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Imagine that you have received a research grant to conduct a linguistic study of your target language and culture. How would you get started, and what would you investigate? How would different structural components presented in class appear in your work?

If I received a research grant to conduct a linguistic study of Portuguese, I would investigate the impacts of the gendering of nouns on Brazilians’ perceptions of random objects. My approach would be through literature review and on the ground research. Through literature review, I would be able to see what other studies have been completed about these topics. I would also be interested in what studies have been completed about the origins of Portuguese and how its roots relate to why it is a gendered language currently. The Western Iberian Latin roots of the language are largely the reason. However, I would be interested to study the ethnogenesis of Portuguese branched off from this language by researching language trees and comparing the similarity of certain key word roots using word trees. However, new words are also constantly being created. I would be interested in how genders are assigned to new words as well. I know that a majority of gender assignments are based on what a word’s suffix is, such as -o indicates a masculine noun. However, I am interested in how exceptions to these common rules are decided.

Additionally, I am also interested in how these grammatical rules related to gender play a role in people’s perception of the world, in other words, the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis. I would be interested in finding ways to test how gendered nouns affect people’s perceptions of those objects. One way that I’ve found this was done in a similar study is asking people to assign voices to animals, being able to classify animals as certain genders, and testing people’s perceived similarities between objects.

This week and the previous week I have continued working on expanding my vocabulary of Korean terms, specifically focusing on food-related terms (meat, vegetables, grains, fruit, types of meals, etc.) I also have been retaining my knowledge on how to tell the date, time, and weather each day by writing it in Korean each day. With my newly learned vocabulary, I hope to be able to use these terms in sentences that can be used day to day, for a restaurant setting or grocery store/market setting. My language partner, Rachel, and I have continued to have our weekly meetings which have been very productive and very helpful to my language-learning journey. We still haven’t been able to go to the Korean Restaurant for our cultural experience but I hope we will be able to this final week of the semester. Something that we’ve both enjoyed doing is watching a Korean Drama to aid in the language learning experience as listening to the language really helps one to get used to the vernacular, pinpoint new words, and understand sentence structure. Some strategies that have been implemented into my language learning journey include resources provided by global studios (Korean to English dictionary textbook) Youtube, music, entertainment, vocabulary quizzes, and actively writing Korean. These strategies have been very effective in helping me retain what I have learned from my language partner and continue to practice and build with what I already know well. The use of Quizlet for vocabulary quizzes has really helped me with memorizing terms better. Before using Quizlet, I would struggle with keeping up with reviewing my new vocabulary but Quizlet made it easier with the flashcard function and the test function. I will build on what I have learned about the language by starting to focus more on sentence structure and how and if it changes when slowly making it more complex. I would also like to learn if Korean has measured words for people or objects and learn more about when to use the right honorifics for the right person. I think now, I feel even more enthusiastic about continuing to learn Korean because I didn’t realize how much progress I’ve made and much faster I have become physically writing Hangul. In the connection between the language and the Korean culture where it is spoken, I have learned from my language partner the importance of using formal speech to perpetuate politeness as it is important to the culture and the Korean people. Even the simplest of phrases have a specific way that they should be said to a stranger/acquaintance or someone that is older or in a position of power. So that is something I will definitely need to continue to take into consideration when I am writing and speaking Korean. I will definitely have to make revisions in your task lists and/or short-term and long-term goals by continuing to focus on expanding my vocabulary but also making sure to slowly integrate grammar so I am able to progress in the aspect of practicing to form my own sentences correctly and communicate effectively with those that speak Korean. I am very grateful for my language partner that has helped me so much.

If I were to conduct a linguistic study of my target language and culture, I would start by investigating the historical events and history of Korea. Part of this research would center around finding possible connections (points of contact from other nations) with different cultures and languages that could have possibly impacted the Korean language. Although Korean is known to be part of its own language family called the Koreanic language family, there is some debate as to whether it may have ties to the Altaic Language Family. I would want to research in what way the Altaic Language Family is similar to Korean and if there is historical evidence to support it. Studying the Altaic Language Family or looking at existing research of the two language families being comparisons, would give insight into finding key similarities or differences that could aid in easing the transition of learning Korean. I would also investigate the aspects of Korean grammar, and see if it's similar in any way to the languages of its neighbors (countries). 

I am so proud of how far Leticia and I have come. It has been an insane semester for both of us. Leticia, who has acclimated to living and learning at a US school and has been ever so patient with me, having never attempted to speak Portuguese until this past summer.

Together, we have both stopped to take a breath and teach each other how best to learn Portuguese. I have watched her seize the role of educator, creating our weekly schedule and researching a textbook and creating assignments in it for me. She also has insane amounts of patience and is willing to be silly. Just last week, our lesson took a weird turn as we discussed the concept of “black eyes” in Portuguese and the short hand of saying someone has “a blue eye” instead of blue eyes. We were both in tears we were laughing so hard over saying to someone in English that you liked their blue eye, which would be totally normal to say in Portuguese. It is finding out little gems like this that have gotten me through some of the more overwhelming parts of tackling a language that I am so unfamiliar with. I look to Leticia as a role model in this. She has truly immersed herself in English and I look to her for inspiration that I can learn a language while still in my home country with all my comforts.

However, to be less sentimental: these are my overall thoughts and reflections regarding my semester of language learning through the Self-Directed Language Program.

I believe that initially Leticia and I were both overwhelmed and I was worried I should have taken the time to first take the intro course to have a better idea of how I wanted to structure the Portuguese course. However, looking back I have no regrets because I believe both of us jumping in was helpful in pushing us to work out the kinks as we were experiencing them. We progressed from having a central notebook in which I took notes and she wrote down key vocabulary. Then, we created the topic schedule for each of our meetings. Now, we also have the additional resource of a textbook. I think that these are all key components to have when both people involved in the SDLC match-up do not have experience with SDLC and, in my case, do not have experience with the language. All three of the resources I have mentioned above were crucial to creating the structured class I needed as a beginner in the language. Leticia introduced these resources because they were also helpful to her as an educator. She was dealing with a brunt of the work in having to come up with examples and vocabulary on the fly at first. She brought in the textbook and website resources (through the schedule) to provide more of that vocabulary in advance. The schedule gave her more time to come up with those examples. She took my learning plan and assigned dates to it, so that she could prepare before each of the dates and also so that I could prepare any questions I had as well.

However, where I think we could continue to improve is that we need to converse in Portuguese more during our courses rather than reading Portuguese from a text. Reading sentences aloud is helpful to better my pronunciation (which always needs the help); however, it does not require any critical thinking. I think that we need to be incorporating more activities like the maps and family trees we drew (during midsemester) so that we can use our vocabulary in conversation. I also think that I could improve upon, or at least something that I have not figured out yet, is if I should be keeping notes. Language is something that is so mentally driven, I usually end our courses with a bunch of random words, letters, and phrases scrawled on my paper in both Leticia and I’s handwriting. I am definitely absorbing some of the skills and vocabulary reflected in these writings, but not everything. I think that something I wish I had done more of throughout the semester is had notes that I would be able to reference when something comes up that I know we have gone over, but I cannot remember. 

Overall, however, I think that the program has largely been successful for both of us. The flexible nature of meet up times and settings was incredibly helpful when both of us had busy times during the semester. It feels like any place on campus has served as our classroom, which is kind of beautiful to me because all we really needed were the two of us.

I love to look back on my meetings with Leticia because they are just…fun! For the past few weeks, we have really found our rhythm and she also was kind enough to put my list of goals into a schedule for us to follow. Now, each day when I arrive to Portuguese we have a specific topic we are going to focus on that day and she has prepared various songs, other videos, or vocabulary for us to go over.

What I most generally hoped to accomplish this month is building my foundation in Portuguese. I feel as though the first month was becoming familiar with the different points of articulation that Portuguese has, many of which are farther back than English goes (at least they are in Leticia’s Rio accent) or are nasally in a way I am not used to. Leticia has been incredibly kind to repeat words over and over for me so that I can phonetically absorb the way that native speakers say the words I am learning. It is something as simple as the month of July, Julho, that I still struggle with. There are subtle phones that my ear still can’t detect and that my mouth still can’t wrap around. It is humbling and frustrating when you feel like you physically aren’t able to pronounce something, particularly not at a fast speed. I believe that I am learning a lot from the experience, however, and I am taking it slow in order to build a solid foundation that has less of an American accent!

We’ve gone over a lot of vocabulary and conversational phrases that have helped in familiarizing me with pronunciation as well as basic words. We reviewed the family tree and how to give directions. These were both fun topics because we were able to draw a family tree and draw a map of a town. Then, I would use the vocabulary I just learned to describe the relations between two people or to direct Leticia to a certain place. I enjoyed being forced to struggle through using some of the vocabulary on my own and see if Leticia understood.

We also learned about cultural topics, particularly art. For this lesson, Leticia went through the different museums in Brazil and what each of them displayed. She showed me some of her favorite Brazilian artists such as Kobra, a graffiti turned mural artist that had breathtaking works splayed across multiple cities in Brazil, and Sebastião Salgado, a photographer of Indigenous peoples she was particularly excited to show me. I didn’t learn much Portuguese in that lesson, but I wasn’t worried. I learned so much about the cultural context of Portuguese as well as what can be communicated without words. It was a definitive highlight of our meetings together.

Overall, I think we have made a lot of progress in how the meetings are more structured now that they are centered around a topic. I am also excited because Leticia has found a textbook that we will also be working out of for our future meetings.

During this month, besides reviewing previous materials at the beginning of each meeting, I start learning commonly used question words in Korean and trying to form a complete questioning sentence. 

When learning English, the first couple of question words we learn must be “who, what, when, where, and why”, so we start with learning how to say those 5 words in Korean. Who is “누가/누구”, what is “뭐”, when is “언제”, where is “어디”,  and why is “왜”, I remember those really quickly as I always hear them while watching Korean dramas and reality shows. When forming a simple question like “why is there” or “what is there”, just add “있어” after the corresponding question words. For example, “왜있어” means “why is there”. When asking “what to do” or “where to do”, just add “했어” after the corresponding question words. For example, “뭐했어” means “what you do”. 

Later I learned when asking questions in Korean about “how many”, we have to obey a rule which is related to the object we are referring to. In English, when we ask about people we just say “how many people” and if we want to ask about items we could say “how many items”, we always have to point out what we are asking for. There’s the same in Korean, there are different words for different kinds of objects we are referring to. Generally, “how many” in Korean is always “몇”, the difference appears when asking about different objects. When asking “how many people,” we say “몇명”, and when asking “how many items” we use “몇개”. It is quite obvious that “명” refers to people and “개” refers to items. However, the difference between English and Korean is that in English when asking “how many bags” and “how many desks”, it only has to change the words. In Korean, “bags” and “desks” are in the same category which is “item”, so when we have to use “몇개” in the question. For “how many bags”, we say “몇개 가방”, we don’t say “몇명 가방” since “명” refers to people. Besides words for items and people, I also learned “마리” is for animals, “권” is for books (also used for magazines, comic books, textbooks, and so on), “시” is for time, “살” is for age, “번” is for frequency, “일” is for the date, and “층” is for the floor. After learning these questions words, I’m able to write many questions. At the beginning of the last two meetings, I shared 5 questions I wrote with Vivian and she said my grammar is mostly correct and taught me the correct way to form a  more complex question. For example, I wrote the question “how many books are there in your bag?” (몇권 책 가방있어?), the correct sentence should be “가방에 책 몇권있어?”, where I should put the object “bag” at the first since that is the object I mainly want to refer to and have the question word “몇권” at last before the verb “있어”.

I have started to write in Korean. I would say writing free hand is the most comfortable way for me as I have not had much practice with typing it. I’ve noticed similar patterns in the structures where honorifics in the language are placed at the end of a phrase or sentence. Compound sentences are made with connective endings while simple sentences in Korean are the simplest way of forming a sentence with a subject, object, and verb in that order. Based on my knowledge of parts of speech in Korean, I realized that the way sentences are spoken are basically the same way in which they are written.

안녕하세요, 모해수 (Mo hae soo-my Korean name) 입니다. 저는 21 살이고 대학생입니다.

Translation: Hello, my name is Mo hae soo. I am 21 years old and a college student. 

오늘은 11 월 6 일 2022 년 일요일입니다 이고 오늘은 날씨가 맑습니다

Translation: Today is Sunday, November 6, 2022 and the weather is nice/clear. 

Tripikata Koreana

While searching for a new topic on language influences of artifacts on Korean language, I came across something called the Tripitaka Koreana. This is a collection of Korean scripts of the Haeinsa Temple locate in Korea, which contain sacred Buddhist texts. Buddhism is a religion that originated in India by Siddhartha Gautama but as it traveled toward the East (through trade), it became something more closely known as East Asian Buddhism which varied from the original concept of the religion based on each individual country's (that came into contact with Buddhism) prior religious beliefs to the introduction of Buddhism. After the religion of Buddhism had been reviewed by Korean scholars, the religion had been reformed and interpreted in a different light. In today’s day and age, it is more closely known as Tonbulgyo, Zen, or Korean Buddhism to Koreans. The Tripitaka Koreana, written in the 13^th century, was carved onto wooden printing blocks that totaled to be about 80,000 wooden blocks (Hanja is the written language that was carved onto these 80,000 wooden blocks). Because of the introduction of Buddhism, it led to the use of Hanja (Chinese characters) which would allow Koreans to accept Chinese culture without sacrificing their native tongue (spoken Korean language).

The language written on these wooden blocks contained hanja script which use Chinese characters but do not hold the same pronunciation of Chinese language. It is possible that the Tripitaka Koreana could have made an impact on Korean language because of the religion and beliefs imbedded into it. Within it, lies Buddhist teachings which have become part of Korean culture in some ways which can definitely make an impact on the vernacular of the language, and the introduction of new words, new meanings, and concepts. Similar to English, the introduction of Christianity introduced new words that stemmed from Greek and Latin language and new ways in which words could be formed.

Today, although the use of Hanja in Korean language has dwindled, there are still concepts and ideas from Buddhism in cooperated in some ways within Korean society. Hanja itself is still taught within schools but it’s often difficult to maintain as it is not used on a day-to-day basis. And it is used mostly in ancient literature, legal documents and to shortened long sentences or phrases in some instances. Hanja however can be beneficial in the sense that there are quite a handful of Korean words that apparently come from Chinese roots. This can be beneficial when learning Korean vocabulary to become fluent in Korean, as 30-60% of Korean words have Chinese origin.

Because religion produces a new way of thinking, Korean society experienced a prosperous rise (in Korean culture life) from the introduction of Buddhism which led to its stature to be how it is today. This may be from laws treaties and scriptures from the Buddhist texts that were in cooperated into the culture and governmental aspects of Korean society which allowed the nation to grow and develop leading it to be what it is today. 

The past Halloween, there was a serious stampede in Itaewon, and many reports about Itaewon say that the TV drama "Itaewon Class" has attracted a large number of tourists, so I went to watch this drama, it's produced by Netflix. At the beginning of watching this TV series, I did not know what it wanted to express, but as the story progressed, I was deeply attracted, not only because of the story but also because of the character characteristics of the protagonists. The first two episodes of the series made me feel very sad. The hero's father died unexpectedly when he was at school. He wanted to avenge his father but was sent to prison. After two years in prison and seven at sea, he came to Itaewon to open a bar and want to avenge his father in a proper way. I admire the way the hero holds fast to his beliefs in the face of all kinds of adversity, and always holds out hope for a new life. However, what attracts me most in this drama is not the hero's experience and success process, nor the love story between the hero and the heroine, but the supporting actors in the drama, as well as the character and life experience of the heroine.

The heroine doesn't appear until the third episode. When she faced the campus violence, she directly posted the video exposure on the network, using her identity as an SNS blogger with 760,000 fans, set off the network's public opinion, and let the abusive girl suffer the network violence. In addition to being decisive and tough, the heroine has an IQ of 162 and is good at everything. She is not only gifted but also has a clear mind. After confirming her heart for the hero, she gave up the offer from a top university without hesitation and decided to help the hero realize his dream. One thing I really like about the heroine is that she not only knows what she wants and how she should do it, but she's also pretty sure she can do it.

Although many people dislike the supporting actress, they think she is selfish and scheming. But I think this character is actually the most real one on the show, and she shouldn't be hated. Because she, like most ordinary people, is hesitant, cowardly, selfish, and insecure when faced with a choice. Unlike the hero and heroine, most people in the world are like the supporting actress. On the face of campus, violence does not have the courage to stand up to help the bullied, in the face of others to provide huge free help will choose to accept, in the face of choosing "to protect themselves" or "to help others" will always choose the former. I also like the supporting cast, which includes rich people and prison inmates, transgender people, and mixed-race people. Everyone's past is different and they have their own difficulties in life, but they are working hard for the future.

Besides watching this drama, I also went to learn more about Itaewon. About why it was named “Itaewon" One theory is that because it was originally a military camp where American troops stationed in South Korea after the Korean war, many military families lived there, including many mixed Americans and Koreans. At that time, in South Korea, which had long emphasized the single nationality, people could not accept children of mixed race, so they were called "freaks". Therefore, the original meaning of Itaewon was freak’s yard. Later, the name was changed to today's "Itaewon" because it took a homonym. Everyone who works in the bar of the hero has been or is being, regarded as a "freak" or an outcast by most people in this society. But in the bar, they not only got the equal opportunity to work but also made concerted efforts to reform the store and open the business together. No one worked for the boss, they all worked from the heart for themselves, and they helped each other grow together.

Hello and welcome back to another journal~

I’m continuing to study and research more about Korea, but instead of regurgitating all of the information, I thought I’d share more about my progression and some of my “highlights” from the past couple of weeks!

I mentioned previously about how I was a guest speaker for my art professor’s upper-level class and that I got the opportunity to teach the students about the Korean alphabet to form their names. Afterwards, the professor invited me to lunch for the following week and I responded with an excited “yes”. At first I wasn’t sure if our conversations would be in Korean or English since, of course, we use only English in class, but as our discussions proceeded, I found that we smoothly transferred from English to predominantly Korean. It was very nice to be able to speak in my first language with a professor for the first time since even with my friends, we tend to mix the languages into Konglish. We got to know each other a little more and she even shared her academic experiences from Korea.

I also noted that I wanted to get used to texting in Korean and it’s been going pretty well so far! I actually attempted this same goal in previous years but never really stuck with it because I type so much faster in English. I told my mom my goal for using only Korean when I’m texting her so that she could keep me accountable and correct any of my spellings or grammar. She has a teaching background so she’s been patient with me and my slow thumbs, but I can see the progress already. Whenever I want to say a particular word but don’t know the best translation, I’ll text the English word in Hangul and she’ll respond back with the Korean word. I’ve also found myself “speaking” differently when I text. If we were speaking in person, I’d naturally speak in a formal yet casual way, but due to the formal vs informal language in Korean, I found myself being more conscious of using formal language when texting. Additionally, I’ve been texting my aunt in Korean too! This just happened to occur without any particular goals because I was used to texting with my mom. While I attempted to do this with my dad, he’s been wanting to get better in English, therefore, most of our texts are in English with him attempting to use some new internet acronyms.

My sister’s now a first-year in college and with roommates and hallmates in her room and lounge, we’ve been communicating in Korean whenever we FaceTime. This is actually very unlike us because although we know and use both languages, we communicate in English. I’ve noticed that it’s when we want a more private conversation we use the language that the surrounding people can’t understand well. It’s funny how we did this in Korea by using English and now we do this but with the scenario flipped.

During this month, with reviewing previous material at the beginning of each meeting. We go in-depth into words for weekdays and counting, also memorizing words on the list provided by TOPIK, which is a language test like TOEFL. 

Besides the questions that we learned last month “How are you today?” and “How’s the weather?” another basic question that could be asked during a conversation is “What day is today?”, we began to learn words for each weekday and Vivian also taught me an easy way to memorize it. The words for each weekday in English follow a rule that every word ends with “day”, Korean words for each weekday also follow that rule, instead of “day” it has “요일” at the end of each word. Monday is “월요일”, Tuesday is “화요일”, Wednesday is “수요일”, Thursday is “목요일”, Friday is “금요일”, Saturday is “토요일”, Sunday is “일요일”, and every word for a weekday in Korean is formed by 3 letters or characters, the only difference is the first character. So an easy way to remember is it takes out the first character and remember them in order as a sentence, like “월화수목금토일”, every time just count through the sentence and add “요일” after the character could give the words for the specific weekday. While practicing the pronunciation of weekdays, Vivian point out a mistake that I always made, which is some times I forget to give the last consonant of the previous character to the later character. For example, when pronouncing the Thursday “목요일” (Mogyo-il), since the second character “요” is in the form of starting with a vowel, so the last consonant of “목”, which is “ㄱ”, should be pronounced with “요”(Mo-gyo-il). Vivian explained to me that the reason we should pronounce it in this way is to maintain consistency. Later I also learned the word tomorrow “내일”, yesterday “어제” and today “오늘". An interesting point is the word for “the day after tomorrow” is simply double the first character in tomorrow “내일” and gets “내내일”. 

There are two ways to count numbers in Korean, so we learned them one by one. The first way we learn is commonly used when talking about dates, prices, and phone numbers. For me, I think it’s easier to remember than another way since within 100 I only need to remember 1-10, which is “1일 2이 3삼 4사 5오 6육 7칠 8팔 9구 10십”. When I want to say for example 22, I just have to combine 2이 and 10십 to get 20이십, then add 2이 after it to get 22 이십이. For numbers over 100, just have to remember how to say hundred and thousand and combine the number I need to form the words. Another way of counting numbers is more complicated, the formation of the words for numbers over 10 doesn’t like the way in previous counting way, I have to remember every number’s Korean words. This second counting way is used when expressing age or ordering food in a restaurant.

I tried Hanbok when I was traveling in Korea. It was really beautiful, which made me want to know more about Hanbok. Hanbok is the traditional clothing of the Korean nation. It was not originally what it is now, because of the Tang dynasty’s strong influence and culture exported, and Korean clothes were the exact same style as those of the tang dynasty. But from the beginning of the Ming dynasty, Korea gradually changed in the clothing of that time, and then developed to Hanbok. The change is mainly reflected in women's clothing. The belt of the blouse is gradually moved from the right side to the middle, and the waistline is also gradually moved up to form the current short top. Men's clothes basically only added their own national aesthetic on the basis of the clothes of the Ming dynasty, and only made subtle adjustments.

The color of Korean clothing can represent identity, and with the change of seasons, the color of Korean clothing will also change. Except for important festivals, the Korean people will generally wear white Hanbok, so white is the basic color of Hanbok, Korea is also known as the "white-clad nation.”

Hanbok is made up of many parts. The 저고리 (jeogori) is a basic upper garment of the Hanbok, which has been worn by both men and women. Men usually wear the 저고리 with a 바지 (baji) or pants while women wear the 저고리 (jeogori) with 치마 (chima) or skirts. It covers the arms and upper part of the wearer's body.  바지 (baji) refers to the bottom part of the men's Hanbok. It is the formal term for 'trousers' in Korean. Compared to western style pants, it does not fit tightly. The roomy design is aimed at making the clothing ideal for sitting on the floor. 치마 (chima) were typically made from rectangular cloth that was pleated or gathered into a skirt band. This waistband extended past the skirt fabric itself and formed ties for fastening the skirt around the body.

Hanbok is classified according to its purposes: everyday dress, ceremonial dress, and special dress. Ceremonial dresses are worn on formal occasions, including a child's first birthday, a wedding, or a funeral. Special dresses are made for shamans and officials. Nowadays, Hanbok is only worn on festive occasions or special anniversaries. But since it is a formal dress, most Koreans keep at least one Hanbok for special times in their life such as weddings, 추석 (Korean Thanksgiving), and 새해 (Korean New Year's), Children wear Hanbok to celebrate their first birthday (돌잔치). 

The color of the Hanbok symbolized social position and marital status. Bright colors, for example, were generally worn by children and little girls, and muted hues by middle-aged men and women. Unmarried women often wore yellow 저고리 (jeogori) and red 치마 (chima) while matrons wore green and red, and women with sons wore dark blue 저고리 (jeogori). The upper classes wore a variety of colors. Contrastingly, commoners were required to wear white but dressed in shades of pale pink, light green, gray, and charcoal on special occasions.

Patterns were embroidered on Hanbok to represent the wishes of the wearer. Peonies on a wedding dress represented a wish for honor and wealth. Lotus flowers symbolized hope for nobility, and bats and pomegranates showed the desire for children. Dragons, phoenixes, cranes, and tigers were only for royalty and high-ranking officials.

During the past month, we learned a lot of things. Since my goal for this course this semester is to learn daily words and commonly used words, so that I could be able to understand the Korean drama or reality show I watched easily without the captions, also I wish to be able to communicate with native Korean about basic things, like greeting, ask directions and order food. So we start with some commonly used adjective words and combine them with their antonym, for example, a word is good “좋아” and bad “나빠”, another word group is long “길어요” and short “짧아요”. We learned a total of 8 groups, and for easy memories, Vivian test me every 4 groups by saying a word’s English, and I say that word in Korean, and I correctly answered most words. In this way, I think having a little quiz while learning new words really helps me memorize, more than that, memorizing words with their antonym is really useful and can help me form a stereotype. After memorizing those words, Vivian taught me several daily greeting sentences, like “How are you today?” (잘 지냈어요?), and I can just reply with the words good “좋아” and bad “나빠” that I just learned. 

After learning the commonly used adjective word groups, and focusing on my goal, Vivian start to teach me some commonly used words to describe the weather and how to use those words. We first learned the words rain “비” and snow “눈”. To be able to use those words in conversation and to express “It’s raining” and “It’s snowing”, Vivian introduce the verb “와”, which means “falling”. Combining the weather with the verb gives us “비와” and “눈와”, which could be used to answer the question “How’s the weather today?”(날씨 어때?). Since the answer to the previous question we learned is simply a word, I had a question about why instead of just answering the weather words, we have to add a verb to answer this question. Vivian explain to me that the way we have to do this is if we just answer “rain”,  it does not mean it is raining and will make the other person confused. Later we learned the words fog “안개”, sunlight “햇빛” and moonlight “달빛”. For those words when we describe the weather we add “있어” to the end, which means “have” and combine it with the words, for example, “햇빛 있어” means “There is sunlight”.  For the word “lighting 번개” we learned a special verb to describe it, which is “처”. Add those together give us “번개 처”, which means “There’s lighting”, but here “there is” is not like “there is sunlight”, because lighting doesn’t continuously appear in the sky, it shows up and disappears, so the verb “처” is used here to give a sense of suddenly show up. 

Every week after class, since I like to watch Korean reality shows, my homework is to write down words I don’t know while watching an episode of a reality show and share them in class. In this way, I learned a lot of words for food and ghost in Korean.