Jaejoong opens up about his past relationship, revealing that he almost married his ex-girlfriend

On the latest episode of KBS’s "Stars’ Top Recipe at Fun-Staurant", legendary idol Jaejoong made a surprising confession.

Jaejoong began the episode by visiting his parents’ home, where he discovered that their refrigerator was nearly empty. He decided to make nabak kimchi for them, and soon, the conversation turned to family life.

Jaejoong revealed that his nephew’s family was expecting a child soon, and joked that that would make Jaejoong the “first idol grandfather.” In response, Jaejoong’s mother brought up Jaejoong’s dating life: “I wasn’t going to bring this up, but shouldn’t you start thinking about getting married soon?”

Jaejoong suddenly made a surprising confession: “I really did have a girlfriend.” Jaejoong’s mother jokingly asked if he was just talking about his fans, but then said: “Is this the girlfriend who came to our house once?”

Jaejoong answered that it was. “We even had a formal introduction between our two families. But I was very young then, only in middle school.”

Jaejoong revealed more details of how he and his ex-girlfriend had met: “At the time, the Internet had just been invented, and Windows had been released in Korea. So we met through online chatting. We exchanged pictures, and we developed feelings for one another, so we decided to meet in real life. I went from Gongju to Daegu just to meet her… She looked exactly like her photo.” Jaejoong shared more details about their first date, saying, “We went to an amusement park for our date. Then we ended up saying a tearful goodbye at the end… At the time, we still felt romantic and hopeful.”

Jaejoong’s mother mentioned that although things didn’t work out with Jaejoong’s ex-girlfriend, “She could still reach out now.”

Jaejoong just laughed, saying, “Can we stop talking about marriage now?” His mother answered, “What else can you talk about with a 40-year-old bachelor, other than marriage?”