The “Gwiyomi” Craze

April 17, 2013 by chrissantosra 4 Comments

While “Gangnam Style” is constantly getting more views, which has now reached over 1.486 billion, and Psy debuts a new single called “Gentleman”, which is expected to be another hit, a new Korean dance craze, 귀요미송 (“Gwiyomi” song), is taking the world by storm.

On Youtube, you will find quite a number of people, young and old, doing their own version of the “Gwiyomi” song, originally sung by South Korean indie singer, Hari (하리).

What makes the song so popular are the “cute” hand movements made by Btob idol group member, Jung Ilhoon.

Many K-pop celebrities have performed their own version of “Gwiyomi”. A South Korean variety show  featured “The Aegyo Battle” (Battle of Cuteness) where a couple of celebrities imitated various “Gwiyomi” hand gestures as they sang.

Here is a video collection of some K-pop celebrities performing “Gwiyomi”. What do you think? Cute? Creepy? Or just plain annoying?

Of all the K-pop stars, I think Sunny of Girls’ Generation did one of the cutest versions of “Gwiyomi”. (Some are trying so hard they end up looking like schmucks.)

I wasn’t surprised at all when I went to the Philippines with my husband and we found out that my four-year old nephew knows “Gwiyomi”. He made me laugh every time he sang “Goma me” instead of “Gwiyomi”. “Goma” means rubber band in my native language, so saying “goma me” doesn’t make any sense.

What does “gwiyomi” mean anyway? “Gwiyomi” is a Korean slang for “a cute person”, derived from the adjective 귀여운 (“gwiyo-un”), meaning cute.

A popular comedian in the Philippines has jumped into the “Gwiyomi” craze. After performing a solo version of the song, he and the other hosts of his noontime show danced “Gwiyomi”.

If you are wondering what the lyrics of the song mean, here is a video that translates them in English.

~~~ The videos featured on this post are not mine, except my nephew’s. Thank you for letting me use your videos on Youtube: Cindy Candy, CNB Boice, 4toLuzSUBK, loveseobie92, jubogapo9sz, joongminable, Ella Iseyama and Guimaras Manga. 

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