An uneducated take on the Korean language

After checking the date of my last post, I realize it was a few days ago. I'm getting busier at school, so I've found my blogging down time has seriously decreased.

Not much has happened. I think my classes/lessons are starting to improve. Now that I've had a few, I know better how long each activity will take so it's helping me plan. For example, I think this week's teacher training was a total success. It's the third one, but it's the first one that I really feel made some progress and I felt like I knew exactly what I was doing. I've picked up some Korean, and it's been incredibly helpful. Knowing some hangul has really helped me learn what's hard for Koreans and why. For example, most Westerners know that people who speak Asian languages don't really distinguish between "r" and "l." I finally know why! (At least, for Koreans.) The hangul symbol ㄹ is translated into the Roman alphabet as sort of a cross between r/l. The symbol ㅂ is b/p. You might remember how I mentioned that Buyeo (부 여) used to be called Puyo/Puyeo. I think (remember, this is not fact, this is just what I've hopefully deduced from the very, very short time I've been in Korea) that this is because in Korean there are no separate "b" and "p" sounds, so you can't actually phonetically translate it into Roman letters. There's also no "v" at all. Imagine trying to explain the difference between b, p, and v! Also imagine it in reverse - when I speak Korean ("speak"... i.e. say hello, Buyeo, etc.) I have to kind of jam b/p and d/t and r/l together. Buyeo isn't really BU-yeo, and it's not PU-yeo, it's like B/Puyeo. Let me break down the Buyeo symbols, then you too will know some Korean!

Like I said, it's 부 여.
ㅂ is b/p
ㅜ is u as in you
ㅇ when you see this "o" shape, it's silent unless it's at the end of a word, then it's a "ng" sound like Seokseong
ㅕ yeo as in yo man!

So now just sound out 부 b/p-u 여 silent-yeo and there you have it! And the best part is every time you see the ㅂ, ㅜ, ㅇ, or 여, they will always sound like the sounds I've just described. I think there's exceptions, but pretty much unlike English, what you see is what you get. ㅜ is always "u." In English there's really no good explanation that I know of for why "apple" and "father" both have "a" but they sound completely different, which makes learning English so hard.

So you see, if you were to try and write a word such as "library" in hangul, even though it's got the different "r" and "l," in hangul they would literally be the exact same symbol ㄹ. So if Korean is your native language, you probably think in hangul (just like I think annyeong haseyo instead of 안녕하세요 even though they're the same thing) so it would be massively hard to get out of the ㄹ box, you know? So essentially I think knowing these sorts of things can help me identify problem areas for my classes.

Okay, quick quiz: what's this Korean word? It's crucial to their everyday lives.
밥

You should know ㅂ by now, and I'll give you a hint: ㅏ is ah. Sound it out! Start with the upper left and read left to right, then down to the bottom.

Okay okay, it's bap/pap, aka RICE! Congratulations, you can now eat rice in Buyeo if you so choose.

Linguistics aside, I really feel like I'm taking control at Seokseong and I like it a lot. My lessons are getting more exciting. Yesterday with the 3rd grade and today with the 4th grade we learned how to ask, "What do you need?" and answer the question. I made a game where everyone gets several cards with things like "a pen," "scissors," "a pencil," etc. written on them. We arranged the chairs in a circle facing inward and everyone but one student sat down. The one in the middle had to choose someone and ask them, "What do you need?" The student sitting down would look at his/her cards and say, "I need a pen/pencil etc." If the student standing had the matching card, he/she had to give it to the student sitting down. Then they switched places. If the standing student didn't have the card, he/she said, "Sorry, I don't have any." (We also included, "Here you go." "Thanks." "That's okay.") Then everyone had to group in the center of the circle and I'd say, "Go!" and they'd dash for the chairs. Last one standing was the middle person. There was a LOT of squealing. The fourth grade were total angels - third grade was acceptable.

I feel like Stephen Hawking here. Not because I'm super smart, but because I like to communicate through a computer. Especially at Seokseong - my computer is hooked up to display the screen to the class, so when I'm on my own I'll leave Google translate open and if they don't know what I'm talking about, I'll type it in. Also we have "conversations" in between classes. One of my students told me via the computer that I was a very good Korean teacher! Not quite sure what that means because I am not actually a Korean teacher... I think she meant my Korean is very good. Probably, "Teacher, you have good Korean." and Google messed it up. Either way it was some kind of compliment so that's sweet. The 5th/6th grade hasn't seen me in a while since I was gone last Friday and they were on a field trip last Thursday and the week before, so they've missed that I've learned several important classroom words in Korean (Eyes up here! Scissors. Volunteer. 1-10. etc.)

I'm going out of town this weekend. I'm headed for Daegu, a city about an hour east of Daejeon. My friend from IU is there, and we're going to stay at a Buddhist temple Saturday/Sunday. I'll let you know how it goes... I googled it and it looks cool, but Kevin said one of his friends did it and it was "horrendous." Lots and lots of bowing and waking up super early and well, doing Buddhist-type things. I'm looking forward to the experience. All this out-of-town-ness makes the weeks very, very long though so hopefully I'll get back at a decent time on Sunday.