This is my final biweekly blog post of the semester and I am happy to say I have made a lot of progress based on my lesson plan and what I hoped to accomplish. I have decided to stick with just my diary entries that I do twice per week and rewrite with corrections afterwards. I have done this in writing via iPad and sending it back and forth through and app that I can save the progress and have my tutor Rachel correct and this has improved my spelling and grammar. We also go over during lessons the common errors she has noticed in my entries and other collection of difficult diphthongs and common spelling mistakes that are made in Korean and that has proven to be useful. Sometimes I feel frustrated when I realize how many spelling mistakes and grammar errors there are in a single entry, which aren’t small, but rather couple of paragraphs so they are sizable and many corrections needed to be made, but as I progressed and throughout the semester, the number of corrections have gone down in number. There are still a lot of errors as I try to incorporate newer and difficult words and grammar, but I also try to include older words that I have messed up before so that I can practice spelling and using those words and the different grammar forms. This helped in my daily life such as writing and texting my family and friends in Korean. I have become more confident in writing and even if I make a mistake I like to think of it as a learning opportunity. I had a moment in November and until today in keeping up with my diary entries due to health issues and being ill, but overall, I think I did my best in keeping up with the diary entries and my penmanship has greatly improved as well as a result of writing by hand and I recommend anyone who is learning a language that has written form to practice writing it in hand and it helps to commit the mistakes and corrections to memory a lot better and also helps penmanship in that language. I learned that penmanship in different languages are also at a different level. I am proficient in penmanship in English as I am used to the stroke movements in English, but in Korean I have poor handwriting because the strokes and movements are unfamiliar to my hand, but I have been improving since the start of this semester! So this is a side effect of my lessons and practice that I didn’t expect, but am extremely happy with. My family had commented my progress and improvement in texting and writing and I am happy to say my lessons and practice have paid off. I think later when I continue to learn and continue my progress in learning Korean, I will choose to practice daily, in smaller increments in an efficient way instead of cumbersome multiple long sessions of practicing and learning. I learned that smaller and frequent practices and in depth is better than trying to bite off more than I can chew. Also, making a conscious effort to challenge myself in that time period I am practicing like I did with repeating words I have gotten wrong before or grammar and also trying newer words and grammar forms are a good way to always learn new things and get better all the time. And so the journey does not stop there! 

Hello again!

I have been doing well in my lessons and have kept up doing the diary entries twice a week and sometimes I forget to do an entry or two but so far I have been doing well in doing my entire and corrections, most importantly, since as I stated in a previous blog post that the corrections is what truly helps me to remember my mistakes and to prevent me from making the same mistakes. I have learned that the activity sheet booklet proved to be inefficient since most of which contained content I was very well versed in and had simple fill in the blank grammar and vocabulary and to be honest, the diary entries worked better by itself since I wasn’t hard pressed to complete my tasks and rush anything and thus get subpar quality in writing or not enough. I decided to focus just on my diary entries and corrections and I noticed I make a lot of vowel errors and diphthongs in Korean and I decided to use words that contain that more often so that I am more exposed to making errors and thus make corrections to them and then learn from my mistakes. I confuse the different “e” sounds in Korean and it is confusing for me sometimes and it is something that one has to memorize when they learn Korean, but thankfully I am slowly getting the hang of things, but like I said, diphthongs are difficult for me to “sound out” thus I try to use new ones every entry and think of more words like them to write out and try my hand in spelling it correctly. Thus far everything has been working well and I am happy with the progress that I made!

I’ve been continuing the diary entries (twice a week) and then having it corrected and rewriting the corrections to commit them to memory still. It has proven to be a useful way to learn for me and especially the rewriting part. I noticed that not rewriting the corrections don’t help and it doesn’t commit the errors and corrections to memory if I don’t do that. As I have predicted, I dropped doing the vocabulary and I picked up doing activities to help my penmanship in Korean such as writing by hand and retracing the alphabet and my penmanship has gotten better and more legible. I have started doing activity sheets on top of that as well and I want to see how well I manage to keep this up. I might have to reduce the load of how much I do, because it is a lot. But I will continue to do my diary entries so I predict that the activity sheets might have to come to a halt or at least reduce the number of pages I do. It has been gratifying to see my progress and my recognition in corrections that were made before and prevent me from making the same mistake again. I hope to be able to continue doing so and so far I am happy with the progress I have made.

I decided to come with a plan for learning written Korean better and I decided with my language partner Rachel and who is also my tutor to write diary entries twice a week and then have it corrected and then rewrite it corrected and then write new diary entries as well the following week. It has been working well and I have learned spelling and grammar a lot better now than before and common errors and being fixed. I have also been doing vocabulary tests and memorization, but I think next time I post I might have dropped that lesson because my Korean vocabulary is pretty sporadic and random and I know certain difficult words and don’t know some simply vocabulary, so it is inefficient to try memorize and paw through all the vocabulary that I might not know. I’ve been excited in writing Korean and I write it by hand since I have to truly know the spelling without spellcheck. I feel like the spellcheck makes it easier to not remember the spelling of the Korean words so I try to write by hand on my iPad and then send it to Rachel and have her correct my entries and then I rewrite the entire thing. Hopefully, this strategy continues to be successful!

Hi~ 

So my cultural presentation is on the Korean traditional garment called Hanbok, which is this gorgeous light weight, multi-layered, loose type of garment that was worn in Ancient Korean Era. I talk about the different meanings of different styles, and style changes over time and the different classifications of the Hanbok and how it ties into my target language itself and the culture nowadays. 

I didn't know how to cut the zoom recording to just my own cultural presentation so I have uploaded the entire zoom session of that class time! Enjoy~ And thank you for tuning in!

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1PFZJ3Dz8NUFTcCdJyhXFE7ZPVjmLTETk/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1If7vYQ-xjzuhQ-NqGPc5Dh9SJOZt4pMH/view?usp=sharing

Korean art is explored through many ways and art itself communicates the things of pertinence and importance of the era. Though a small country (of its own right), Korea had made its mark in the world of pottery. They date back when there were just brown pots of clay all the way up until there is white porcelain or paekcha, which was first developed in the Joseon Dynasty.

The prehistoric pots of Korea in the Neolithic period were just brown bowls that were flat or had a pointed base and had different incisions and decor made of cuts and they show a distant relation to the Lianing province and the Liaodong peninsula of China. The different pottery designs of the prehistoric pottery were commonly zigzags or parallel cuts which were given the name chulmun in Korea. 

Later on, the pottery becomes more undecorated, but the pottery itself becomes thicker in material and there is a more variety in shapes and this also allows for different utilities of pottery: steamers, bowls, jars, pots, kettles, plates etc. It might be because decoration does not allow much utility of pottery itself that there are less decorations. There is definitely more clues of influence of China, therefore Korea and China must have had contact at that point in which the pottery showed signs of similarity in motifs in the design and make of pottery.

More later on in age, the Korean pottery is more gray and has more cuts for decoration once more (it’s making a comeback!) and close hatching style. A typical pottery of this age is the round bottom jar and it has small handles on the neck. There is signs of advancement in pottery at this age and they are becoming more skilled and paving the way for the Three Kingdoms Era pottery.

The high-fired gray stoneware was prevalent in Baekje, Gaya, and Silla kingdoms and the most popular were the stemmed cup, bowls with wide stands (kobae), long-necked jars (changgyong ho), horned cup stands (kurut pachim) and more. The ceramics at this age are more elaborate and elegant and fine in detail. Technology was advanced enough to support such fine pottery and therefore one can infer there is advancement not just in pottery, but likely in all aspects, and it can be inferred that literacy increased at this point, but at this point, the Korean language itself hasn’t been born just yet, but this will pave the way for the government and the kings and citizens to thirst for their own language of their own as they pave their own culture and pottery. 

In the Goryeo Dynasty, the celadon ceramics were produced and it was regarded as the finest and most elegant pottery at that era. They were first produced in China, and at this point it is known that China and Korea has contact and influence one another, but more often than not, China has more influence to Korea at this point than anything else, but Korea adapts the pottery style and designs to their own liking and taste.  Korean pottery weren’t the finest, but the Korean celadon later were even finer than those of China. The popularity were proven by themselves in the tombs of royals although the Mongols have ruined most of the Korean celadon ceramics made of that century. This paved way for the Buncheong Wares and these were blue-green ceramics covered with a white slip. They were similar to celadons but later, they proliferated to have their own regional twist and idiosyncrasies. The shapes include mahyeong vases, which are bulbous vases with tall necks and cylinder flasks with a single top spout and a flat turtle-shaped bottles with a small spout. 

A by-product of the buncheong was the maksabal which used clay that was not good enough to be used for buncheong. They were considered low in quality, but another way to do pottery and art. It was also a good common vessel for function. They were used for storage (onggi) and they stored food and pastes, and soy sauce. They were often buried underground aor even used as bathrooms.

Now fast forward to the Joseon Dynasty, we have the white porcelain which is much more durable and perfected and whiter than any other Korean ceramics and became popular even in China.

Language and speech and communication itself is made through air and there are many things we can do with air and airflow. One of them is speech and sounds and articulating through with words and sounds. There is another way as well.... Which is music and tones and songs with or without music. 

Korea has a lot of traditional instruments, but a very few instruments take center stage in the Korean music scene and popularity and still remain pertinent to this day. 

The gayageum is a traditional Korean instrument that is in the zither class, which just means that they are stringed instruments that are in the family that consist of many strings stretched across a thick and flat body. The gayageum itself has 12 strings usually though it has been modernized to have 18, 21 or even 25 strings. It is one of the centerpieces of Korean traditional instruments and is fairly well-known. It is the most well known of the traditional instruments and is the sound that people seem to think of when thinking of ancient Korea. It’s thought to have been derived from the guzheng and share similarities to the Japanese koto and yatga (Mongolian) and many other instruments.

The gayageum can be found in literature as far back as 1145, in the Samguksagi, in the history of the Three Kingdoms of Korea and it was developed in the 6th century in which King Gasil after he saw an old Chinese instrument (believed to be the guzheng). The original name of the gayageum was gayago or gayatgo and later was changed to the name it is today. The gayageum was later improved during the reign of Jinheung in the Silla Dynasty. The first gayageum had many names: beopgeum, pungnyu, or jeong-ak gayageum. The gayageum is usually accompaniment for other music acts or as a background music, for the court and chamber and other lyrical songs. 

The gayageum evolved later in around the 19th century with the emergence of more melodic music which is more improvisational and faster in tempo and this version of the gayageum is more prevalent in modern day than the older version of the gayageum. The traditional gayageum’s strings are made of silk and some of the newer gayageums use nylon strings.

The modern gayageum has a lot more strings than the older and more traditional versions of the gayageum. There was an introduction of nylon/steel strings instead of silk strings and brass strings have also been introduced to make a louder sound. 

The implications this has on my target language is that the evolution of the instrument itself is very analogous to the change in the target language as well and the culture. There is a sense in wanting to preserve its nature and its’ beauty and the its’ own flare of its own culture (even though it may as well be derived from another country and culture) of Korea that is very reminiscent of the language as well. There is this tension between constant change and a sense of preservation and pride in their roots and the want to also spread its’ branches.

Korean cosmetics has always been highly esteemed and it’s quality is renowned. It’s been like that for ages and its selfcare has been imbedded in the Korean culture for eras. This emergence of popularity of Korean cosmetics has purged due to technology and social media, but it has been emerging as a prominent forefront of beauty standards.

The use of cosmetics in Korea has been observed around the time of the Ancient Chosun era and they used accessories and ornaments and embellishments and cosmetics to show their social and governemental positions and religious piousness. They valued fair skin as it showed that they were of higher class that did not require physical labor outside in the sun in which they had to toil. The observable start of “cosmetics” was the application of lard to the skin to prevent frostbitten skin as well as to moisture skin as well. It served essentially as a balm. This was Ancient Korea’s emergence into the world of cosmetics.

There were steps taken to maintain fair skin and among them were eating mugwort and garlic for 100 days.

In the Three Kingdom’s Era of Korea, Goguryeo favored a round face with thin brows and hairdressing. The hairdressing was in fact an influence that Goguryeo had from China. After a certain point, most people regardless of class and status were into cosmetics and beauty. There were murals dated back to Goguryeo that depicted how the women who were noblewomen and maids were and how they fashioned themselves and how they did their makeup. The painting showed that they had their hair done up and combed in a comlex up-do while they had thin eye-brows and had blush and or rouge on their cheeks in circle right at the apple of their cheeks and had thin and round rouge on their lips as well. 

Baekje didn’t have explicit record of the cosmetic trend of its’ people. But it seems that Baekje had influence on Japanese cosmetics and makeup techniques and Japan already had started making makeup and advancing their cosmetics, it would seem that Baekje must’ve had at least the same caliber and advance technology to produce the cosmetics that would later influence Japan. There is a clue that Baekje people wore a lighter makeup style than usual which might be another clue that they indeed had advanced cosmetic technology to allow a sheer look and a more natural look instead of the exagerrated look of thick and heavily colored cosmetics. Baekje also saw hairdressing and makeup as a sign of status and most people who were of a higher status usually used cosmetics. 

The Kingdom of Silla held beauty to high esteem and they seemed to have highly advanced cosmetic manufacturing and makeup technique. Silla also seemed to influence Japan due to proximity and trading with each other. 

Later, Korea became affected by the Chinese cosmetic style and manufacturing that the style then adapted to a more extravagant and elaborate style. The Goryeo dynasty had a more advanced manufacturing of cosmetics and less extravagant style than when the Chinese style was adopted. 

The Joseon Dynasty adopted a more demure style of fashion and makeup, but this didn’t mean that the manufacturing of Korea slowed or reduced, but instead the cosmetics were seen as important with a different light and perspective. The everyday look was more natural and sheer in look and the heavy thick makeup style was reserved for gisaeng, court ladies and musicians. It is said in an ancient book of an ideal Korean woman, that women’s makeup has around 18 kinds of cosmetics and makeup tools. There was already “salesmen” for the production and sale of these cosmetics in the Joseon Dynasty which suggest an emergence in industrialization of cosmetics.

April 25

As of now, I've come really far in my spelling and speaking less awkwardly and using less incorrect phrases/words. I still find writing my diary entries everyday and not forgetting really hard, but I try make up for it and do my best to catch up. I still haven't memorized my keystrokes just yet, but I'm hoping with more practice, I will. Even typing in English is sometimes difficult and I don't think I fully memorized that one just yet either and still have to take a glance down occasionally! But I have become way better at reading, as I practice reading with subtitles on and I try to keep up with the speed that the people speak (reading pace) and it is difficult and sometimes I have to rewind back, but I hope that with more practice, my reading will improve as well as my spelling, through reading a lot. I have noticed in my younger years that I learn a lot of vocabulary and spelling through reading and just by context and exposure to different vocabulary. So I hope that by exposing myself to more words and more Korean writing and speaking, I will absorb what I get exposed to. So I've been listening to a lot of Korean youtubers as well as reading blurbs and blogs and posts by Koreans as well as putting Korean video subtitles when I do watch the youtube videos. I also want to start reading manga in Korean and Korea has a big webtoon and manga culture so I hope to expose myself to even harder vocabulary than just the colloquial Korean that I listen and read to everyday. Certain words are hard to come by just small blogs and posts and everyday speech so I hope that by reading a variety of manga (with images for context to help clue me in on what the characters are talking about) of different genres I will be able to read actual books and expand my lexicon and will get a feel for how written Korean is supposed to look like. Currently, I've been told that I write like I speak, which is really informal, full of slang and written almost like texting a friend through social media or the phone, which is not how Korean is usually written on pen and paper. So in order to write a bit more formally and "correctly", I would like to see different sentence structures and how the "demeanor" is when writing and POV when writing as well. I would like to expand my vocabulary for sure and I would like to understand the standard writing style in Korean. My study session group still watches a show or two every week with reflections due by the next session and we also had a couple of cultural learning sessions that I really appreciated. We went over Korea's independence day and the meaning and how it came to be (a introduction/crash course of it) and the meaning and overview of South Korea's national anthem and the different verses and the culture and historical context of the song. I forgot to mention in the third blog post that we went over idioms and the meaning of the words specifically first, then the contextual meaning of the entire idiom as a whole and then how it came about and how it's used in modern times versus the origins and I thought that was really interesting and I could see the historical value and how that idiom came to be and how it applied to people of Korea back then and how it still has context to us now. 

March 28

I have a harder time keeping up with my daily diary, but I still try to write entries when I remember to since that itself is the hardest task! I'm keeping up with texting and typing in Korean when I can and I switched over from free hand writing and scanning the image and sending it to my tutor, to typing in Google Docs and then seeing how it auto-corrects my writing and then double checking that it is the correct word that I am going for. This enforces vocabulary AND spelling so I do like that I switched over and also it helps me get used to the Korean typing and I hope to memorize the keystrokes in Korean and I hope to quiz myself over it and memorize it so I'm not constantly looking down at my keyboard, but focusing on just my spelling accuracy instead multi-focusing on finding the correct keystrokes and also spelling accuracy. I took up reading small blurbs like instagram posts and facebook posts in Korean and texting my parents in Korean as well (I used to just read in Korean and text back in English, but now I am trying to text back in Korean as well). I also bring up Korean subtitles instead of English or if there is option for both, I try to read both English and Korean subtitles as it helps watching videos with subtitles and reading it in English helps expand my vocabulary while reading it in Korean helps with my spelling and knowing how a Korean word and sentence is formed. In our tutoring sessions, we have been watching a show weekly with writing reflections in Korean as well as writing diary entries every day in Korean and submitting it to our tutor. We have been talking in Korean as well and if we say something that is awkwardly phrased or grammatically incorrect, our tutor corrects us (me and my language partner, Rachel), but mostly it's just me being corrected! Hahaha! My strategies from last time such as typing into Google Docs and continuing to type in Korean has been going well, still struggle in them, but I am definitely making progress! It's definitely exciting to see the progress, and although I have a harder time seeing my own progress, I hope that I make a net movement of going forward!

This is written in retrospect, but at this time I recently got a keyboard cover with the Korean alphabet to help me type in Korean and it is a little hard in the fact that I'm not familiar with what letter and keystroke corresponds to which Korean letter. So I'm working on getting more familiar with typing in Korean and texting in Korean as well. I am also working on doing a daily diary that I later submit to my tutor, and she corrects it and hands it back to me and I try to form similar sentences with the corrections the next time. It was hard and frustrating at first (both the typing and the writing errors and correcting them and getting used to red marks on my diary), but later I got the hang of spelling correctly and writing a bit more neater. The typing is still hard to get used to though. I think going about it like the way I have been is helpful to me since I am well versed in speaking and conversational Korean, I think focusing on writing is best. 

https://www.ice.gov/news/releases/ice-returns-9-ancient-korean-artifacts-south-korea

Recently, the 9 of the Joseon Dynasty’s national royal seals were returned by ICE to South Korea. Of the nine, two seals of the Joseon Dynasty, the “Daegunjubo” was created in 1882 by the royal seal was made in 1740 and returned to the Cultural Heritage Administration (CHA). The emperor’s seal is classified by the CHA as a national treasure of South Korea.

The Daegunjubo is a “guksae”, and official state seal made in King Gojong’s rule. The royal seal is a ceremonial seal created during King Yeongjo’s rule and is called the Royal Seal of Hyojung. 

The Daegunjubo is a relatively small seal, measuring 7.9 centimeters in height, and 12.7 centimeters long and is a silver seal with turtle shape on top. The Daegunjubo is recorded as being called the “Gojung Sillok” (Annals of King Gojung), “Seungjeongwon Ilgi” (Diaries of the Royal Secretariat) and “Ilseongnok” (Daily Records of the Royal Court).

The Royal Seal of King Hyojung is a gold seal whose height is 8.4 centimeters tall and 12.6 centimeters long. King Yeongjo created the eobo, aka the royal seal, to present the title “Bright Righteousness and Correct Virtue” to King Hyojung in 1740 after King Hyojung died. It was used ceremonially for coronations of the king and queen and for something like an act of good deeds or valor. It is said that the eobo is enshrined with the ancestral tablet of the king or queen after their death to symbolize the continuity of the dynasty and the validation of the royal family. The eobo is also used in state affairs such as foreign diplomatic documents and in that case, it was referred to as the “guksae”. 

The eobo in documents was usually used for the king’s written orders of the day, which is called “Hongpae” and ‘Baekpae” and is like a diploma of passing the state exam for high ranking officials and “Yuseo” which was a written command for regional officials and so on and so forth. There were many written commands by the king, but it is rare to find a seal of the crown prince that writes commands in proxy of the king. 

On the Daegunjubo, there was an inscription that had “W B. Tom” on it, but it is theorized that it might have been a foreigner who got the seal somehow and then later inscribed his name on the seal. There was no prior practice of inscribing foreign languages on the seals so it is hypothesized that it was more of a “damage” than a true inscription, but otherwise, the both seals are in good shape.

In total, there were 412 guksae and eobo made in the Joseon Dynasty and the Korean Empire, but there are still 73 missing. A man named Lee Dae-Soo, a Korean-American had the two seals and decided to donate them to the CHA and the Korean government. 

The CHA made a statement saying that they will try to make sure all the missing artifacts of Korea return to Korea. 

The other five are signets of the Joseon Dynasty’s Royal Court. These signets were used to officialize books or paintings using these signets in the Joseon Royal Court.

My Learning Plan

Where are you now?  What can you do?  What do you know?

Use the Levels of Competence document and the LinguaFolio® checklists to assess your current abilities in your language.  For more information, see the SDLAP Wiki.

Interpersonal Communication  - B1

Interpretive Listening - B1

Interpretive Reading - A2

Presentational Speaking - A1

Presentational Writing - A1

What is your ultimate goal?  What is your goal for this semester?

What do you want to be able to do with this language at the end of this semester and in the future?

 I want to be able to write and type and understand professional documents and to understand a higher level of comprehension in Korean (ie political debates, national news).

 I want to learn proper grammar and syntax and more vocabulary and be able to read books of varying difficulty: easy fiction novels to in depth conversations with the author.

 I also want to be able to translate from Korean to English and vice versa in writing, and conversation and understand cultural aspects of Korea as well and certain differences between Korean-Americans and native Koreans.

What tasks will you complete and what activities will you do this semester to meet your goals?  How will you document and evaluate your progress?

Novice learners should consult the ‘Language Tasks’ page of the SDLAP Wiki and incorporate the required tasks in their learning.  Be as specific as possible when planning activities, e.g., “I will watch YouTube videos to learn how to talk about the family.” or “I will consult a grammar text to learn about possessives.”  Make sure you include some tasks that are relevant to your interests, e.g., “I will learn to understand soccer commentary.” or “I will learn to talk about the stock market.”  Culture and language are, of course, inseparable.  It is expected that all your language will be culturally appropriate and that every task will contribute to your cultural competence.

I am currently working with my tutor Somyung Kim and classmate Rachel in learning Korean. I am focusing on the written portion: grammar and syntax. I want to focus on spelling, vocabulary as well as sentence structures. My level of speaking and comprehension is at a B1 level. My writing and reading skills are more at an A2 level. I would like to raise those two things up to B2 and if possible, C1. 

I am currently working on a daily diary in Korean and getting those edited weekly. I also watch a show or movie and write a reflection of that in Korean. I plan on texting Somyung and my parents more in Korean than in English and they already text me in Korean so the reciprocating part is not a problem. I will try to speak only in Korean to my Korean classmates in SDLC and as well as Somyung. I will also write to them in Korean. I will text my Korean friends and family members more often and hopefully can get corrected and learn as a part of my daily life. I will try mock email Somyung an “official” email and letter as if in a company setting. I want to try reading children’s books in Korean, as in fictional books such as Harry Potter and gather new vocabulary words, but perhaps start off a little lower in difficulty. I also want to be able to translate from Korean to English and vice versa. I would also like to get culturally aware of Korea and learn Korean history as well.

I could do other activities as strategies to study language better such as making skits and or making a poem or song to help make it easier to learn or to challenge myself more. I could also try learning proverbs and idioms in Korean as a fun activity and translate the meaning. I could also get a rule to speak in Korean for a full 24 hours excluding sleep of course. 

A way I could see how effective my learning is and how well I am retaining the information and lessons is to assess myself after a week of these activities and challenges. Either done by my tutor or simply done by myself, but the questions provided most likely by my tutor. 

I will build on what I have already learned by reinforcing it by reading these books and then writing my diary and getting them edited and rewriting my diary with the edits and corrections. For my strategies, if I find that these activities don’t work, I will try the more traditional way of worksheets and workbooks and having them corrected by Somyung and redoing them until I get them correct by second nature. 

So far, I’ve felt embarrassment from not being able to just know Korean like the rest of my Korean friends around me. I feel a little frustrated with the lack of knowledge of writing in Korean and how long it takes me and how many repetitions of getting it wrong before I get it correct! I lack patience, I am aware, but I didn’t realize it took me this long to learn something as I am used to picking things up pretty quickly…

I’m so far successful in sounding comfortable in Korean, but in terms of writing and typing and texting I am not so good at it… Which is what I am primarily trying to work on.