2011 HalfKorean.com Interviews

Even though we are already almost a quarter of the way through 2012, we wanted to take a moment to review our interviews from 2011. If you’ve missed any interviews from last year, now would be a perfect time to check them out. We’d love to get feedback from all of you to let us know what interviews you enjoyed, what you disliked and what you would like for us to improve on.

As most of you frequent visitors know, the core content we have focused on for HalfKorean.com during the past few years have been our interviews with various prominent and notable people. We feel that sharing their mixed Korean experiences with all of us a great way for not only our community to learn about them but for everyone (including non-Koreans) to learn about us.

We appreciated all of the interviewees for spending their time with us and allowing us a look at their mixed Korean experience and we will continue to provide the community with insightful interviews in 2012!

HalfKorean.com Interview with Jackie Chain
We kicked off the year with hip hop recording artist Jackie Chain. At the time interviewed Jackie, he had just released his Who Da Mane mixtape album. He also had been gaining recognition from many publications as an artist on the rise.

While his first full length major label debut album I Ain’t Slept in Weeks still has not released yet, he has kept busy by releasing another mixtape titled After Hours this past February.

On a personal note, my favorite quote from all of last year’s interviews was from Jackie when he proudly stated, (pardon the language) “I’m a kimchi eating motherf*cker!”

HalfKorean.com Interview with James Yun
Anybody whom has followed professional wrestling over the last decade would know who James Yun is. He is one of only a handful of Asian American professional wrestlers and undoubtedly is most recognized as the WWE character Jimmy Wang Yang that he portrayed from 2006-2010.

The veteran wrestler has wrestled for practically all major North American promotions during his career including WWE, WCW, TNA and ROH.

HalfKorean.com Interview with Meg & Dia Frampton
It was actually perfect timing for us to interview sisters Meg Frampton & Dia Frampton of the indie rock band Meg & Dia, as it wasn’t much more than a month after we published the interview that Dia would be seen competing on the inaugural season of NBC’s The Voice.

Although Dia did not win the competition, she was runner-up and gained huge amounts of exposure for not only herself but her band, Meg & Dia. Our interview didn’t contain anything related to The Voice but we could sense that they had something big planned for the future.

We were also able to touch on Meg’s side endeavor that she had just debuted, the Chandler the Robot jewelry line.

HalfKorean.com Interview with Michael Horton
Hip hop recording artist Michael “Maniac” Horton (매니악) has been steadily rising in the Korean hip hop/rap industry. He spent some time with Korean group UPT (formerly known as Uptown) after already gaining a solid fan base from his work with underground Korean crews such as Jiggy Fellaz.

He clicked with fellow UPT group member Snacky Chan and together they left UPT in late 2010 to set up their own duo, New Dynasty. Their first album, Body Language, released last May.

HalfKorean.com Interview with Tony Rutland
Pro basketball player Tony Rutland was someone we had been trying to interview for some time and we were finally able to connect in 2011.

He had played basketball worldwide including one stop in the Korean Basketball League (KBL) in 1998. At the time of our interview he was not playing professionally but was considering making a return to the KBL as an “ethnic” player.

HalfKorean.com Interview with Scotty Curlee
The interview with Scotty Curlee was interesting as he is a movie director and producer whom jumped into the entertainment industry with no prior knowledge or background.

He had left his lucrative career in the pharmaceutical industry and decided to jump full force into the faith-based film industry in 2007. His very first feature length film, The Potential Inside, was an award winner and played at many worldwide film festivals throughout 2010-11 and was released on DVD in April 2011.

HalfKorean.com Interview with Greg Pak
Any comic book fan will recognize Greg Pak‘s name as he has been writing for Marvel Comics since 2004 and has worked on characters such as Hulk and Magneto.

Along with comic books and graphic novels, he is a highly regarded film director who has done many short films and also the 2003 feature film, Robot Stories.

Greg can be seen at numerous comic conventions and events as he is a frequent featured discussion panel guest.

HalfKorean.com Interview with Marja Vongerichten
Our interview with Marja Vongerichten was probably my personal favorite of 2011 as we were able to discuss so much about her interesting life.

Not only was she putting Korean cuisine on the culinary map as host of the new PBS TV series Kimchi Chronicles, but she had a fascinating and compelling personal story that we enjoyed learning about and presenting with the interview.

Kimchi Chronicles is still airing on PBS so make sure to check your local listings if you haven’t seen an episode yet!

HalfKorean.com Interview with Priscilla Ahn
Priscilla Ahn had been one of the most requested interviewees that we’ve had over the years, so we were thrilled when we were finally able to secure an interview with her.

When we talked with the singer-songwriter, she had just released her second full length album, When You Grow Up, in May and was in between tours and promoting the album.

HalfKorean.com Interview with Safiya Johnson
We finished up the year with an interview with professional fitness competitor and model Safiya Johnson.

She competes in the bikini division of the International Federation of Bodybuilding (IFBB) and is the younger sister of veteran fitness competitor Tanji Johnson.

At the time of our interview, Safiya had only recently switched from IFBB Fitness to IFBB Bikini (in 2010) and had been an IFBB pro since 2008.