As I wrote before, I am really having a great time exploring this city.  I keep finding awesome things to do; I keep meeting awesome people.

I’ve started a Korean language club.  I found some other people interested in studying, and we have started to meet and practice Korean!  So far it’s just been once, but it will become a regular thing.  I’ve made a blog to complement this group, you can find it here:

http://portlandkorean.wordpress.com

Contrary to what you may think, I am still alive.  I am also still in Seoul.  I just haven’t been blogging so muc here. I have been doing it here.  Also, I feel like there hasn’t been a whole lot of things to say over the past fe months.  My life has been pretty consistent recently.

Anyway, I do want to spend some time talking about the recent protests here in Seoul.  Perhaps you heard about them.  If not, read this.  It will bring you up to speed in a very fair way.  The most recent news is that the South Korean presdident has agreed to some of the citizen’s demands.

The recent protests mentioned have been quite a spectacle.  I have dozens and dozens of pictures that will eventually make it on my my flikr site.  I’m also working on a video to share some scenes from a recent march and to translate some of the picket signs I collected.  Look for that in the next few days or so.

Anyway, comments make me feel loved, and probably encourage me to write more. (hint, hint)

In some respects, Korean is the easy way out when studying an Asian language. Chinese has those dreaded “tones” which for a non-musical guy like me are really scary. Then there are the thousands of pictograph characters that must be learned. They aren’t letters. Japanese also makes use of the Chinese characters in a major way. Japanese is further complicated by having 2 completely different “alphabets” that are mixed along with the Chinese characters.

To the untrained eye, a Korean sentence like “제가 사과를 좋아해요” (I like apples) looks incredibly daunting, it really isn’t. Chinese and Japanese have a huge barrier to being able to read. Let me betray a secret of Korean: Learning to “read” is really quite easy. Understanding what you read is of course another matter….as it is in any second language. But in Korean, because the reading barrier is so low, one can easy move on to meaning, and the arch nemesis of grammar!

In middle school I studied Latin, which according to Mr. Dare (yes, that is really his name) is responsible for some 65% of English words. So, knowing Latin can really help improve your English vocabulary. Of course Greek also influences English, especially in science and medicine.

The relationship is similar between Korean and Chinese. 70% of Korean is derived from Chinese, and therefore, understanding some basic Chinese characters can really improve your Korean vocabulary. So I’ve bought a new book aimed at helping foreign learners of Korean master 500 of the most common and useful 漢子 in Korean.

You probably aren’t as excited about this as I am, but that’s OK… this is my blog after all.

I’m having dinner with a former Korean teacher tonight.  When I see him, I almost always learn something new about Koreans or their language. See this post for what happened last time.  I’ll let you know what happens.

Oh, and for what it’s worth, here’s another video, this time starring some kids from the orphanage:

If you go to the actual  YouTube page you can find a rough English transcript in the description.

You already know that I live in Korea. You probably know that I am working hard to learn the language. But you might not know how easy it is for you to get started learning the language! Visit KoreanClass101.com for a wonderful Korean language podcast. I feel like I’ve seen every website there is for learning Korean – and this is absolutely one of the best. It has been in full production for just a couple months, so it is easy to get started and up to speed. The staff is very helpful in responding to comments and questions, and there is an active user community in the forums to support your learning. If you want to learn Korean, this is a great tool to add to your arsenal.

Perhaps the best feature is that you will learn about standard and intimate politeness levels early on! Many textbooks, and some classes don’t bother to teach you the common everyday Korean. You will really hear Korean as I do in Seoul!

They asked me to join their blogging team, so from time to time, you can read about my linguistic and cultural experiences with the kids at the orphanage there.

With as much Korean as I speak, I don’t really have any funny stories about using the wrong word and embarrassing myself. I do have one…but it is really rather bland. I’ll tell you about it and then share another funnier story about some other poor foreigners language faux pas.

I was in the kitchen of the orphanage one day searching for some chopsticks, so with my hands in the air I asked:

“손가락 어디에 있어요!” (son-karak awdi-ay ess-aw-yo
Which got a big laugh from the cook. It was then I realized I had really asked:

“Where are my fingers?”

You see, fingers is “손가락” (son-karak) and chopsticks are “젓가락” (cheot-karak)

Silly me….

But at least I’m not this guy:

A friend of a friend (OK, I know that’s lame..but the story is good) who was pretty new to Korea, and had gone to the grocery store in search of some salsa and chips. One thing that foreigners learn quickly is that there are a lot of Korean words that have been borrowed from English. So if you don’t know a particular Korean word, one possible solution is to use the English word, and it just might work. Especially if you pronounce using Korean pronunciation rules.

So, the guy finds a store clerk and proceeds to ask for the salsa. But he doesn’t speak any Korean, he pantomimes dipping chips into some chips into a bowl of salsa, and he says “SALSA, SALSA!” The clerk gave him a mortified look.

In Korean what he was saying was really “설사” (sawl-sa) Precise pronunciation is really very important in Korean, as s slight vowel change can completely alter the meaning. He learned that lesson. In English, it might be sawl-sa, or sall-sa, etc. In Korean it is ONLY “살사” (sall-sa) “설사” (sawl-sa) as it turns out is diarrhea . Notice the difference?! It’s really slight! So this poor chap thought he was showing the clerk dipping ships into a delicious crushed tomato sauce, but he communicated a very different message!

One of the blessings of being in a foreign land, surrounded by a language and culture you don’t share is the bliss associated with not understanding peripheral conversations. Although I know a fair amount of Korean, and can have conversations about “real” things, I rarely find myself understanding the people I pass on the street.

In a way it gives me a great excuse for ignorance. I can sit in a meeting at school, and not worry about what was said unless someone feels the need to translate for me.

This also means that when I overhear an English conversation, it is almost impossible NOT to eavesdrop. A few months ago I heard some other foreigners talking about taking a trip to Thailand, and one guy was whining about how he didn’t know what to do in order to get to Thailand. I really wanted to say: “Use the internet you moron!” “Call a travel agent you imbecile!” But of course, I really just had to mind my own business…

As far as the Korean I hear on the street, it is really very different from what I read in books or am taught in class. The real spoken language is another beast altogether. And since I have no context for their conversation, I find it really hard to parse what they are saying. However last night I wasn’t even thinking about it, and I heard this simple exchange. It actually caught me of guard, and I didn’t realize I was understanding anything until the 4th line, so the middle two I’m kind of guessing about.

Girl: 어마, 내일 오빠의 생일이야? (Mommy, is tomorrow big brother’s birthday?) (Koreans often refer to each other by titles, rather than names, even if speaking in the second person)

Mom: 맞아 (Yes)

Girl: 몇번 (Which one?)

Mom: 여섯번 (His sixth)

It’s the little things like this that tell me I am making progress.

If you’ve been wondering what my Korean sounds like, I just made this video. Of course, it is always interesting to hear your own voice….especially in another language. And it is a good learning tool.

At any rate, I hope it says something like:

Hello everyone! My name is Austin, I’m 26 years old. I came to Korea from America to teach English. I teach at an elementary school. The students there are very smart and cute.

I have lived in Seoul for 1 year. During that time I’ve been studying Korean very hard, but it is difficult. In my opinion, speaking seems to be the most difficult. So I made this video. Actually I’ve never listened to my self speak Korean before. I really want to practice pronunciation.

Thank you.

UPDATE:

You may not be able to tell, but I can see now that I really need to work on my accent! The pronunciation is OK, but there’s plenty of room for growth. The good news: one of my students just told me that I only made one mistake (the equivalent of saying “Me” instead of “My”)! That’s encouraging!

Do yourself a favor and click this link. It’s a flash animation of a popular Korean kids song. If you happen to be studying Korean, you’ll even be able to find a bunch of other songs on the Yahoo site. They are great study tools. Don’t worry, you’ll be able to get the gist of the meaning just from watching, but the translation is important for the cultural insight I picked up today.
My little brother is a curly-curly haired brat.

He only has one true name, but he has a few nicknames

Mommy, she calls him honey pigDaddy, he calls him toadI call him prince

Which one is right? I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know.

It’s important to know that this song is written from the perspective of a big sister. When I first saw this, I wasn’t 100% sure of all the words, but I new enough to guess based on the pictures. And the last nickname I assumed to be prince, and not princess. This of course makes sense to my American mind, where sibling rivalry is the norm, especially between two young children of the opposite sex. I’m not sure what it says about Korean culture… if it reinforces the rather misogynistic status quo, or if it is just a positive example of sibling love. I an imagine the silly kids song in English that would have the same happy big sister thinking she was so clever to call her little brother princess. ( I should point out that the link I sent you is a different version from the one I saw, where the boy really does look dressed like a princess during that line.)

The second verse repeats the first half, but goes on to elaborate just how special this little brother is:

He’s a healthy “honey pig” that eats well

He’s a kind hearted and happy (plump) toad

He’s a wise and brave prince

Which one is right? I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know.

I actually didn’t know about this second verse until today which really prompted these thoughts. Again, I’m not sure what it really says about Koreans, but I am struck by what I see as glaring differences in what an American English song would say.

In other news, this week is the big biennial “Mass Games” put on by my school. Pictures to come sometime this weekend.