Daybreakin Things

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In fact, Korean is very difficult to learn for foreigners. But don't panic! ;P This series would introduce you to be able to imagine just how Korean looks like. (Of course, I'm not a professional teacher, so I can't educate you formally.)

NOTE: This series may have faults. If you find them, please report me by commenting.

Syntactic Features of Korean Language

Korean is very different from most European languages such as English, German, and Swedish. Theoretically, Korean is one of agglutinative languages which attach various affixes to words for grammatical purposes. This phenomena can be extensively seen in Korean verbs and nouns followed by postpositions (also known as particles).

Also the syntactic structure of sentences is very different. English uses <Subject> + <Verb> + <Object> order typically, but Korean uses <Subject> + <Object> + <Verb>. Omitting the subject or objects is more frequent than English. When we decorate a noun with relative sub-sentences, English uses the order of <Target Noun> + that/which/who/whom/etc. + <Sub-sentence>, but Korean uses <Sentence ending with a verb changed into adjective form> + <Target Noun>. Korean does not exchange the subject and the verb when making questions, just changes the form of the verb. These features make many Korean people to be confused with learning (especially speaking) English-like languages because they have to think in a different order.

Korean Characters

Korean characters are very special in the point that the designer and the design philosophy are explicitly known. In the long history of Korea, there were some attempts to represent Korean sounds with simplified Chinese characters like Japan, but the final one is our current Korean characters invented by the King Sejong (세종대왕; 世宗大王), and announced in September, 1446. He named it 'Hunmin-jeong-eum (훈민정음; 訓民正音)' that means the right characters teach people widely. Despite of his effort, Korean character set was not generalized (especially for official documents) until 1894's 'Gap-oh Gaehyeok (갑오개혁; 甲午改革)'[footnote]a large renewal of Chosun's law and system conducted by the King Kojong[/footnote]. In the 1910s, a Korean researcher Sigyeong Ju (주시경) named it 'Hangul (한글)'. Actually, we had more sophisticated pronunciations and tone variations like Chinese at one time, but they were disappeared about a few hundreds years ago. You can see traces of old Korean pronunciations at 'Hunmin-jeong-eum' here, and some symbols of it are obsolete in modern simplified Hangul.

Unlike Chinese characters, Korean characters represent the sounds of Korean. One character is one unit of pronunciation (called syllable or syllabe block), and each character must have at least one vowel. For example, an English word 'Carlos' which has 2 vowels is written (actually, approximated) as '카를로스' which has 4 syllables and 4 vowels, because we have to write vowels for single consonants sounds such as a sound between 'r' and 'l', and also 's'. Thus, 'Ca' -> '카[Ka]', 'rl' -> '를[Reul]', 'lo' -> '로[Ro]', 's' -> '스[Seu]'. (Note that 'r' in Korean pronunciation is not same to 'r' of English. It's something between 'r' and 'l'.)

Korean characters consist of some basic components (called 'Jamo (자모)' in Korean). Those jamos resemble the shape of our tongue when it sounds for each jamo. We combine them to make a syllable, which is the basic unit of pronunciation. If you want to know more details about jamo symbols, combining rules, and their pronunciation table, refer related articles of Wikipedia. (I think they explain better than I.)

The exact number of all combinations of modern jamos is 11,172. If you want to see the complete list of modern syllables, you may consult the Unicode 5.0 Hangul Syllables table. However, the number of most common syllables for the real life is about 3000, and also we don't memorize all syllables because we can make any sounds via combining basic jamos.

Korean computer keyboards have 2 sets of symbols for consonant jamos and vowel jamos, and are called 'Dubeolsik (두벌식)'. There is another kind of keyboard layout called 'Sebeolsik (세벌식)', which separates consonant jamos into two groups of first sound and ending sound. The printed symbols of typical Korean keyboards are dubeolsik. It is harder to learn sebeolsik because it has more keys to remember, but that layout is closer to the design principle of Hangul. You can see the keyboard layouts for various languages including Korean in this page.
The combining feature of Hangul greatly improves the input speed especially for cellphones. English cellphones usually use their own dictionaries, but Korean cellphones don't need dictionaries.

Pronunciation Features

Compared to English, Korean has less kinds of consonants and more kinds of vowels. It does not have 'z', 'v', 'w', 'f', 'r', 'th' sounds. In spite of more kinds of vowels, some of them are usually abbreviated to easier ones. These facts makes English pronunciation of some Koreans look very strange. These pronunciations were disappeared with their corresponding obsolete jamos.

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I will introduce some basic greetings in Korean at the next time. More details of syntax and vocabularies will be followed later.


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오늘은 한국을 비롯한 중국 등 음력을 사용하던 동아시아 국가의 최대 명절 중 하나인 설날이다. 이쪽에 중국계 교환학생들이 많은 관계로 역시 Chinese New Year Party에 관한 소식을 많이 들을 수 있었다. 그 중에 어제 파티를 했던 Jiang Hua네 그룹에 끼어서 같이 요리도 하고 밥도 먹고 실컷 놀았다.
Today is one of the biggest holiday in Korea, China and some other eastern Asian countries which use the moon calendar, which is the new year day called 'Seolnal' in Korean. ('nal' means day, so we also call it just 'Seol'.) Because there are many Chinese exchange students, I could hear news about Chinese New Year parties. I attended to the one that Jiang Hua joined.

어제는 가톨릭 달력 상으로 재의 수요일이었고, 그 전에 갔던 성당이 가톨릭 성당이 아니었기 때문에 진짜(?) 가톨릭 성당은 어떤가 하고 찾아가보느라 재의 수요일 미사에 갔었다. 이번엔 제대로 찾아갔는데, 확실히 이쪽이 우리가 아는 가톨릭 미사의 예식에 더 가깝기는 했다. 우리가 흔히 유럽의 성당을 상상하면 생각나는 뾰족뾰족한 고딕 양식의 그런 성당이 아니고 굉장히 현대적인 공간이었는데 겉보기에는 그냥 스톡홀름 사진에 나오는 그런 건물들 같으나 속에 들어가면 꽤 큰 공간을 만들어서 미사 집전 공간으로 사용하고 있었다. (오히려 개신교에 속하는 루터교 성당이 전통적인 성당의 모습에 더 가깝다.) 내가 본 것 중 인테리어가 대칭적이지 않은 첫번째 성당이기도 하다. 나중에 기회가 되면 사진을 올릴 생각.
Before going to the party, I went to a mass in the Catholic church (St. Eugenia Kyrka) at Kungsträdsgatan for the Ash Wednesday. This time, it was more closer to the original Catholic than the last time at the Lutherian church (St. Jakobs Kyrka). The building was not a kind of some Gothic-style that is most common imagination of us when we think of European churches. It was a very modern place in a usual Swedish building. (Interestingly, that Lutherian church which is a protestant church is more closer to our imagination.) The interior design was not symmetric, that is first time to see for me.

다만 미사가 모두 스웨덴어(....)였기 때문에 'father' 비스무리하게 '하느님 아버지'를 지칭하는 말 말고는 도대체 한 마디도 알아들을 수가 없었다; 게다가 내가 숙제 때문에 10분 정도 늦게 들어갔는데, 입구에 성체를 놓은 바구니가 있길래 뭔가 하고 보고 있으니 옆에 있던 스웨덴 아줌마가 손짓으로 먹으라는 듯(?)이 하길래 뭐지 이러면서 먹었(.....)는데 알고보니 그게 아니고 옆 바구니로 옮겨서 인원수 파악하는 용도(.....)였던 것이다. 미사 중이라 소리내서 물어볼 수도 없고 해서... 성체를 두 번 모시고 말았다. (........) 아무튼 미사는 잘 끝났다. 정확히 7시 0분에 끝내주시는 신부님의 센스.
한국과 달리 헌금을 내는 순서가 없었고 신부님과 수녀님 외에 성체를 나눠줄 수 있는 권한을 가진 사람들이 한국에선 죄다 머리 희끗한 아저씨들이었는데 여기는 전부 아주머니쯤 되는 여자분들이었다는 것, 또 성체 대신 포도주를 마실 수도 있다는 것, 파견성가 전에 공지사항을 이야기하는 순서가 없다는 것 정도가 달랐다. 아, 여자들이 미사보를 쓰지 않는다는 것도 있다.
However, I had some troubles there. Of course, the whole mass was given in Swedish, so I could not understand anything. Even worse, I did take the eucharistic two times, because an old women signed me to shift one to another basket for counting people, but the sign seemed like taking it for me. (I couldn't ask her because it was silent mass time.) Anyway, the mass was over at exactly 7 o'clock.
The differences were that there was no money contribution, that all eucharistic distributer except the father was women, that we can choose wine as eucharistic, no notice announcement time, and that women do not put on
velums.

아무튼 미사가 끝나고 나서 이것저것 음식 재료를 챙겨 Jiang이 있는 동의 5층 부엌으로 갔다. 벌써 다들 중국 전통 요리를 만드느라 정신이 없었다. 동일이와 나는 딱히 한국 전통 요리를 할 만한 재료도 없고 방법도 몰라서(...) 김치볶음밥을 하기로 했다. 사실 만두는 중국에서도 많이 먹는지라 얘네들이 만두를 엄청 많이 만들어놔서, 가래떡만 있으면 떡국도 가능할 것 같긴 했지만 일단 패스. 근데 요리를 시작하고보니 동일이 이 녀석이 여기 와서 요리 한 번도(........) 안 해봤다면서 칼질하는 게 영 불안해보이는...-_-;;; 나름대로 중학교 가정 시간에 열심히(괴롭게) 외웠던 지식들이 도움이 되어 무사히 꽤 맛있는 김치볶음밥(...)을 만들 수 있었다. 중국 음식은 워낙 많이 해서(특히 만두) 많이 남았는데 우리가 한 볶음밥은 거의 딱 맞게 다 먹었다. (중학교 때 가정 배우면서 이런 데 와서 써먹게 될줄은 정말 상상도 못했다. 이런 게 새옹지마라는 건가.)
After that, I arrived at the party place with some food, where Jiang was. They were already cooking their traditional Chinese dishes, including 'Mandoo(만두)'. Dong-il and I didn't know how to cook Korean traditional dishes and didn't have suitable materials for those, so we cooked a 'Kimchi Bokkumbab (김치볶음밥)', which is an oily baked mixture of rice, kimchi, some small-sliced vegetables and some other things(?). Surprisingly, Dong-il have never cooked anything since he came to Sweden, so his using of knives seemed unskilled. But fortunately, my knowledges learned at a course about home stuffs(...) at the middle school helped us to make it successfully. (Actually I hated that course very much at that time.)

대충 열명 넘게 모여 있었던 것 같은데, 다들 밥을 배부르게 먹고 돌아가면서 새해 덕담도 한 마디씩 하고 이런저런 게임을 했다. 007 게임이나 눈치 게임 같은 것은 그냥 그러려니 했는데, 얘네들이 갑자기 'the killer'라는 게임을 하자길래 뭔가 설명을 들어보니 '마피아' 아닌가. -_-;;;;;; 무려 영어로 하는 마피아라...;; 시작하자마자 첫날이 밝기 전에 밤에 마피아가 한 사람을 죽일 수 있다든가 하는 식으로 규칙이 살짝 다른 것들이 있긴 했지만 그 외에는 거의 똑같았다. 도대체 이 게임 누가 만들었길래 중국 애들도 하는 건지는 모르겠지만 아무튼 그쪽에서도 꽤나 유명한 것 같다.
There were more than 10 people. Ending the dinner, we began saying some well-wishing remarks for the new year and playing games such as 007-game and 'Noonchi(눈치)' game. I was surprised when I knew Chinese also play 'Mafia(마피아)'. -_-;;; We had to play it in English. There were some small variations of the rule, but it was almost same to Korean's. I wonder who made this game and how it is distributed to China.

게임도 끝나고 먹은 거 정리도 다 한 다음 삼삼오오 모여서 이야기를 하는데, 내가 간단한 한자어들을 중국어로 어떻게 발음하는지 같은 걸 물어보니 신기해하면서 나보고 한국어도 조금 알려달라길래 '사랑하다'의 동사 변화를 설명해주었더니 다들 안드로메다(......)..;; 일본어나 한국어와 같이 동사 끝 어미가 그처럼 다양하게 바뀌는 언어가 사실 세상에 별로 없으니 신기할 만하다. 똑같은 긍정에 똑같은 시제를 가지고 있다고 해도 '사랑해', '사랑해요', '사랑합니다', '사랑하십니다', '사랑하지요', '사랑한다', '사랑하세요' 등등 엄청나게 많은 변화가 가능하고 특히 항상 존댓말과 반말을 따로 구분해서 말해주니까 그런 점도 재미있어 한다.
We talked together in some groups after games. I asked pronounciation of simple Chinese words, and they were amazed by that I knew Chinese characters. I also taught some Korean that is variations of the verb, 'Saranghada(사랑하다)', which means 'love'. They said it's very interesting and difficult to remember all variations. I think it's because there are few languages in the world, which have many variations of verbs even though they have same tense and meaning.

그래서 결국 결론은, 파티는 즐거웠다는 것이랑 이 블로그에 간단한 한국어 강좌(......)를 올려주기로 했다는 것.;;; (...먼산)
Anyway, therefore, the conclusion is the party was very fun, and I decided to write Korean lectures on this blog. (...)