Before becoming Lisa - one of the world-famous K-pop stars - Lalisa Manobal was once a Thai girl who dreamed of standing on stage.
That journey brought her to Korea at the age of 14 and also opened up a meeting with three people who later became indispensable members in her life: Jennie, Jisoo and Rosé.
In an interview with Vogue Korea in September, Lisa recalled her early years at YG Entertainment. After participating in the audition, she and her mother were advised to change their name to a name with better energy.
From Pranpriya Manobal, she changed to Lalisa - a name meaning "praised person" in Thai - then shortened to Lisa.
In 2011, Lisa came to Korea to start her training process and became YG's first foreign trainee. At that time, she knew almost no Korean and had to learn everything from scratch. However, the desire to become an artist helped her overcome many challenging days.
Also in that first year, Lisa met Jennie - the first member in the group who later became Blackpink. Thanks to her good English skills, Jennie helped Lisa get acquainted with the new environment and guided her on many things in life as well as the internship process.
After Jennie, Jisoo joined and quickly became close to Lisa. Notably, language barriers could not prevent the two from connecting.
When Lisa did not speak much Korean and Jisoo almost did not use English, the two still found ways to communicate. Lisa even recalled that they had very deep conversations.
About a year later, Rosé appeared and became the last piece of the group. Having in common that both had lived in foreign environments, Lisa and Rosé quickly found a connection. Lisa likened the relationship between the two to being so close that it was "like twin sisters".
The years of practicing and growing up together have created a special bond between the four Blackpink members.
For Lisa, Jennie, Jisoo and Rosé are not only teammates but also friends who have accompanied her from the early days until she became an international star.
