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Last year, a young South African made history when he won the People’s Choice Award at the Changwon K-Pop World Festival. South Africans just love K-Pop, and with its popularity growing, Anna Stroud went to this year's festival to see the contestants battle it out.
Last year, a young South African made history when he danced his way from the regional round of the Changwon K-Pop World Festival in Pretoria all the way to the finals and into the hearts of South Koreans.
Onstage in Changwon, South Korea, Lindsay Katlego Setlema won the People’s Choice Award for his rendition of “Danger” – a song by K-Pop sensation Taemin.
- Read here: Lindsay Katlego Setlema: Born in Vaal and big in Korea
- Jemiketta!* Pretoria hosts the Changwon K-Pop World Festival
“I don’t think there’s a word to describe how I felt at that moment. It felt very surreal for me. It was too much,” he said.
Setlema and finalists from all over the world spent two weeks perfecting their moves in South Korea. “We got to work with amazing artists from South Korea,” he said. “I learned a lot about my job as a dancer and South Korea as a country.”
You can watch him accept his prize and dance his way to glory in the videos below (warning: you might cry):
Hands up if you like K-Pop
On May 1, Worker’s Day 2019, K-Pop (Korean pop) fans arrived in their numbers at the Atterbury Theatre in Pretoria to enjoy the regional round of the Changwon K-Pop World Festival.
Each year, Korean embassies across the world host these regional rounds to find the best local K-Pop singer and dancer.
The embassies submit recordings of the winning performances to the judges in Changwon, who then select the finalists. Last year, Setlema blew the judges away with his explosive dance moves and boundless energy.
“K-Pop transcends borders,” said the Ambassador of the Republic of Korea, Jong-Dae Park. “South Africa is rich in culture, people are versed in music and dance,” he said. “Many South Africans are very creative and curious for new things and I can see that is blending well together.”
There were 16 entries in the vocal and dance categories respectively.
It was the difficult task of judges Minister Seon-Cheol Park, renowned K-Pop choreographer Suni Chae and the general manager of the Cape Town Korean Culture Day Dwain Loubser to choose four winners in each category.
“I can really notice the quality of their singing and dancing and how knowledgeable they are of our K-Pop music and dance,” Ambassador Park said. “So I’m really surprised and encouraged to see this kind of vast and very great energy and enthusiasm around K-Pop.”
Sophy Baird was the MC for the event. A lawyer by profession, Baird has been a K-Pop fan since 2013 and became involved with the Korean Embassy in 2014.
She said she did not expect the huge turnout on 1 May. “At first when this competition started it was very humble, we didn’t even have a venue.
You had to submit your application online to the embassy and then they submitted it to headquarters. So there wasn’t a competition at an official venue. And now since I’ve been MCing it’s grown to a point where I can’t believe it’s become so big.”
Baird explained why K-Pop is so popular globally and in South Africa. “BTS has exploded on the K-Pop scene and on the western music scene and I think that’s pulled more of the younger generation towards K-Pop; definitely more than in my day when I started listening to K-Pop, because they have the benefit of social media,” she said.
“I think South Africans are curious to find out about different cultures. And I think they gravitate towards K-Pop because South Africans are dancers through and through and a lot of K-Pop is in the choreography.”
And the winners are:
Vocal category
Ambassador’s Prize: Stephanie Toerien, singing “Stay with me” by Chanyeol & Punch
3rd Prize: Haana Lu (Glenda Mwelwa Lupiya), singing “Gotta go” by Chungha
2nd Prize: Lauwrinda Hartley, singing “Blue” by Taeyeon
1st Prize: Persis (Joy Persis Lupiya), singing “Blue” by Onew
Dance category
Ambassador’s Prize: New Attitude, performing “Hellevator” by Stray Kids
3rd Prize: TMNTG, performing “Really bad boy” by Red Velvet
2nd Prize: South Mujigae, performing a mash up of “Error” by VIXX and “Getting closer” by SEVENTEEN
1st Prize: Susan Nkata, performing “What you waiting for” by Anda
Being a K-Pop fan in Africa
Persis, who was also the winner of the vocal category last year, said she didn’t expect to win again. “I just didn’t think it was possible, so I’m a little shocked. But I’m happy, obviously.”
“To be honest, the way BTS has blown up in the west has definitely had an influence on the awareness of K-Pop globally. Not that all the credit goes to BTS, but a lot of new K-Pop fans are probably Armies [hardcore BTS fans],” Persis said.
“But I think a lot of other long-time fans are also more motivated to come out of the woodwork and connect with other fans. Being a K-Pop fan when no one knows what K-Pop is can be quite hard, especially in Africa. And you sometimes don’t even know if people will understand why you love the thing so much, you might get teased (I was) by family and friends.
You might eventually just want to keep the whole business to yourself.
“I thought I’d been in this thing a long time when one of the participants told me she’d been a K-Pop fan for 10 years! My mere five-year career seemed so measly.
I also met a couple of other girls who have been craving K-Pop related events for a while, and just had no idea where to find them. So the more awareness grows, the more connections get created and the culture also grows.”
K-Pop inspires future performers
“Winning felt and still feels quite surreal,” said Susan Nkata, winner of the regional dance category. “This is my fourth time applying for the Changwon cover dance contest and in all three previous attempts I placed second. I guess fourth time’s the charm and it’s quite literally a wish come true.”
Nkata became interested in K-Pop after watching a Korean drama called Boys Over Flowers and discovering a boy group named SS501.
“I was absolutely amazed at the sheer talent of these artists and the amount of effort that goes not only into producing the music and music videos, but into producing the groups themselves.
I fell in love with the fact that every group was dancing, and not just side stepping but doing full on choreography. I was inspired to work even harder than I had ever worked as a performer.”
When she wasn’t performing, Nkata was cheering on her fellow contestants. “There was so much fun, passion and talent on that stage.
The audience turnout this year was probably the biggest the competition had seen to date. It really made me so happy to see so many people present to support and share in our love for K-Pop through our performances.”
