3 13 2020
Dear Reader,
After a nice evening nap (that turned into a full blown slumber) I found myself up at 1 AM wondering what to do with myself. I have been practicing Korean and feeling like I'm getting a little stuck, so I said to myself: what the heck, why not try to study now.
I googled 요리사 to try and find something familiar to start with. After some time in TTMIK (talktomeinkorean.com) I know the word for cook and a bunch of other words to help me me get started talking more deeply about regular areas of life. I talk a lot about food, engineering, and school, so I look up the words 요리사 (cook) and 공학 (engineering study) a lot. As I try and read, it's really a walk through the dictionary, but it's fun to discover nouns and verbs used in a context that I actually find useful. So I don't mind the dictionary walk because I know I will be using what I learned very soon. Even when there's no one to talk to, I just keep a diary and talk about what interests me. Sometimes I write in Korean to practice the new words I learn. my goal is to one day be familiar enough with Korean that I can write my everyday kind of thoughts in Korean. So the familiar things I tend to learn about in Korean are also words pertaining to love, dating, family, and money. I also end up turning to TTMIK (a great resource that I highly recommend checking out whether you're a beginner or advanced) to learn more grammar so that I can express more complex ideas in Korean. Right now though, I'm just trying to get more creative with the basic structures and transition words I already know.
This brings me to a point about language practice that I really wanna talk about: breaking down your English thinking into simpler sentences so that it's easier to start thinking in Korean. What I like to do is write a paragraph about some in English. Then, if it's too complex for me to translate in Korean, instead of going to a translator straight away I start to wonder if there is a simpler or more concise way of expressing my ideas.
For example....
When an English sentence is hard, I make an easy sentence that means the same. Then I use a dictionary with the easy sentence. [long sentence, subordinate adverbial clause, descriptive clause]
or
This sentence is too hard. I'll write an easy, similar sentence. Then I'll use the dictionary. [simpler grammar structures, Subject-predicate, subject-verb-object, subject verb object, fewer words to look up]
Which sentence is easier to translate? The second one. Sure, maybe I'll get more out of trying to translate the first, but the second is just as useful in a similar context especially if I am talking to someone and I can point to what I'm doing. And progress is progress. If you're just not ready for the big stuff, write or speak smaller sentence. You have to start somewhere!
If you have an interest in any language--not just Korean--this was for you :)
Bye,
Waterfall girl.
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