Yesterday, thousands of lights in homes, businesses and outdoor billboards were turned off for the first annual Earth Hour in Toronto.

Who participated? I did =)

Tablo from the popular hip-hop group, Epik High, announced on March 22nd, that their 5th album will be released in mid-April. I can’t wait because I loved their last album, Remapping the Human Soul (Fan is my most played song on my iPod).

P.S. If you haven’t already, check out Tablo’s solo project with Pe2ny called, “Eternal Morning”. Love it.

P.S.S. Did you know that Tablo is a Korean-Canadian? (I might be wrong, I saw this floating around the internet somewhere)

Bae Yong Joon, a.k.a Yonsama, is very interested in the anime version of Winter Sonata, a classic Korean drama that started the whole Hallyu (Korean Wave) sensation. The Japanese entertainment company, Total Promotion, announced this project as the Korean media company Key East signed a memorandum.

Opinions? I personally can’t imagine Yonsama as an anime character.

Lee Honey, Miss Korea 2006 and Miss Universe third runner-up 2007, has been named the most outstanding beauty queen of 2007 on March 27th, 2008. Lee was selected through an evaluation of 100 top contestants who participated in the world’s five leading beauty pageants — Miss World, Miss Universe, Miss International, Miss Earth, and Miss Tourism Queen International. I’m so glad that Lee Honey finally won first place in something – I was pissed off so much because she didn’t win the Miss Universe 2006. 4 out of 15 judges placed her first, and another 4 placed her second. This makes Honey Lee the first Asian to win first place.

Miss China was 4th runner-up for this title, which enraged Chinese netizens. They left countless hate messages, like “I don’t know why she got the first place title.” or “There were way more potential women than Honey Lee.”. Jealous, much? But some kind people with sense left comments like “I’m glad that she got first place, we need to show the world the beauty of Asian women.”

“Se7en held a White Day celebration and party at the Hiro Ballroom in New York City on March 14th for an event produced by Swerve Media and Base NYC. Three of his U.S. album tracks were played at this preview party. There will be a total of five album preview parties across the country (Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles) and in Toronto, Canada after wrapping up the finalization of a contract.”

This is from Wikipedia, so I wouldn’t count on its authenticity…

But wow, imagine Se7en in Toronto!

Jang Nara (장나라) released her 6th album on March 25th, 2008. I was surprised by this because she has been missing in action for a very long time, spending her time in China all the time. I used to hate Jang Nara, because she was a typical, boring looking celebrity. But when I found out that she was singing in 5 different languages in this new album, I thought I’d give it a try because I’m interested if she can actually speak those languages.

In this new album, she has 12 Korean, 9 Mandarin, 1 Cantonese, 3 Japanese, and 1 English songs divided into 2 CDs. I couldn’t tell if she was speaking in Chinese or English in the English song (Fairytale), because of her horrible pronunciation. I guess it can’t be helped, at least she can speak 4 others. I can’t tell if her Mandarin or Cantonese is good or not, opinions?

Younha released a new Japanese compilation album, featuring the popular song, “Password 486″ (비밀번호 486) in Japanese. It also features the Korean version of the Japanese song, “Yubikiri” (ゆびきり). It was released on March 26th, 2008. She left Korea early January to release this album. There is to be one single from this album, called “Scratch On The Heart”, a typical Younha-style rock song.

Album rating: ★★★½ – Recommended for Younha fans.