Favorite K-pop Songs of 2016

There were so many great comebacks and debuts last year! This list was made based off of my Last.fm statistics and how much I loved each song. It was really hard not to include other songs that I felt deserved to be on the list but I didn't want the list to be super long. So, here goes my most played/most loved song list of 2016 (in no specific order.)

  1. Sentimental- WINNER
  2. Pentagon- Pentagon
  3. The Closer- VIXX
  4. Monster- EXO
  5. Emptiness- MADTOWN
  6. Knock- KNK
  7. Just Go- iKON
  8. Hit Me (Feat. KUSH)- MOBB
  9. Full House- MOBB
10. Letting Go- DAY6
11. Cheer Up- TWICE
12. Holup!- Bobby
13. Playing With Fire- BLACKPINK
14. Toy- Block B
15. Fxxk It- Big Bang
16. Fire- BTS
17. Lie- BTS
18. Save Me- BTS
19. Blood Sweat & Tears- BTS
20. Am I Wrong- BTS

Honorable Mentions:
  1. Bermuda Triangle (Feat. Crush, DEAN)- ZICO
  2. White Sugar- MONSTA X
  3. Heartless- U-KISS
  4. Lucky One- EXO
  5. Beggin On My Knees- GOT7

My Food Adventures

I'm currently watching Let's Eat Season 2 and it's torture! It doesn't matter what they're eating, I just want to try it all! I live in the Midwest and the Korean restaurants here are few and slim, so unfortunately I don't exactly have the option to try most of the food that is shown in Let's Eat but I did want to share some of my Korean food experiences.

The first time I ate at a Korean restaurant was probably close to 2 years ago. I remember it was super cold outside and some of my friends and I decided to check out a Korean restaurant that seemed to have decent reviews online. Their menu had Korean food on one side and Chinese food on the other. I ended up ordering bulgogi and I really liked it. One of my friends also got bulgogi and my sister and my other friend got soup. I don't remember which soups they ordered but I did try them and they were a bit too spicy for me. The restaurant itself wasn't really anything spectacular. I can't really remember anything specific about it other than I remember it was rather busy because every time someone opened the door we could feel the freezing cold winter air come in from outside. I can't remember if we ate there once or twice but the restaurant ended up closing a couple months after we were there.

Lucky for us we found another Korean restaurant that we all enjoy a lot! It's called Yami Korean Cuisine and it's just this small little restaurant run by probably a handful of people. The menu is kind of small but the food they have on there is so good that you crave it enough that you don't mind getting the same thing over and over again. The main dishes that I order there are japchae, dolsot bibimbap, and bulgogi. They also have 4 options for appetizers and they are all delicious. The appetizers are dukbokki (spicy rice and fish cake), fried wontons, fried chicken with a sweet and sour sauce, and kimbap. The environment is really nice there. The decorations are really simple and the people that usually wait on us always make us feel really welcome and seem really happy that we are open to trying different food. It seems to get pretty good business which makes me really happy! 

Dolsot Bibimbap

After it's stirred and has the bean paste in it-

There is one other Korean restaurant that I have yet to try. I'm pretty sure that it also has Chinese food. Some of the reviews online made it sound like it was more of a fast food type of deal where you order your food at a counter and some of the reviews also said that the menu was confusing or something. I might try it one of these days but for right now I'm pretty happy with Yami. I'm hoping that they will expand their menu one of these days. Either that or I should just learn how to make Korean dishes. Which is probably close to impossible at this time in my life because I have practically zero cooking experience and zero time. Haha!

If anyone has any Korean food recommendations or is watching Let's Eat Season 2, feel free to comment below! ^^ 

[Album Recommendation] Eddy Kim- Sing Sing Sing

This album was released back in January but I didn't actually listen to it until last month. Even though I try to listen to the less well-known artists, sometimes I can't keep up with everything new that's being thrown at me and I end up missing a few things. Unfortunately this happened to be one of those comebacks that I missed but all is well because my sister happened upon this little gem of a mini album and shared it with me!

Sadly, I don't know that much about Eddy Kim. I do know that he was a contestant on Mnet's Superstar K4 (which I've never watched.) He also has already completed his mandatory military service which saves us all the heartache of him having to leave us later! He can play the guitar and the piano and he also composes all of his songs.

I did listen to him when he first debuted last year but I wasn't completely sold on his first mini "The Manual." The songs are very pleasant to listen to and his voice was as wonderful then as it is now, I just wasn't blown away. I feel like I will listen to it more now but initially there weren't any songs that I felt the need to put on repeat.

Now, this album. THIS album. I am so in love with it! I don't love every song on it equally but they all add different flavors to make a nice blend of sound and emotions.

Here's the tracklist:

My favorite songs are definitely Sing Sing Sing, My Love, and Apologize. Sing Sing Sing is a little more upbeat and happy, My Love will literally make you feel like you're in love, and Apologize is sassy and catchy! The last song on the album (조화 (造花)) is really really good but it's a little more on the heavy side, which is why I probably don't listen to it as much as the others. 조화 (造花) is a song that he wrote when he was in the military. I'm not really sure what the lyrics translate as but whatever he felt or was going through when he wrote that song, you can tell the song really takes him back to that time. I watched him perform it live and it was so emotional and powerful. By the end of the performance he could barely sing because he had started crying. It was a beautiful performance! Being someone who loves music so much, it really makes an impression on me when people become so engulfed in their music and their performances.

I didn't mean to make this a full-out album review but it kind of ended up that way. I really do hope that everyone who reads this will give the album a chance! Eddy Kim is incredibly talented and I would love to see his fan base grow and see him become really successful in the future. I'll post links below to some of his MV's and the live performance I mentioned above. Thanks for reading!!

Eddy Kim- My Love MV
Eddy Kim- Apologize MV
Eddy Kim- Artificial Flower (조화造花 ) Live
Sing Sing Sing Full Album

First blog!!

I'm super new at this blogging thing but I wanted to give a run down of what I plan to blog about in the future. I'm sure next to no one will actually read this but in the chance that someone finds this and has similar interests, I want them to at least give me a chance! ^^

First things first, my name is Kierstin. I'm 21 years old and I live in the U.S. I'm not the most experienced person when it comes to life but I hope that I can at least add some color to it as I learn more about who I am and about where I belong. At the moment, I am not in school but I am working full time as a department supervisor at a retail store. I'm a very family-oriented person despite the fact that I cherish my alone time very very much. I also love my dog probably more than I should but if anyone sticks around long enough, they will probably figure that out very quickly. I do attend church and my faith is a big part of my life and the decisions I make but I am not the preachy sort. I stand by the Bible and its principles but I will not shove them down your throat. If asked, I will gladly talk about my beliefs but I don't like to spark up debates.

Now, onto the blogging stuff!! The main reason I wanted to start blogging was because there are so many things that I love and so many experiences that I would love to write about but I've never really had the proper place to organize all of my thoughts. I've also had very little motivation to write the past couple of years or so. So, maybe this will give me a little nudge.


These are some of my future blogging plans:

• Book reviews
• Movie reviews (including Asian movie reviews)
• Asian drama updates, episode recaps, and reviews
• K-pop album reviews and playlist updates
• 3DS game reviews and/or progress updates
• Travel and concert journals (Yay! Adventures!)
• Random thoughts, rants, my wonderful customer service stories, and probably silly stories about my beagle. <3