Park Yoo-sik (Kang Ki-young)
Young-joon’s best friend

Kim Mal-hee (Heo Soon-mi)
Mi-so’s second sister

Kim Ji-ah (Pyo Ye-jin)
Yumyung Group secretary

Yang Cheol (Kang Hong-suk)
Yumyung Group secretary

Jung Yu-mi (Jung Yu-mi)
Young-joon’s childhood friend [E14]

young Kim Mi-so (Kim Ji-yu)
Mi-so at 5 years old

FILMING LOCATIONS: OVERVIEW

PYEONGTAEK[평택시]

— AK Plaza — Pyeongtaek Store [E12+16]

SEONGNAM [성남시]

The essay book Every Moment Was You.Recalling Our Twinkled Nights Dreams Loves [모든 순간이 너였다] by Ha Tae-wan [하태완] (published by South Korean Wisdomhouse Publishing Co. Ltd) is Mi-so’s favorite book, containing all her dating romance, as she says. Later on, the book that Young-joon finds “childish” at first, becomes the most appropriate way to express how he feels toward Mi-so.At Forest of Wisdom [지혜의숲] in episode 4, Mi-so reads one of her favorite parts of the book entitled ‘You’ve got to date someone like this’ to Young-joon: “I want to be in the kind of relationship,” she reads, “Where I feel like the tiredness of my day gets washed off just by hugging you once, even if you don’t make my heart flutter every second.“

In the evening, still in episode 4, Young-joon sits at home, and reads another part of the book: “In this heavy and confusing life,” he recites to himself, “While you deal with your business, you wonder what they are doing all of a sudden, and think of the person first instead of yourself. That’s enough of a reason to call it love.”

In episode 11, Young-joon again, reads in the book at his home library and this time the following part — which is probably the best summary of his love to Mi-so and of this drama in general:

My every moment was you.
When I loved,
and also when I was in pain.
Even at our moment of farewell,
you were the whole world to me,
and every moment was you.
Without you,
I don’t think I can explain the story of my life so far.

“Would you like to have ramen?” In Korea, there is a deeper meaning to that seemingly innocent offer of instant ramen/ramyun (라면) to a guy or girl. In episode 5, Kim Mi-so (Park Min-young) invites Lee Young-joon (Park Seo-joon) to stay on at her place for ramyun — which, in Young-joon’s words, is ‘instant food full of chemical additives’. Both think it is totally normal, till they understand the ‘real’ meaning behind it.

Park Yoo-sik (Kang Ki-Young) explains it to Young-joon like this:
“When a woman says: ‘Oppa, would you like to have some ramen?,’ that means: ‘When you have this ramen, we are dating.’ It’s the same thing as saying: ‘I like you.'”

He continues explaining:
“Ramen is just an excuse. When a man and a woman are in a closed environment, you want to hold hands, and you want to hold each other.”

META REFERENCES

Because This Is My First Life

Jung So-min and Lee Min-ki, the main couple of Because This Is My First Life (directed by Park Joon-hwa), appear as Mi-so’s parents in an episode 10 flashback.

Another Miss Oh 

When Young-joon decides to stay over at Mi-so’s place in episode 12, she suggests watching TV to relax. Upon turning on the TV, however, the first thing they see is the hot kiss in Another Miss Oh, and a flustered Mi-so immediately changes the channel.

Another Miss Oh and Why Secretary Kim share the same production company, Studio Dragon.

AWARDS

Park Seo-jun won the ‘Rising Star Award’ for his lead role in Why Secretary Kim at the 13th Asian Film Awards (AFA13) on March 17, 2019.