(♀️, 20 years old) Freshman English Lit. Major at Hosu Women’s University
The mood-maker of room 207, home to a group of particularly unique young women, even for the occupants of the Hosu Women’s University dormitory.
The sight of her flitting about like a squirrel is adorable and endearing. That’s how much she enjoys living in the dormitory. She’s so, so glad to no longer be alone. Thanks to having passed around the ddeok her maternal grandmother packed for her on the day she moved into the dorm, she’s called the ‘daughter of the rice-cake shop.’
Her mother passed away when she was ten and, following a war with her new stepmother, she grew up in her maternal grandmother’s home in the countryside. Her father, who never once sought her out while she was growing up, even ruthlessly sent her brother off to the military when he was caught protesting! The father who treats them worse than a stranger would is seriously hateful. When she can’t hold back her loneliness, from time to time she sits alone at the window launching paper airplanes. The way her knotted heart comes untangled if she writes down her true feelings and sends them flying off as planes became her own private secret...
On the group blind date she goes on with her roommates she meets Im Soo-ho, a man who is good at origami, and ends up falling for him at first sight. She doubles down her courage and is the first to ask him out, but gets stood up. Afterward, she bears the hurt of lost love while kicking her blankets until one day, he’s forced to climb into room 207 covered in blood. Wanting to save him–despite the fact that if they’re caught one more time by Hall Director Pi all four girls will be in danger of being kicked out of the dorm–she persuades her roommates, hides him in the dorm, and proceeds to treat his wounds...
A few notes on the above:
- Official sources like the OST track have her university as HOSU WOMANS UNIVERSITY, but we opted for a more grammatical translation. The front gate has the hanja for ‘Hosu’ as (好秀), as well as the year 1885. No such university actually exists, but it’s inspired by Ewha Womans University, founded in 1886.
- Ddeok (떡) are, of course, rice cakes though I find this a misnomer for multiple reasons. If you watch dramas, you’re probably familiar with them, and the spicy street-food staple ddeokbokki. Wikipedia has romanized the initial double consonants as Ts instead of Ds, but it’s written with the blended d/t (ㄷ) instead of the purely aspirated t (ㅌ), which never doubles. Either spelling works, but pronunciation-wise, I think ‘dd’ is closer.
- By ‘protesting’ they mean taking part in the student demonstrations against the South Korean regime that held power at the time. Student protesters were often rounded up by the Agency of National Safety Planning (ANSP) and dragged off for questioning, torture, and even death. Her father used his political clout to get her brother forcibly enlisted instead.
- In modern parlance, a group date would be ‘sogae-ting’ (introduction + ting) but the word used here is ‘bang-ting’ (room + ting). This makes sense because it’s set up as a group date between the girls who share room 207 and the boys who stay at the Haedal Boarding House in Sillim-dong.
- In Korean, ‘ibul-kik’ (이불킥) is a coined word made from combining the Korean word for ‘blanket’ (ibul) with the English word ‘kick’ (kik), and refers to ‘a situation when someone lies on the bed to sleep, but suddenly remembers an embarrassing moment and kicks the blanket out of shame.’
- Young-ro’s original character name was actually ‘Eun Young-cho’ (은영초). In fact, the first couple of episodes were filmed using this name and later dubbed over. The change was made due to objections that it was a reference to real-life student democracy activist, Chun Young-cho, though the production company claims there’s no relation. Korean fans later commented that they were glad of the change, as ‘Young-ro’ sounds softer and suits the character perfectly.
- Her birthday is given as 28 March 1968.
You can find the original Korean on JTBC’s official website here.
All source materials belong to the parties to which they are licensed. All translations are our own.