Oh my gosh, this song is a lot better than I thought it was going to be.  I am going to make no secret of the fact I’m not exactly a JY ENT fan.  I tried and I failed, however, Jia and orange hair, along with this song, may make me a Say A very, very soon.  

Miss A -Goodbye Baby

This song is so addictive!  So I decided I want to pick apart some Korean from their interview with Naver.  

Q:  이번 앨범을 한마디로 정의 한다면?

This time album in one word define (to-do verb)

This time define in one word the album?

A:  중독, 블랙홀!!

Addicting, black hole!  

Vocab:

이번 - this time (endic.naver.com)

앨범 - album (Konglish)

한마디로 - in one word (endic.naver.com)

정의 - define (endic.naver.com)

한다면 - to do verb (endic.naver.com)

중독 - addicting (endic.naver.com)

블랙홀 - black hole (Konglish)

을 - direct object marker

Sorry I can’t provide more for some of this.  I found bits of it confusing, so I linked dictionary articles.  

Remember:  Everything is being moved to my Wordpress site since Tumblr is having issues staying up.  My Wordpress site is located here:  http://korea.china-rouge.net I am trying to wean myself off of Tumblr so for a while there will be cross posts but there will come a time where I just post links.

This tumblr won’t ever close, though.  I like it too much but there will come a time where all the bulky articles are at the wordpress and this just used for light, fun things.

끝까지 들어 is a phrase I’ve always been confused about.  I figured I’d finally do what should have been obvious…but wasn’t.  I went to the Naver dictionary.  끝까지 by itself means “to the end” and 들어 is where this phrase got confusing.  It turns out 들어 is a verb that means enter but also hold, take, walk in, cut, and be sharp, according to Naver’s dictionary.  

끝까지 들어 together, however, I found means something like “don’t interrupt me.”   So it being titled in English as “Listen to the End” means something like “listen until I’m done”.  

I figure since this is something I found in the dictionary at Naver as a full phrase it’s just a phrase I have to learn to understand as meaning “don’t interrupt” instead of taking it apart as I normally do.  When taken apart you can see the basics of “hold” and “to the end” and that does give clues to the phrase; I guess what through me off was it being titled “listen to the end.”  

PS.  Welcome to Navi Week, yes.  

On the 26th group 2NE1 will return to the stage to show off their flashy new moves with their new song “I am the Best” on….*drumroll* SBS’ Inkigayo.

Source:  star.mt.co.kr

Taken from article:  그룹 2NE1이 가요 프로그램 ‘인기가요’를 통해 신곡 무대를 첫 선보인다.

For group 2ne1 the music program Inkigayo is the first stage they will show their new songs.

Random Vocabulary: 

첫 - first

가요 - music

프로그램 - program

선보인다 - show off (something)

몇시예요 - what time is it?

오전 - AM

오후 - PM

시 - hour, o’clock

분 - minutes

Know how to combine?  4시15분 means it’s 4:15. It’s really that simple…unless, you want to make it hard by learning all the Sino-Korean and native Korean numbers to use instead.  That will come in a later post.  AM/PM aren’t really necessary if using 24 hour time but if using 1-12 you may want to add it on.  For example: 오후 4시15분 means 4:15 PM.  The AM/PM goes in front of the time.  

More fun with time:

전 - can be used to say 10 before 4.  For example:  10시5분전 is five minutes before 10. (4시10분전 is how you say 10 before 4 by the way) 

반 - half.  4:30 = 4시반

여기까지가 우리 둘의 끝인가요

Here is the end for the both of us.

여기까지 - here, to this place, so far

우리 - we, us

둘의 - two, both

끝인가요 - end

가 - subject marker

의 - possession marker

요 - makes things more poliet

Video credit:  (youtube)

A Korean actress will be in the group SDN48’s third generation.  I thought this was very interesting so I decided to look it up!

새로운 한류의 신호탄?

New Hallyu flare?

새로운 - new

한류의 - hallyu (+grammar marker that indicates possession) 

신호탄 - flare

영화배우 정시연, 일본 걸 그룹 SDN48 정식 데뷔

Actress Jung Siyeon, to formally debut in Japanese girl group SDN48.

영화배우 - actress

일본 - Japan/Japanese

걸 - girl (Konglish)

그룹 - group (Konglish)

정식 - formally

데뷔 - debut (Konglish)

Curious about the band she’s debuting into?  SDN48 is a sister group to AKB48 (yes, that AKB48, the one smashing records right now) and this far into their career they’ve shown strong interests in debuting in Korea and producing Korean language music.  They even have a song called “Ai chuseyo”  (Love Please) which has Korean right in the title.  They are “adult idols” so don’t expect the stuff you see from SNSD, Kara, or even their sister groups.  None of the girls are minors.  Consider the fact they’re called “adult idols” and that none of them are minors your full warning about anything SDN48.

I wanted to post something about this because this is how misunderstandings happen and anti fans form:  Girls Day were not showing off their underwear in their short-short outfits.  

The white shorts you’re seeing are called dancers shorts, or spankies.  They’re tight, short shorts and, on the contrary, you wear them in order to hide your underwear.  Dancers, cheerleaders, and performers use them often in short outfits. 

걸스데이 기저귀패션 논란 해명 “반바지인데 춤추다 보니…”

Rough Translation:  Girls Day’s diaper fashion controversy explanation “it is dance shorts you’re seeing”

걸스데 - Girls Day

이 - subject marker

기저귀 - diaper

패션 - fashion (Konglish)

논란 - controversy 

해명 - explanation

반바지 - shorts

춤추다 - do a dance

보니 - watch, see

Source:  tvreport.co.kr

안녕하세요!

 넌 고양이있어요?

둘 고양이있어요!  

Translation: Hello!  Do you have a cat?  I have two cats! 

The picture above is my cat Sol~ (솔); Sol is short for soleil which is French for something like sun/sunny.  

(Je suis franco-americaine…that feels strange to say since I haven’t ran into many, if any, French-American things.  There’s a definite disconnect between the two.  However, my rambling about my background isn’t meant for this blog~)

Vocabulary

• 고양이 - cat
• 강아지 - puppy (나  강아지있어요~)
• 개 - dog
• 토끼 - rabbit
• 도마뱀 - lizard
• 뱀 - snake
• 생쥐 - mouse (as in the pet, not the computer part)
• 새 - bird (ps.  This is part of a Korean swear word too~)
• 바다거북 - turtle
• 돌 - rock/stone (we’ve all had a pet rock at some point, right?)

And just because I like these animals (they obviously aren’t pets!)

• 팬더 - panda
• 호랑이 - tiger 

Video Credit:  sayurixchan@youtube

떠나가 - leave, depart 

떠나다 - the verb form of leave, depart

가 - subject marker

또 - again

나를 - me (+object marker)

찾지 - find, look for,  

지 - again hard to explain the function of 지…it has a wide range of functions apparently and in this case it’s being used to make a blunt statement.  It’s a bit informal (which might explain why it’s hard to find clear explanations on).  I’ll keep researching 지 and post what I find when I’m more confident.

말고 - can be used as do not, without

살아가다 - verb form of 살아가라, live, make a living, 

라 - from 살아가라, used for emphasizes.  He’s pretty much saying “Live!”  instead of “Live.”

 So to put this together:  또 나를 찾지 말고 살아가라 

Again me look for do not live 

Do not look for me again and live!   

I’m hooked…hard.  I love this song!

I don’t know I don’t know
내가 왜 이러는지

내가 - I (+ subject marker)

나 and a subject marker becomes 내가.

왜 - why

이러 - to be like this

는지 - not translation:  this thing is confusing.  I found one place that means it indicates a question (make sense in the sentience) and another that states  that it makes the verb into the object.  Confusing!  

“Why I am like this?” Makes sense and that happens to be the common translation of “내가 왜 이러는지” floating around.

Sorry, day two is late.  Life has been busy with hospital visits for various family members in the last 24 hours.  However, this isn’t the place to explain all that.

Day Two:

되다  - to become, get to be (endic.naver.com)

우리 - we, us, our

The catch with uri - often times Koreans will use 우리 instead of na (I, my, mine) for things.  You may hear people say “우리 엄마” to say “my mother” when it literally means “our mother”.  Korean is a very group oriented culture in general.  In fact, SNSD’s Yuri was bashed for saying “my country” (when talking about hanbok) instead of saying “our country”.  She said “저희” when the correct phrase would have been “우리”.  For us outsiders saying “my” for things that are ours (for example my mother is not your mother so I wouldn’t say “our mother”) is common but in Korea 우리 is often used instead.  (krnloop.wordpress.com)

어디서나 당당하게걷기

Anywhere you go, walk confidently.  

The video I was watching has it translated as “Walk confidently anywhere you go.”  Same thing, no?  

youtube credits: gossipwhatever

Anyway, breaking down 어디서나 당당하게걷기 is actually kind of fun.

어디서나 - anywhere

당당하 - confident

게 - makes confident an adverb, aka it’s now confidently.  The general rule of thumb is that adverbs modify verbs.  (Also adverbs modify adjectives and other adverbs, but, if nothing else, remember that they modify verbs.) In this case confident(ly) is describing you how you should walk.  Walk is the verb.  

(PS. 게 also means crab)  

걷기 - walk

Can you put the parts together now?  

Recently, I stumbled up sites discussing “한국어 학습용 어휘 목록” as decided by the National Institute of the Korean Language (NIKL).  They (NIKL) decided on around 6000 words that a Korean learner must know in order to establish some sort of fluency in the Korean language.  This was decided on back in 2003 and as such I am having some difficulty finding the list.  However, if you keep searching you do find things.  

From here on out I will include “Essential Korean”, as decided by the NIKL, at this blog.  For more advanced learners the beginning stuff will seem very basic but I hope we can all learn.

Todays lesson is:

하다 - to do, to have (endic.naver.com)

밥을 하다 - make rice 

밥 - rice

을 - direct object marker

하다 - to do, or in this case make

(example taken from the same naver link from above)

있다 - to be located/situated at/in, to be (in a state), to have

그 도시는 서울의 북서쪽에 있다

그 - the

도시 - town/city

는 - topic marker

서울 - Seoul 

의 - of, it indicates posession

북 - north

서 - west

북서쪽에 - north west side

있다 - to be located at

The city is located to the north west side of Seoul.

These may or may not be useful when it comes to talking about Korean grammar.  Depends on how deep into grammar you get.

• 동사 - verb
• 명사 - noun
• 부사 - adverb
• 형용사 - adjective 
• 전치사 - preposition
• 전치사 구문 - prepositional phrase 

This was inspired by Korean Word a Day’s tumblr.  He provides a new word of Korean everyday and, in the definition/usage stuff he provides for the word, there are some of these phrases.

This can be confusing if you don’t know what the phrases, meant to help you in usage of the Korean word, mean.  

For example the one of the latest posts at Korean Word a Day is about 투표 (vote) and in the post is shows that it can be used as a 명사 and a 동사.  Now you know that it means it can be used as a noun and verb.   

Check out Korean Word A Day:  http://koreanwordaday.tumblr.com/