During the past month I met my language teacher weekly. I wrote my weekly diaries and got corrections. I noticed that I am having trouble with when to space my korean words. So I looked up some rules for spacing korean words and found out that there should be a space between every word except for particles and auxiliary words. Subject particles come in two forms as 이 and 가. For object particles I would add 을 to words ending in a consonant and 를 for words ending in a vowel. For location particles I would add 에서 behind words so for example I had to write “I was sleeping in my dorm” which is 기숙사에서 잤다 I would add the 에서 behind dorm (기숙사). There are also topic particles such as 는 added behind a vowel and 은 added behind a consonant. Another rule is applied to numbers where numbers would be spaced every 4 order magnitudes. Lastly, for writing many single words, they are spaced in succession and are allowed to be grouped semantically.
In one of my classes this month, my language partner and I went over some proverbs and idioms in korean. The first proverb we learned was (열 길 물속은 알아도 한 길 사람 속은 모른다) This means no matter how deep the water is we know how deep it can be however, we never truly know the heart of a person. The second prover is (동에 번쩍 서에 번쩍) which presents the action of moving just as fast as how the other person is startled. The third one we learned was (사촌이 땅을 사면 배가 아프다) this translates to “when your cousin buys land your stomach hurts” I think this is a popular one used in South Korea daily. The proverbs mean that you are jealous that your cousin or the other person got something. The fourth proverb I learned was (물이 깊어야 고기가 모인다) this means you have to be warm in order for other people to like you or your plate has to be big in order for others to follow you. Lastly, we learned the proverb (개구리 올챙이 적 생각 못 한다) this translates to “a frog can’t think of the time it was a tadpole” it has a meaning where people do not remember the time they were poor after they become rich.
Out of the idioms we went over, I knew most of them because I heard it when I was living in South Korea. But one idiom that I learned was 눈코 뜰 새 없다 which translates to no time to lift your eyes or nose. This has a meaning that you are so busy in life that you don’t have time to look up. I really like this one because I am currently connected with the literal words. This month I was so busy with my college classes that I did not have time to look up and enjoy the things around me. I think idioms are so interesting how they are just words or very short sentences that have a deeper meaning to it.
Comments
Hi Rachel Kim, I also have trouble writing Korean! It can be pretty tricky learning how to space Korean characters. And I have always relied on intuition so it's helpful to know that there should be a space between every word except for particles and auxiliary words. I also thought that the water proverb was super interesting.