If you’ve learned some words associated with school or education like 학교 you might have noticed the reoccurring 교 theme, that’s because a lot of school and educational words use Sino-Korean!
This one will be a 2 for 1 deal – there are two different Hanja that are pronounced 교 and both used for educational terms:
校: more specific to the school and environment
敎: related to the education process
I wanted to do a quick post about this while chatting with my boyfriend about AI. We wanted to test and how well it could translate something so I specifically put the sentence “I’m going to my house to see my brother” into ChatGPT (free ver3, not the latest paid ver4). Not a complex sentence, but it tests 2 things about Korean, and it gave me:
“나는 내 집에 가서 내 동생을 보러 갑니다.”
Which is wrong and awkward. ‘Brother’ is really just a trick though, 동생 doesn’t work if you’re speaking about an older brother, 형 if you’re not male, etc. But the real test was ‘my house’ in a 1 to 1 translation 내 and 집 would mean my house. But for a lot of things Koreans don’t say 내 they say 우리.
One great tip for practicing and learning Korean on your own is using your phone AI like Siri to practice Korean! With Ai assistants for modern phones you can switch it to accept Korean (or even be bilingual and accept English and Korean) and practice some commands or fun questions and answers. It can be a nice listening and speaking practice whenever you like or if you feel less confident in your pronunciation right now.
Round two of Korean drinking culture! In the first post I got into all the hierarchy, rules, and culture in different areas. Now let’s get into the more fun and relaxed part with all the Korean drinking games, slang, and more.
Drinking is a big part of adult life in Korea, and comes with some very interesting rules, games, tricks, and tips to surviving the Korean adult world.
Korean drinking culture really takes off in university where many clubs, groups, and majors will have special events centered around drinking with your peers. Then it continues into working life with bosses/managers and other higher ups pressuring teams to drink a lot or go for multiple rounds.
A key thing if you want to visit South Korea is knowing some basic directions in Korean to get around so let’s get into it. Asking directions in Korean is vital to avoiding becoming lost and also can be key to discovering some interesting spots you would of never would have found yourself!
방향: directions
지도: map
직진: straight
왼쪽: left
오른쪽: right
저쪽에: over there
A lot of fans dream is to use Kpop to learn Korean, and while obviously that’s not entirely possible it can certainly help. One of the first phrases I learned was “머리부터 발끝까지” or “from head to toe” because someone pointed out how common it was in songs and it stuck out!
So with that in mind I wanted to use many peoples introduction to Korean as a study asset! This is gonna be pretty easy mode so only lyrics that get repeated so its easier to pick up on and remember.
I’ll use a variety of songs; from different years, genres, and artists so everyone can find something they like and will become an earworm teaching you some Korean words/phrases.
One of the most common beginner questions is “Is Korean an easy language to learn?” while Korean definitely isn’t the easiest language to learn, it’s also not the hardest out there! I’ll get into the 2 main parts; the writing and speaking because both of them have their own characteristics.
Wanted to get started on Korean? I talk about self studying over here and give some nice resources to help you make the first steps.
Let’s go into emotions in Korean and how to describe your feelings. There’s not too much to say about this and I don’t feel like dragging it out and meeting a seo word count… Of course you already know why it’s important to know how to express yourself so let’s just get on with the list.
I’ll list out all these terms in the neutral dictionary forms, so depending on the formality you might swap out the 다 ending for 요 or 입니다 when using these words. Need help with formalities? Here’s my post breaking them down a bit more and when/where and how to use them.
감정 emotions
기분 feeling
느낌 feeling/vibe
Luckily its easier now more than ever to learn how to self study Korean and develop into near fluency even by yourself from your own home. As Korea and the languages popularity has increased more and more resources are coming up and places to connect with others along your studying journey!
I want to break it down into bits; depending on how you want to study and avenues to use. I know people have different levels of comfortability and preferences so while you might enjoy a 1-on-1 zoom teacher session other people might feel uncomfortable. But I’ll keep it to all things you can do on your own in your room!
