A Love EXO-perience WiD.O. (With You)

For Life

D.O.'s POV

I haven't slept a wink for weeks now.

In between rehearsals with EXO for our comeback concert (we'll have 3 concerts in total - one in Asia, one in North America, and the final leg will be in Europe), 4 of us - ako, si Chanyeol, Suho, at Kai, ay busy kakapili ng participants for Project: Europe as was discussed to us during that meeting a few weeks ago.

Ano nga ba itong project na ito, you may ask. Well, a few weeks ago ay kinontak kami ng manager namin to get ready for a meeting. This meeting came as a surprise sa aming lahat, dahil we were in the middle of rehearsals at that time. Nakakapagtaka dahil first time namin iyon na magkasama-sama ulit na EXO members after a long time dahil iyong iba sa amin (like ako at si Xiumin) ay naging inactive dahil sa military enlistments at iyong iba naman ay naging abala sa mga solo projects nila, at iyong araw na iyon sana ang unang araw ng rehearsals namin. Napalitan yata ng alien itong manager namin, kasi hindi naman siya ganito, iyong makakalimot na i-remind kami beforehand kung may meetings or whatever. Either nakalimutan niya talaga (signs of aging), or sobrang importante ng meeting na iyon kaya walang oras na dapat sayangin.

In a nutshell, the meeting was about EXO penetrating the European market. Wala pa raw kasing K-Pop group na nakakagawa nun before, and our management company is bound to change that. Pinili kaming 4 among the 9 EXO members na magrepresent sa project na ito upon recommendation ng manager namin kung sino ang may alam mag-English. Although hindi naman lahat ng part ng Europe ay English ang salita, halos lahat sila if not all of them can speak the language. Naol. My English is elementary at best, pero a lot of people praise me dahil nakakaloko raw yung diction ko, especially when I'm doing English cover songs.

Anyway, the plan is to have a reality show which will be shot in different parts of Europe, which will last for a month. We each get to choose a "partner", or someone we will train and be trained with by vocal and dance coaches and eventually ay magpe-perform with us during our comeback concert. The target participants were women living across Europe between 18 to 25 years old, and they were asked to send a video of them singing or dancing or both. Ang daming magagaling na nagsend ng videos, some of them were even professionals who want to expand their audience market to Asia.

Nakapili na silang tatlo ng partner nila – from Spain (Kai), Germany (Suho), and France (Chanyeol). Very talented women, but very, very pretty and ultra sexy. Mga manyak eh.

I, on the other hand, am still taking my sweet time in picking. There were a lot of good choices, but I just don't see myself connecting with any of them.

"Come on, D.O., just pick one already so we can all move on," pagmamakaawa ni Suho. Nasa loob sila ng kwarto ko, and they were nagging me relentlessly na makapili na ng choice ko for the reality show.

"D.O., limang videos na lang 'to. Kahit sino na lang, please," pagmamaktol naman ni Chanyeol.

Kai, in my defense, retorted, "'Wag mo silang intindihin and take your time, D.O.. They just want to get it over with so they can meet their partners already."

"Nakakahiya naman sa'yo eh ikaw din naman atat na atat ka nang makita in person 'yung hermosa chica mo," Chanyeol cheekily replied. Tawa lang si Kai.

"Just play the videos already so D.O. can finally take his pick and WE CAN ALL FINALLY SLEEP," our leader Suho commanded.

Sunod naman kami agad. 4 video entries after, nawawalan na kaming lahat ng pag-asa.

"You can always re-watch the previous entries, D.O.," pang-aalo ni Kai. "I'm sure may runners up ka naman na sa isip mo. You can settle with one of them."

Dejectedly, sagot ko, "There's still one more. Tapusin na natin ito para makapili na ako finally."

Chanyeol pressed the play button.