Korean study blog for my help and yours. Korean grammar and vocabulary posts as well as interesting cultural knowledge!
Games are always a favourite of mine to post about and share with everyone, and I have found another that I really like! Noun Town is a game that focuses on teaching many different aspects of language through gaming. In a 3D isometric world, you get to explore and literally add color back into the town by learning new things. The game is available in a lot of languages: Spanish, French, Japanese, Chinese, and of course Korean!
Whether you’re worried you will offend or want to impress people, learning Korean etiquette and the dos and don’ts is important! Because of Korea’s unique culture, they have their own etiquette rules and guidelines. Though typically, if they can tell you are a foreigner, Koreans will go easier on you and not expect you to know everything while visiting, so don’t worry about remembering all of these right away!
I have covered a bit of these in the Korean superstitions post a while ago, such as the superstition around putting chopsticks in rice and how it’s become very rude to do. But today I’m going to dive deeper; from food and drinking culture, to daily life, hierarchy, and more.
Starting off strong is etiquette related to hierarchy! South Korea has a big focus on hierarchy; who’s older, more experienced, higher position, etc., and so a lot of cultural rules stem from that.
Tea is a classic drink with a long history, and Korea is no exception. Today I’ll dive a bit into the drink with vocab for the different kinds of tea in Korean, Korea’s culture and history with tea, some Sino-Korean, and more.
Korea has a rich tea history and culture that goes back over 2000 years! So I won’t be going fully in-depth on it all, but it will be just a nice overview to introduce the culture a bit.
The 만 grammar particle is a great piece to add to your vocabulary! Emphasize and clarify by adding ‘just’ or ‘only’ to your sentences with this simple particle. I’ll go through some quick examples as well!
As in English, Koreans can also change where ‘only’ is placed to change the specific meaning of a sentence. ~만 can be placed attached to the subject or object of a sentence and replaces the usual particle that would sit there (so for a subject: ~은/는, or for an object: ~을/를). To quickly explain:
I’m here with a very interesting cultural post by request! Jeju’s Haenyeo (해녀; lit. sea women (海女)) are specialized female divers who earn their livelihood by diving without breathing equipment for abalone, conch, oysters, sea urchins, and more. And have been mastering the practice for multiple generations!
Pluralizing a word/item isn’t as tricky as you might expect! Using 들 Korean plural particle can help you express multiples and emphasize the amount as much as you want.
There are 2 main ways to make plural words in Korean. First is by simply adding a number; for example “가방 두개” (lit. bag 2) simply translates as “2 bags” without the need to add anything else to pluralize it.