Rain (Real name: Jeong Ji-Hoon, Hangul: 정지훈, Hanja: 鄭智薰, born on 25 June 1982 in Seoul) is a male Korean R&B and pop singer. He has become well-known throughout East Asia -- including Japan, Hong Kong, Korea, Taiwan, Mainland China, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand -- as a leading star of the Korean wave, otherwise known as Hallyu. He has been called the "Asian Usher" or the "Asian Justin Timberlake. In April 2006, Time named him as one of the people who help shape the world. Rain became interested in R&B and Hiphop dancing when he was in 6th grade. He was a member of a boyband called Fanclub. After the group disbanded, Rain was still keen to continue his dancing career and entered many different auditions. Despite his talent, the singer was rejected at several auditions because he was "too ugly". In a CNN interview, he recalled one incident where he was told, "Your dancing is great, but we're rejecting you because you don't have double eyelids"[4] Finally, Rain entered an audition for a Korean entertainment company, JYP Entertainment. Park Jin Young, JYP's CEO, became interested in the entertainer and took him under his wing. During the early years of training, Rain was a backdancer for both Park Ji Yoon and Park Jin Young, who is also known as JY Park.[5] Finally, in 2002 he debuted with the album Rain, where he was introduced to the media through his stage or commercial name, Rain. In the album, a similarly-named single Bad Guy was a big hit. After his first album, he took time off from his career as a singer to star in the drama series, Sang Doo! Let's Go To School. Following the success of his debut as singer and actor, Rain released his second album How to Avoid The Sun, and had another hit with the title song "Ways to Avoid the Sun." In 2004, he starred in another successful drama called "Full House", which would be one of the highest-rated Korean dramas of all time with ratings of over 30% for every episode.It would air in many other countries including the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Vietnam, China and Japan. Through Full House, Rain gained fans across Asia. His performance in the drama also won him the Best Actor Award at the KBS Acting Awards.
