Tuesday, August 9, 2011

Junbi or prepare or 준비

When I was little, we used to take part in some korean martial arts called taekwondo.

And the first command or word by the instructor was junbi. 준비

In teochew, junbi means "to prepare". Or "get ready".

Sunday, July 31, 2011

Korean Leng tang or cold tub cold bath

Mogyeoktang (public bath) comprise of un-taang (hot tub) and leng-taang (cold tub).
And in Teochew, "leng" means cold as well!

PS: Any readers can help me write the hangul of "leng" and "un"?

Friday, July 29, 2011

Book or chaeg or 책

책 is chaeg. Book. Sounds exactly the same in Teochew!

The Journey of Learning Korean

Besides being very impressed with Korea's development, the Korean language caught my attention, when many little phrases and words are similar to the teochew language. My learning Korean journey is only the beginning. And hopefully the momentum will keep on going.

The K-pop wave or hallyu swept across Asia and even to Europe for years, since the launch of paradigm-changing movies such as My Sassy Girl (엽기적인 그녀 That Bizarre Girl), Winter Sonata (겨울연가 Gyeoul Yeonga) and Taegukgi Hwinallimyo (Hangul: 태극기 휘날리며) - hit a right chord in people's mind and hearts.

I have to admit I was not fully caught up with this trend. I did managed to watch several powerful Korean movies during my movie going years (2004-2006) averaging one cinema movie per week.
Old Boy (black dark tough)
Taegukgi (my favourite)
3 Iron (strange bizarre artistic)

Only last year I managed to get hold of My Sassy Girl.
Music wise, I had one customer who gave me a compilation CD of popular Korean Original Sound Tracks (OST). Most of the songs were slow. Such as "Perhaps Love", From The Start Till Now, I Believe (this is very popular).

Late last year, I was intrigue by a fast paced korean song playing in my gym. The title was "Go Away" by 2NE1. Took me a while sifting through YouTube to get this song. Firstly, I don't have a clue what the title was. A few lines in the song was in English, and I used that as a search clue. Then going through artiste, and songs - listening and soon found it.

Shigan or time or 시간

시간 this means shigan or time. In teochew, it is si3 gang. The korean pronunciation is rather fast. Shigan. Do you have time? So it is one common word.

Thursday, July 28, 2011

Haksheng or student

학생 is haksheng. And this was one of the most similar sounding words to Teochew. Haksheng means student. In Korea, haksheng also is used as a common name-caller. E.g. if you saw a young teenager, you can just call "haksheng" instead of not knowing the teenager's name and unsure what to use.

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Paek or hundred

One hundred or hundred is 백 or paek.
In Teochew too, it is paek. Sar-paek means three hundred. For Korean language, it is Sam-paek.

Monday, July 25, 2011

Mogyoktang or hot bath tub

First word in this blog is mogyoktang ( 목욕탕 ).
In teochew, "tang" means a huge tub to contain water. Chui tang, is a water tub.

So it was surprising when I learnt that one very big korean culture - mogyoktang - hot bath sauna has such a fine connection to teochew language. 

Welcome to Korean Teochew Language Discovery

Thanks for reading this blog and a warm welcome to you. This blog is simply about Korean and Teochew Language Discovery. Showcasing similarities in both these seemingly different and faraway language.

How it was started: Recently after visiting Seoul, South Korea, I discovered that there are quite a few words in Korean that are similar or same as in the teochew dialect. (Taechew/Teochew southern dialect)

Discovery: discovery is most apt since the crux of the blog is about discovering these "connections" and perhaps pondering and sharing why and how, comments and more from readers.