https://www.reddit.com/r/AMA/comments/36a7gl/as_of_5132015_i_am_no_longer_a_trainee_at_sm/
He's the first one who have revealed so many internal affairs and trainee details that it created a fuss
He was a trainee from 2013 to 2015, he's half Korean and half American
his name is Neil Hannigan
(t/n: we'll only copy a few since there's too much content, you can find the rest in the link above!)
- How long was your training?
A little over 2 years, I started training April 27th, 2013.
2.Where did you audition?
SM Global Casting 2013 NYC
3.Why did you not renew your contract?
I'm tired and I realized I don't want to do this anymore.
Q: Were there any other reasons why you left S.M.? Was there any abuse?
A: One of the bigger reasons was, I didn't have a chance to debut with the next boy group.
Because of that, I didn't feel like renewing the contract because by the end of the second contract, I'd be 19-20 years old and I could have gone to college, get a job, you know, all the normal life stuff.
There wasn't any abuse, just harsh words from the people who taught us stuff if we didn't improve at the needed rate which was quite fast. The competition gets harder all the time, it's just work work work everyday and I started to think that it's not worth it.
Q: Did you get to meet any of the current SM groups? If so, who did you meet and how were they?
A: The current SM groups didn't really stop by in the whole 2 years i was there.
I was a trainee while Yeri from Red Velvet was a trainee too, the talk around was that she was really stressed out before debuting with RV.
I saw all the members of RV in real life, i never talked to them tho.
As I said, I saw a lot of newer group members, I saw almost all EXO members but I never really had a conversation with any idols, most of them are very self-involved from what I've seen and hard-working.
Q: what about the current trainees? We've seen them in the SM Rookies videos, so anything to expect from them? Also, any idea how many trainees SM currently has? We haven't seen that many SM Rookie girls, so I'm just curious .
A: 3 of all the trainees had the same contract expiration date as me (week, not the exact day) and I don't know for sure, but I heard that 2 of those also did not renew.
Basically SM is debuting a new boy group soon, and many of the guys didn't get picked including me, that's the biggest reason why I left, apart from not having contact with most of my friends back in New York and not having enough contact with my own family.
At the point when I left, there were a lot of trainees, about 40-50 in different buildings, girls and boys practice together.
There are many promising people, I thought I was promising too, but everyone is outclassing everyone, for example, I'm not very good at singing, I'm mainly a dancer so I didn't have a chance to debut soon.
Because of the high expectations and everything, there is a lot of underage drinking going on, we've heard of girls harming themselves and all that stuff. It's not the healthiest environment.
Q: What would the typical timetable/schedule look like/consist of?
Usually wake up at about 6, because we're young, we go to school first.
After school, we come back to the building, and everyone has a slightly different schedule because everyone has strengths and weaknesses.
For me it was usually like this :
6AM : Wake up, eat, shower, go to school
Then come from school, sometimes I could go earlier due to training.
Then it's usually about 2-4 hours of dance training, starts with a warm-up which lasts about 30 minutes.
Another 2 hours of singing, learning to rap in my case as I wasn't such a good singer, my pitch was unstable no matter how much a practiced.
That's about 6 hours of training there, we'll say it's about 8PM by now if everything goes "by plan".
I eat dinner, have about 1 hour of free time on my hands, which is usually spent practicing, no one really relaxes after the schedule.
We don't have to go to sleep at any fixed point, more practice the better, but I usually went to sleep at 11-12, sometimes 1 AM, so all of us usually got 4-6 hours of sleep a day, we also had to do homework.
Acting classes and language takes place in some days of the week not everyday.
Q:Was there a regulated diet that you had to follow?
Some had, some didn't.
I was pretty normal while I was 15, but for their standards I had to diet a little bit even tho I'm a guy.
I went to the gym, so that kept me awake a bit longer.
Now I'm quite used to eating less but my friends and family were/are worried but I'm ok.
I am quite tall (6'0) (184cm) and I weight about 140-145 pounds (64-67kg) and my BMI is almost on the underweight mark.
Q: How friendly were the trainees? Was it very competitive or did everyone have the "we're all in this together" vibe?
A: The trainees are friendly to an extent, and it was a we're in this together feel UNTIL there were any announcements for a group, hence the new boy group SM is getting (you've probably seen the dance videos, that's the guys), then everyone gets really competitive.
Q: What's the best and worst thing that you looked forward to and dreaded everyday in that 2 years?
A: The best thing I looked forward to was, just a good word to keep me driving forward, maybe some kind of guarantee that I'll eventually debut, which I had, but only if I renewed again, but this time for 4 years.
Q: Plastic surgery is quite prevalent in South Korea, which is fine. But when trainees or idols get procedures done, do they do it because they want to or is it done at request of the company?
A: You can do one if you want, and you can also get it requested, but you can say no if they just suggest you to do it.
If you are absolutely required, I think it's parents' consent under 18
post response:
[+651][-67]
original post: here
- ㅇ 2017.05.04 04:02
- Wow how did I focus on reading all of that. I've always had a bad image of SM but the more I read the more I started liking SMㅌㅋㅋㅋㅋThere's nothing unfair with them..The training teacher? He sounds like a real parent
- 2806
- ㅇㅇ 2017.05.04 04:32
- Why are people saying he got special treatment in SM when he suffered so much to debut?
- 27314
- ㅇㅇ 2017.05.04 04:13
- People keep saying that EXO got special treatment by debuting, but except Chen and Baekhyun, all of them went through all the steps of being a trainee ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
- 26315
- ㅇㅇ 2017.05.04 12:11
- They're cleaner than I thought ㅋㅋㄱIn the old days there were talks about trainees owning tons of debts to smaller companies so I was wondering how SM would fit in this, but they're better than I thought. They don't give up on their old trainees but send them to other companies to see if they can debut and give them another shot? I always thought that the big companies were always in competition.
- 1290
- ㅇㅇ 2017.05.04 11:31
- So that's why Seulgi always cries when she talks about her trainee life.. Even Suho he's always choking up when talking about trainee life..They're seriously amazing
- 1140
- ㅇㅇ 2017.05.04 04:04
- Suho 6 years... The trainees are seriously like the Maginot line... Seriously amazing
- 1001
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