SEOUL, South Korea (AFP) — South Korean pop icon Rain announced his engagement to top actress Kim Tae-Hee in a handwritten letter to fans Tuesday — but said their wedding would be low-key given the country’s economic and political woes.
“I am going to be a good husband and man as a head of a family,” the 34-year-old said in the letter, posted on his Instagram feed.
“She has always been by my side through the hard times and the good times,” he said, referring to the actress two years his senior, who has a massive following in Asia.
The celebrity couple first met while shooting a TV commercial in 2011 and began dating a year later.
Rain, whose real name is Jung Ji-Hoon, is one of the biggest names in the world of K-pop, which commands a huge following in South Korea, across much of Asia and beyond.
He has also starred in several South Korean TV dramas and Hollywood action pictures including the Wachowski brothers’ “Ninja Assassin” and “Speed Racer”.
“Regarding the time and the wedding ceremony, we plan to keep it as quiet and holy as possible during the current unstable national mood and economically difficult times,” he said.
The couple are expected to wed at a Catholic church in Seoul on Thursday with family members in attendance as the bride-to-be is a devout Catholic, South Korea’s Yonhap news agency said citing industry insiders.
The singer was confined to barracks for a week in January 2013 for sneaking out to meet Kim while performing his mandatory military service.
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