Shimizu Saki Also Has The Flu

According to an official announcement by H!P, Berryz Koubou captain Shimizu Saki has also been infected by the influenza virus, a store visit on 10/18 will be postponed as a result. This makes her the 5th Berryz Koubou member to get infected, after Momo, Miya, Maasa, and Risako.

At this rate I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that Chii and Kuma have gotten sick too by tomorrow. And even though it is slightly sad to see them all get sick so soon it might be better for them to all get sick at the same time since they already have a week free to rest and it would mean that they would all get back near the same time.

For now only Berryz Koubou members are catching the “Berryz flu” so hopefully it doesn’t spread to other members of H!P and they all take precautions.

Hope you get well soon Captain, Momo, Miya, Maasa, and Risako!

Official H!P Announcement Regarding Captains Flu

Korean Auditions Start Today UPDATED

Well actually by this time they started some time ago, but it still is March 9 where I am posting from so I will rely on that. I wasn’t going to post, but because I partly forgot that they were going to start today I decided to post it as a reminder, here is a quote that is flying around the various H!P fansites:

“H!P (Hello! Project) will be hosting a Korean Audition Show to be aired on Mnet, looking for new members this Spring (some of which can possibly end up in Morning Musume, who is also performing at the AX convention in LA in July!

Morning Musume also had a concert on June 1 in Korea at the Olympic Hall in Seoul too (Jessica, Tiffany, Taeyeon, and Sooyoung of Girls’ Generation / SNSD attended the concert). Sooyoung was actually a part of H!P’s parent company when she lived in Japan.

H!P originally planned to launch this audition for last year after they held their concert but negotiations with Mnet fell through.
They did go through with a Taiwanese audition TV show from which a new all-Taiwanese group, Ice cream Musume, was formed and is promoting both in Taiwan and in Japan.

Berryz Koubou (a group in H!P) performed at the 2008 ASF and won an award for Asia Newcomer along with SHINee.

The leader of Berryz Koubou (Saki Shimizu) and the leader of C-ute (another H!P group, named Maimi Yajima) are heading to Korea on March 9 to start the auditions.

They’re an open audition which means ANYONE can apply”

Source: AsianFanatics (thats what they are credited for on some sites)

As I mentioned some time ago, H!P already had a Korean member, but she left and went back to Korea, and from what I read in the translation she is probably SooYoung (not sure on this). I’m not sure what “ANYONE” means, but it probably means girls only, I don’t think Tsunku is that desperate (at least for now). So expect to see video of the auditions sometime on the Hello!Online trackers and some fansub groups might translate (not likely though). Tsunku’s Asian domination continues…

LINK (The page of the TV station that’s broadcasting the auditions, apparently they are called “Asia Super Girls” for some reason)

UPDATE: Here are some pictures from when Tsunku, Shimizu Saki, and Yajima Maimi arrived in Korea. Shimizu looks extremely good, completely different from her Dakishimete Dakishimete “tough-guy” look; Yajima looks kinda short for some reason, but she still looks cute. Tsunku……looks scary as always, anyways here are three pictures, not much of an update to deserve its own post. And the official name of the audition is “Meet Tokyo Girl”, which sounds kind of wierd, considering that the girl that’s going to get picked is from Korea.

PIC SOURCE: Stardust

Shimizu And Yajima Going To South Korea To Announce Auditions

Long title huh? I have a girl in a class that looks like Shimizu….

Anyway according to JPHIP:

“Shimuzu Saki and Yajima Maimi will visit South Korea on March 9 to officially announce the “Hello! Project South Korea Audition”.
The audition is organized by Korean music entertainment enterprise Mnet Media and Up Front Works.
The South Korean member(s) selected in this audition will have thorough Japanese style training as a member of Hello! Project, and will be given the chance to debut in Japan.”

Source : tiny @ JPHIP

So Shimizu Saki and Yajima Maimi will go to South Korea and just announce the auditions which were silently revealed through various forums, and on here. This isn’t that big of a news, the only thing that will get on Hello! Online’s new’s page is when the winner(s) are announced, so don’t expect to see it on H!O that soon. But it is good that they will actually go to Korea for members, because H!P has only had one member, who left H!P to “continue her studies” (got tired of not getting picked on any popular groups and wanted to return home, not true but that is the fan interpretation).

This is a great thing and a bad thing, great because H!P will expand slightly more (Tsunku’s Asian Domination) and bad because most H!P fans will start crying over her being Korean and H!P being Japanese, remember the “discussion” JunJun and LinLin created? Some H!P fans are not that considerate of people being put into H!P from other places, so I hope this helps them keep quiet and understand that H!P is expanding and they are not going to stay the same forever.

Anyway’s enough ranting, by the way expect the Alo-Hello! 3 review sometime on saturday and sunday, it is going to be in majority pictures so basically I’ll make it so that non-H!P people can understand it, I will probably have to put another section for reviews. Shimizu and Yajima good luck in South Korea!