S’poreans showcase K-pop moves, recipes, pets in bid for glory on popular video app TikTok

SINGAPORE — It has become the birthplace of many internet memes and content creators are flocking to the app hoping to be the next viral sensation.

TikTok — a video app which features an endless scroll of bite size clips typically about 15 seconds long — is the latest social media platform that has captured the world’s attention.

The app was one of the most downloaded apps in the world in 2018 and has 680 million monthly active users worldwide.

The social media giant also announced the top 30 finalists from Singapore, who will be competing with 150 other creators from the region in TikTok All-Star Southeast Asia 2019.

 

The competition drew over 302,000 submissions from across the region. Those clips have already garnered half a billion views. After several rounds of public voting, the winners are set to be announced on Sunday (Dec 1).

TODAY spoke to some of the Singapore finalists to find out more about the draw of the app and the inspiration behind their content.

1. Superoll_

Alicia Wong, 23, and Sarah Swee, 25, who go by the username “Superoll” may have joined TikTok only two months ago, but their videos — which feature them imitating popular K-pop dance moves — have already amassed close to a total of 200,000 views.

The two lifelong K-pop fanatics made the decision to hop onto the app after their idol, South Korean rapper J-Hope from the boy band BTS, started the “Chicken Noodle Soup” challenge and invited fans to copy his dance moves and share the results on TikTok.

“We had already started dancing together by then, so we thought why not just create an account and maybe J-Hope will like our video?” Ms Swee, who works at mixed martial arts organisation One Championship, said.

Though J-Hope did not see the video, the duo’s dance moves did not go entirely unnoticed — their #cnschallenge video has been viewed more than 30,000 times and has received 1,600 likes.

“Every time we refreshed the page there were thousands and thousands more views on the video. On the ‘discover’ page, our video actually had the ‘hot’ logo and it was quite high up on the ‘challenge’ page,” recalled Ms Wong, who is in her final year at university.

The discover and challenge pages are both features on the TikTok app.

When asked about how they have taken to overnight internet stardom, the pair said that they were genuinely surprised by the overwhelming response to their videos.

“Actually we were quite surprised that we even made it to the top 30 round in Singapore (of the TikTok All-Star competition). But we are just glad that we found a passion and a hobby that we can pursue together,” Ms Swee said.

2. Zatayayummy

Though Mr Chua Zong Han has been sharing his recipes online since he was 15, he made the leap to TikTok only two months ago, where he goes by the username Zatayayummy.

With more than 46,300 subscribers on Youtube and 9,100 followers on Instagram, he wanted to reach out to a different demographic.

Mr Chua said: “Personally I actually have been looking for a platform like this for a while now, and since TikTok allows me to do that, I get to share my videos in bite sized pieces.”

From butter cakes to pineapple tarts, the 21-year-old full time national serviceman – who aims to be a full time recipe content creator later on – learned how to bake his first cake from watching his mother before venturing online for recipes.

Mr Chua Zong Han, 21, attracts a wide audience to his TikTok videos featuring recipes. Photo: Najeer Yusof/TODAY

His transition to TikTok was seamless. he said. “Food is really just a language itself, you see it and you like it.”

He said: “Prior, my viewers were mostly aunties. But on TikTok, there are a lot of the younger ones, secondary school students who want to learn baking and who want to know more about baking and they just got started.”

Having only been on the app for two months, Mr Chua was surprised to become one of the 30 finalists in Singapore, for the regional round of TikTok All-Star Southeast Asia 2019.

When asked about what winning would mean to him, he said: “I have actually never thought about winning the competition because this was something my friend asked me to join. I was like since I'm doing the videos then I will just join the competition and try it out.”

3. Miss Fuji

She documents and edits TikTok videos of her two-year-old Shiba Inu, a Japanese breed of hunting dog, as a way to relieve stress from handling family matters. The dog’s name is Miss Fuji.

Housewife Raine Pok, 40, left her job as a freelance television producer and coordinator to look after her son and mother.

Ms Pok said: “Right now, I'm not doing anything because I have a son and he has some handwriting problems. So my time is now spending more with the kid and my mum is also sick… So this is a way to relieve stress.”

A dog lover, Ms Pok had five dogs over her lifetime before Miss Fuji and felt something in her life was amiss without a dog.

“I felt I was lacking something, I missed the touch of a dog. But my husband wasn't ready to have a dog. So only when my kids were older, then he felt that we could maybe accept a dog and the kids will also enjoy it,” she said.

Ms Pok believes that Miss Fuji has a very unique charm, which is the reason why her viewers just can’t get enough of the furry animal.

She said: “She is actually quite real like she can just lie there, sleep in a very awkward position and some people will find very cute. It is very real. The dog is not always pretty and perfect because on TikTok I think the difference is you can celebrate a certain uniqueness.”

Ms Pok believes that Miss Fuji has grown more comfortable in front of a camera since they’ve started using TikTok.

She said: “I'm happy doing what I'm doing now, because she used to be a very skittish dog. So she has come a long way from the time when I first took her back. She was very frightened and a bit bitey as well. But now she has really toned down.”