was my last day at the learning center - and on Tuesday night, I graded my last stack of papers. I don't know if the picture above truly indicates how big these stacks of paper were that I had to deal with on an every-other-day basis, but they were quite a pain. Countless journals, vocabulary sentences, reading packets, grammar packets, writing packets...but I am going to miss the small surprises that I received as I went through them (as I have noted in my previous entries) and all the lessons I learned from them.

I was kind of sad that so few kids were remaining on my last day of work, and some of my favorites had already quit (yes, teachers always do have favorites!) - but I was happy to get out of there having experienced some of the sweetest moments I had in all three summers of my teaching experience. Honestly though, it's harder and harder to get attached to the kids at a personal level each year. I haven't figured out why this is - maybe the attitude I come in every summer is detached every year, maybe the kids are just changing to an impersonal level, maybe the gap between the kids and me is growing as I get older. I don't know. The first summer that I taught at the learning center, I was in charge of 3rd-5th graders and a small group of middle-schoolers - but I became attached to them at the end of the summer and had known them at an intimate level. Maybe it's due to the fact that we went on a summer trip together, but the goodbye was sadder back then. In fact, I felt weird at the end of Wednesday that I didn't feel very attached to these kids at all. Maybe it's due to the fact that this summer, I was only at the learning center on Mondays and Wednesdays, from 8am to 3pm, as opposed to last two summers where I was there full time from 8am to 6pm, Monday-Thursday.

Whatever the reason may be for my particular detachment from the kids this summer, I am done with the learning center. I wish I can see them grow to mature little beings (and see 'M' get his "mastery degree" from Harvard at age 20), but this is where my "fate" with them ends. I have come to realize that connections between people - "destiny and fate" between two people - cannot be forged, manipulated or forced. If it's meant to be, we'll see each other again someday. If it's meant to be, we'll be in each other's lives even if we will against it. That's just how life goes.

I totally didn't expect this entry on saying goodbye to the learning center to end up being this lengthy and was thus planning to write on my final roles as an intern on this post as well - but that will just have to wait for another day.

Summer is coming to a close. I'm honestly scared for what's coming up next.

White...angels.

September 7, 2010

This is going to sound ridiculously silly, so I hesitated on writing this blog post for a very long time.  But they have been such a big part of my life - actually for more than half of my life - so I think it's worth dedicated a blog entry to them.

I'm usually the type of person to scoff at "girl fans" smothering all over boybands, singers, actors, such and such (although I do admit that I do that occasionally when I find a particular actor/singer/entertainer attractive).  But in my case it's different.  Or maybe I am just thinking that it's different when it's not.  I don't know.

Anyway, today (in Korea...and here too now that it's passed midnight) marks the 14th anniversary of the debut of the legendary Korean Boyband H.O.T.  They initiated the entire Kpop scene that is going on right now, bringing the adult-oriented Korean music entertainment of the times to a teen-oriented Kpop that exists today. They literally swept the nation. I can go on and on about the million thousand records they broke and set, all the new ideas they and their fans initiated, what they meant for the Korean culture and in my own personal life...but it would require too much emotion on my part, too much reminiscing.  Therefore, I'll keep this (relatively) brief.

I came to know them first when I was 6 years old, at the time of their first debut.  At first, I only liked them because of my older sister, who was 11 at the time of their debut (and therefore the perfect age target).  As I grew older with them, however, and experienced the tragic (?) disbanding of the group due to greed and money of their entertainment company, my engagement with the group became increasingly popular.

If I had stayed in Korea, I do not know if things would have been different.  Regardless, I ended up immigrating to the United States at the age of 7 and therefore never got to see a live H.O.T. performance when they actually performed together as a group, and even watching performances was very difficult (the online community hadn't developed back then).

But I grew up with them.  And as I got older and reflected back on their older songs that I had (at a young age) hadn't given much thought about, I reconnected to them at a different level.  The band H.O.T. had swept the entire preteen-young adult population of Korea for a reason.  They were - and still are - widely different.  They gave a voice to the teenagers.  Their first song was about school bullying.  Their second album title song talked about the weak being oppressed.  The second song of their second album spoke about teens being oppressed by the society's norms and their parents. Their third album title song expressed anger toward society's injustices. The second song of their third album, appropriately titled "Hope", gave HOPE to the nation that was undergoing an economic crisis.  Their fourth album title song spoke about a crucial event that occurred within the year where children burned to death at a day camp because they were locked to their rooms.  The entire fourth album is FILLED with messages about society, addressing crucial issues on suicide, school bullying, oppression, financial issues tearing families apart...Their title song for the fifth and final album together gave voice to handicapped individuals in a society that looked down upon them.

Now can someone tell me if there is ANY OTHER MAINSTREAM KPOP GROUP today that does this?

14 years have passed.  A couple days ago, I had the opportunity to see one of the members live in concert.  I held front row tickets and therefore saw him extremely up-close.  It was a really strange and exciting feeling to be able to see him for the first time after 14 years of following him quietly.

Music is such a beautiful thing.  Thousands of people can be gathered together for the sake of music and musicians.  And today, we commemorate H.O.T. - the boyband that started it all, but still remains distinguished due to all the reasons I have stated above.

I went from a six year old girl that liked the light-hearted song "Candy" to a twenty-year old college student who appreciates the ups-and-downs of life that are well expressed throughout their five albums.  They went from 18 year old barely-of-age boys to grown men all in their 30's.  Yet the fandom continues.  Now we're more like a family.