Slow-cooked Korean

[qeadz]

Does this help?

Well thats about word spacing, I was meaning where words can be broken. Evita seems to be right that Korean words can pretty much be broken anywhere which makes it surprisingly hard for me to read! Luckily it's not done very often (at least in this book Im reading).

Anyhow, on to a short update because it's been a while:

Not much has happened. Work has been crazy busy and as such updating this log fell behind because I'd rather spend the few minutes trying to get my Korean study done! I've largely kept to an hour a day, but a couple days have been more like 40 - 60 minutes.

When the pressure is on, its hard to make time to do output but I managed to keep at least some writing going. It's too early to tell how well things are going but hopefully in a few months I'll get a feel as to how much I think the following aspects are contributing to my learning:
* Increased focus on output, particularly writing.
* Writing in a physical journal with a pen rather than on PC.

I have high hopes for the outcome. I mean it has to work. Because if July comes and it seems I have still large basic gaps in my knowledge of Korean then I'd have no idea where to turn.

My wife has been occasionally talking to me in Korean. Not conversational, but simple things like asking how long our son slept at daycare or whether I need to work late, or work on the weekend. I can't bring myself to try mangle an answer in Korean so I still answer in English but at least I'm understanding it now.

Now you may be thinking: Surely if he is listening and following some intermediate level dialog then this should be trivial?

And the reply would be: I know everyone on this forums understands that in some ways its apples and oranges! It would seem my understanding drops considerably if the Korean I am hearing is unexpected and without context. For some of the material I listen to, I cannot recall exactly what was said but I do recall the topic, some parts of the dialog, sometimes the order in which the topic changes...

So it places even more emphasis on me starting to watch some Korean dramas. I said I would. I began with one episode but never did any more. That needs to resume I think!

[qeadz]

저는 이 번 토론회 우편물을 한국어로 쓸 거에요. 지난 주에 바빠서 많이 공부하지 않했어요. 그럼에도 불구하고 5 시간 동안 듣기 하고 읽기가 할 수 있었어요. 말하기 연습에 대한 계획이 아직도 없어요. 어제 재 아내는 한국어 말할 수 있는 백인 친구를 만났어요. 그 친구는 국제 완조 단체가 위해 북한에서 도와 드려요. 어쩔 수 없는 부러운 느낌을 있어요.

I'm going to write this post in Korean. Last week I didn't study much because I was busy. Never-the-less I was still able to do 5 hours of reading and listening. I still don't have a plan for speaking practice. Yesterday my wife met a Caucasian friend of hers who can speak Korean. She helps in North Korea on behalf of an international aid organization. I can't help but feel a little jealous (of her speaking ability).

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I *feel* that writing in Korean more is doing me good. Of course I'm sure the above has a load of errors in it. I have yet to see what effect this increased focus on output (especially writing) will have. Perhaps I should attempt more posts in Korean on this log.

[qeadz]

저는 ‘호빗’라고 책을 차츰차츰 읽고 있어요. 많은 아려지지 않은 단어들이 있어서 진전이 힘들어요. 언잰가는 이런 책을 편하게 읽을 수 있으면 좋겠어요.
이 오후에 밴쿠버에 내리는 눈이 예측돼요. 캐나다의 나머지과 달리, 밴쿠바는 눈이잘 처리하는 것을 별러 안 해요.
다행이 저는 도심에 살고 있기 때문에 집에 쉽게 걸을 수 있어요.

I'm slowly reading The Hobbit. Progress is tough because there are many words I don't understand. Someday I hope to be able to comfortably read a book like this.
Snow is forecast for this afternoon in Vancouver. Unlike the rest of Canada, Vancouver doesnt deal with snow particularly well. Fortunately I live downtown so I can easily just walk home

[outcast]

A question just came up now that you are writing your log in Korean.

How would Koreans normally write something in a forum or log as you are writing? A log entry that just has a general audience and no one specific... I know you are using the informal polite conjugation, I probably would too just for the practice since it is the most commonly used. But would your wife write it like this? Or would she use the plain diary form?

And maybe when you are responding to a question or quote from someone else, then you would use whatever form is appropriate for that person based on age and rank?

What I am asking I guess is how do Koreans handle politeness levels online and log entries when the audience is general. I think this is important because many of us learners will do a lot of our Korean interactions on the internet and not necessarily in person.

[qeadz]

How would Koreans normally write something in a forum or log as you are writing?

You are quite correct that the politeness level I chose was specifically because its the one I want to drum into my head. I do occasionally use the others except for informal because so little interaction for me would be done with it. It'd only be my nephews with whom I'd be able to use it, and even then for a variety of reasons it's better that I use English instead.

I have read blog posts in Korean. Specifically for Hearthstone (a digital card game).

Many of the blog entries use the formal conjugation throughout (사랑하다 --> 사랑합니다). However there are some which mix the ㅂ니다 and 요. To be frank I never got a full introduction to Korean politeness levels. I believe there are technically 7 but only 3 are commonly used nowadays with a 4th kind of falling out of use.

Basically I read the brief "you're a beginner so heres a beginners take on politeness" and then some random post on the internet. I quickly moved on and perhaps it's time I revisited this. Anyway back to topic:

I'm going to guess that maybe a 'language log' could be either seen as a blog or as a diary. This is a guess on my behalf, but whichever way it goes I'd still be in error with the way I've been writing. I'd either be using '사랑한다' or '사랑합니다' (giving examples because I don't recall the names for the politeness levels).

I'd love to find out, as you mention, how politeness levels extend to various kinds of digital interactions. My wife doesn't read forums, has no idea what a language log is, nor does she read blog posts really - she reads Korean news sites and opinion pieces found on them. So she isn't sure but probably '사랑합니다' style is the way to go.

[qeadz]

It's been another busy week. I doubt there will be much to say on the log next week so I'll do a week-wrapup because my Korean: A Comprehensive Grammar physical book finally arrived.

I've been using it so much. Its great! It has renewed my focus on reading a bit slower and looking up grammar again. I've gone through phases where I don't really look up a lot of grammar - letting a lot of it kind of slide in the interests of just getting more text read. But another grammar push is probably a good thing.

Just today even I found out:

어/아 놓 - do something all the way
어/아 두 - do for future reference
어/아 대 - do repeatedly (often in negative way)

을까 보 - think it might
을까 싶 - afraid it might
을까 하 - think of doing

Each of these is new to me - being that previously I did not identify them as being set grammar patterns (assuming I've encountered them before), and certainly havent gotten to them in my HTSK progress.

I will probably forget them in short order but I will remember that they have special meaning and in future will look them up again as needed.

My statistics on LingQ are beginning to show the shift in focus I've had. Last year I was almost hitting an average of 500 words read a day. However my recent average on LingQ is only just above 300 a day. This is most certainly because I'm spending more time writing and actually more time listening than I used to. My total time spent on Korean is roughly the same so it's just apportioned differently.

In a way its kind of demotivating to see these numbers drop a little. I do think that reading is fantastic exposure to the language so in a very real sense my rate of exposure to new words, new sentence constructions, and such is reduced.

While I *know* I made a conscious choice to divide my time differently this year and it would come with some downsides, I'm in this grey area where I can't tell if my adjusted approach is going to help me improve where I want to improve, but I definitely can tell that I'm not picking up new words as much as I used to.

[qeadz]

저는 지금 사무실에 앉고 제일 좋아하는 노래를 듣고 있습니다. 많은 해야 되는 일을 있지만 관심이 없슴니다.
한국어 연습 과정에 마음이 울적합니다. 왠야하면 얼마 년 그 언어 연습 걸렬 것이 깨달압니다. 재 완래 언급된 목표가 초가 식구와 말하겠는 것이에요. 아직도 여러 가지 능력 중에 듣기와 말하기가 재일 부족한 것 같슴니다.
요즘에는 몇 알고 있는 단어들을 잊기도 시작했습니다. 적어도 이런 느낌이 있습니다.

I'm currently sitting in the office listening to a favorite song. There is a lot of work I should be doing, but I lack interest.
I'm feeling somewhat depressed about the whole Korean language study thing. It's because I've realized how many years of practice its going to take. My original goal was to be able to speak with my wife's family. But still listening and speaking are the two skills I feel I am most deficient in.
These days I am even beginning to forget some of the vocabulary I know! At least it feels this way.

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My Korean is, of course, still limited. So please forgive how clunky even the English translation above reads. The English isn't even an exact translation of the Korean so if you are able to read Korean then appreciate that I have, in places, deviated a little so that the English doesn't read as poorly as I'm sure the Korean does!

[qeadz]

I'm sitting in the office on a Saturday. I am supposed to be revising for a test actually, but instead took the opportunity to write some Korean. This week has been another really busy week at work. I have, however, still managed to get a reasonable amount of Korean done but not in the proportions I had hoped.

My listening is up, reading was reasonable, but writing was lacking. Speaking was non-existent.

Today I just want to reflect briefly on writing. As those who have read my blog recently know, I am increasing the amount of output in my study plan. I am aiming for 66% input and 33% output. I'll define input as reading and listening primarily and output as writing or speaking - regardless of what I am writing or speaking.

Over the entire time I've been studying Korean, I've *mostly* kept diary entries (however short they have been). More recently I began targeting grammar by constructing sentences not intended to be read together or on any specific theme, but rather purely for the sake of finding a way to try use the grammar construct.

I have also been on-and-off retelling a childrens story. Recently I've also tried my hand at taking an existing text in English and translating into Korean.

Originally I would have said that one of these would likely prove the most useful and become the dominant use of my time spent writing. However I am feeling that they really all do have a place in my language learning routine.

Diary is always relevant. A lot of what I would like to do with the language will involve every-day vocabulary. If I am going to communicate with family on my trips to Korea then a lot of everyday 'around the house' vocabulary is a must.

Targeted grammar use is also important because I've found that I'm unlikely to reach for new grammar unless I find a way of forcing myself to use it. Some of the grammar concepts I am learning now are kind of hard to work into a diary entry, for instance - it's awkward and forced. So there is a place for writing out a few sentences which don't have to contain any meaning other than a structure to house the grammar concept.

Right now I am not doing a lot of this, but I do 4 - 8 sentences a week which are targeted grammar.

Retelling an existing story has been perhaps the least useful of the things I am doing, but still with value. It has enough structure, events and intricacies which I need to retell in order for the story line to be represented. However it is still flexible enough that I can dumb down some parts.

There is the added advantage that it forces me to encounter new verbs and adjectives. The nouns are less important because children's stories are always talking about things that are not very every-day-ish and very childrens-fairy-tale-ish

Lastly translating existing text has been the biggest mental workout. In this case I took a future section from the English version of The Hobbit (so it won't clash with the Korean version I am reading) which included some dialog and some description. It's filled with things which I am very much used to, but realize I actually have no idea how to express in Korean. It's like I know a bunch of words which I feel could be assembled in some way to have the desired meaning, but actually assembling them correctly is a great mental workout.

I don't know if it *is* actually effective, but it causes me to think a lot about language structure, grammatical patterns and how best a meaning might be conveyed. I allow myself to use Naver search a *lot* because I think this is less about me trying to say it with my limited knowledge, but rather a process of discovery.

[AndyMeg]

Maybe this resource could be helpful to you: easytolearnkorean. It deals with many actual topics and vocabulary that aren't usually teached in textbooks. It also explains many things related to korean culture and their way of thinking.

[qeadz]

Thank you AndyMeg!

I had seen that site before but since I revisited it now when you posted, it just happened to have a breakdown of key things relating to the SAAD (THAAD?) deployment in Korea... which happens to be exactly what I was reading about the day before.

Anyhow I wanted to do a quick update which is really to underscore the difficulties even when accepting a native speaker's correction.

I wrote a diary entry in which I spoke about going to the gym to do exercise. Among other corrections, the corrector changed my chosen word for 'gym' (헬스장) to 체육관. Now I had not heard of the latter, but was fairly sure the word I was using meant what I thought it did.

So one of the obvious tools at the disposal of most language learners is Google (or other) image search! Plugging 헬스장 into it reveals many photos of rows of treadmills and other exercise equipment - exactly the kind of place I went to. However entering 체육관 in brought up many photos of courts on which sports can be played.

I guess in English we kind of do have a difference in meaning between a 'gym' and a 'gymnasium', and the former and latter Korean words appear to match accordingly.

I cannot say for certain whether the difference in meaning is as stark as the difference in photos associated with the words, but it leans heavily toward the word I chose as being the correct one for naming the place I visited.

This method is not without its surprises though. Image search is ... less filtered on foreign content. So once or twice I have searched on a correct but not too common term to see how or if it differs from the existing term I am aware of, only to find out that one of the terms *also* has been associated with more adult activities or content.

At any rate whenever I have an easily answerable question regarding Korean, theres never a reason to stay in the dark for any length of time. Wherever I am when the question comes to mind, I can usually get my phone out and quickly resolve it.