Until last year, I’d listen to One Direction. And then I was like, ‘What are you doing, Maahi? You should have gone the other direction?’” jokes 11-year-old Maahi Mukherjee, who is on the phone with us from Kolkata, where she is spending her lockdown. Mukherjee got introduced to Korean band BTS, only in 2020—a fact she regrets. But, she’s glad she joined the Adorable Representative MC for Youth (ARMY), which is what BTS fans call themselves. Don’t ask us what it’s supposed to mean, because we don’t have a clue. But pre-teens everywhere are hooked. 

In fact, when this writer tried to decode why the band is such a phenomenon—their album, Map of the Soul: 7, became the first album in the world to surpass four million sales in 2020—she failed miserably. They are known to sing about mental health, positivity and the power of loving yourself, but how can one understand any of that, if they don’t know Korean?