Page 24 of Teach Me K-Pop

“OH! OH! The new FLY just got posted!” Alita practically shrieks when a notification chimes on her phone.

“AAAAHHH! Can we watch it on the big screen?” Harper hollers as she’s already running toward the presentation area and searching for the projector’s remote control.

“You think he’s ready for that?” Savannah quirks an eyebrow at me.

I raise one of mine right back at her. “I’m not asking you to go easy on me.”

Savannah giggles. “Awww, it’s cute when you think you’re tough.”

“Sav! He’s still a teacher!” Alita admonishes. “But also, yes.”

“Okay, moving on from this,” I start. “Before we assess whether or not this is suitable content for me, can you at least explain what FLY even is? First it wasn’t breakfast cereal and now we have bugs or airplanes or something. We’re all over the place.”

The three of them exchange looks that I can’t even begin to interpret—partly confusion, combined with something else that might be amusement—while they appear to silently decide who’s going to be the one tasked with this request.

Harper speaks first. “Um. It’s kind of a reality show? But also not? And a little bit of a variety show? But not really? And a competition? Sort of?”

I stare back at her, perplexed, while Savannah and Alita bob their heads in agreement with her. “What?”

I am legitimately clueless. I haven’t run across anything about FLY, whatever it actually is. But I have seen the RYSING wings logo enough now to know that it probably tied into that somehow. Maybe.

“I think it might be one of those things you just have to experience,” Savannah tells me.

“Gotcha. Pull it up, I guess?” I gesture toward the computer to find that Alita is already well on her way to doing just that. “Okay, someone tell me what’s up with ‘FLY’ and all the wings and stuff.”

Remote in hand, Harper sits down across from me, looking very serious. “We told you every fandom has a name, right?” She waits for me to nod, and then continues. “So, the RYSING fandom is called VOX. Remember?”

“I vaguely recall that, but I don’t get why a Korean group has a Latin named fandom?” I say.

“Okay, so, as a group, when they debuted they kind of came out of nowhere and like, blew up. They got really big, really, really fast and got a lot of hate for it from other groups and all over the internet. But they had a lot of super loyal fans from the very beginning, even if the original fandom name was some bird-related thing, because birds like, rise or whatever. But we don’t really talk about that.” She pauses, perhaps for dramatic effect, and I make a mental note that I’m going to have to investigate the bird thing more later. “Anyway. On their first mini-album there was a song called ‘fly with me’ that they would do as an encore through their whole first tour. At the last night of the last show in Seoul, Nikko was doing the ending comments and said that the fans were what made them fly—that the sound of the fans’ voices singing back to them was loud enough to drown out all the other noise and keep them going when the rest of the world was trying to hold them down or clip their wings. And they just kind of leaned into it by calling us VOX and naming their show FLY, you know?”

I realize that both Alita and Savannah have gone completely still and quiet as Harper was speaking, like this is a reverent moment. And maybe it is. These are people they care about deeply. This origin story is part of their story, too, now.

“Nikko is so poetic sometimes,” Savannah sighs, the other two nodding solemnly in agreement and I try to bite my tongue as I remember just how poetic I’ve seen him be. “They use wings in all their imagery now, on albums and merch and stuff. The title track on their newest album is ‘sky blue,’ and it’s a song for the fans about wishing them happiness. Plus, that shade of blue is kind of their color, I guess. It’s all pretty genius how it ties together, really.”

“That’s actually very cool,” I comment. While I had understood the lyrics to “sky blue,” I hadn’t really gotten it yet, not the way they do. But the more I learn, I’m starting to understand why their fans are so invested.

“It totally is… OH MY GOD!” Alita shouts, again, as a video fills the screen. “Look at them!”

“Are they…” I pause, not quite sure how to process what I’m seeing, “...dressed as pirates?”

The thumbnail for the video appears to show the group on board a large ship of some sort, all decked out for a high-seas adventure, and one of them is wearing a very jaunty hat with an extremely large feather.

Harper gets up to walk closer to the screen, staring at it, jaw slack. “Okay, we knew the 50th episode was going to be big, but this is, like,insane.”

I finally think to read the caption. “‘FLY Episode 50 Special: High Seas Treasure Hunt, Part One.’ Well, that definitely sounds fun. Eight-year-old me would have loved it, I know that.”

Alita clicks the video open and spins around to look at me. “Um…”

“Excuse me?!” Savannah has her hands on her hips and a suspicious expression. “Mr. K! What the what?”

I have no idea what’s going on. “I’m going to need more information about what just happened.”

Harper gives me a once over and says, “You can read Korean.”

“Yes? I mean, I also speak Korean, but I can indeed read it,” I reply with a shrug.

“Since when?” Alita asks, staring at me expectantly along with the other two.

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