i’m curious if anyone else has had a similar experience because this has always felt so surreal to me.
i’m from the hunter region in nsw (around the maitland/newcastle area), and before danielle debuted in newjeans, she went to hunter school of the performing arts (hspa) in broadmeadow. we didn’t go to the same school, but i had multiple friends who did, they knew her atleast semi-personally, i knew OF her and had seen her many times, we weren’t close. she left around year 8 to pursue training before eventually debuting in 2022.
the funny part is i had absolutely no idea when newjeans debuted.
i became a fan because i genuinely loved their music. then one day my friend (who went to hspa with danielle) said “you know that’s danielle, right?”
i genuinely thought she was joking.
then she pulled out one of the old year 8 school photos and it suddenly clicked. she looks completely different. she had braces, was way more tanned, and just looked like a normal kid you’d see around the hunter.
it’s such a weird feeling because, as a k-pop fan, idols always seem so distant. but danielle doesn’t feel like some untouchable celebrity to me. my brain still thinks of her as “the girl from hspa” who happened to become one of the biggest k-pop idols in the world.
now every time i see newjeans in the news or hear one of their songs, it honestly blows my mind. especially with everything that’s happened recently, seeing danielle in headlines all the time and everything surrounding the group, i can’t help but feel for her. it’s strange knowing that someone who was just a local girl from my area ended up at the centre of one of the biggest stories in k-pop.
it’s one of those things that sounds made up whenever i tell people, so i usually don’t even mention it because i feel like people assume i’m lying for attention. but it’s genuinely one of the strangest coincidences i’ve ever experienced.
i know this probably sounds like one of those “trust me bro, i knew a celebrity before they were famous” posts 😭 but i swear it’s true. i’m not trying to claim we were best friends or anything like that. we weren’t. i just knew her back then through mutual friends and my local area, and it’s been so surreal watching someone from around here become one of the biggest idols in the world while also being a genuine fan of newjeans.
has anyone else had something like this happen? maybe someone you went to school with or knew through friends ended up becoming unexpectedly famous?
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