Cultural Post #3 (113)

[Jeffrey Choi]

I taught one of my non-Korean housemates 7 common Korean slang words. I noticed that these words are very common in normal day-to-day conversations, so if my friend were to ever interact with Koreans and use the appropriate slang word, he would be praised. Koreans love it when a non-Korean speaks Korean. I think the lesson was overall effective. I didn't use too many words so he was generally able to recall which word to use in the correct context. There were a couple words where he got confused on which to use. This was because the meaning can be somewhat similar. For example, daebak means "that is crazy!" and jjang means "awesome." I didn't really know how to discern the differences between the two. There is a gut feeling I get that helps me pick which one to use in the correct context. I didn't know how to explain this gut feeling to him. Overall, it was a fun and enjoyable time for both of us. It was great that I was able to have my friend exposed to my culture.