Korean in Taiwan
Sunday, March 2nd, 2008
I usually write about my experiences with Korean orphans, but I’ve just spent a week in Taipei, so I decided to switch things up a little bit…
Of course, the language of Taiwan in Chinese, but a lot of Koreans travel there, and my Korean came in handy at least once. I was entirely unprepared for the Chinese… I should have spent some time with SurvivalPhrases.com before the trip. Alas, I was hopelessly lost, except for the precious few Hanja I understand and recognize.
In Taipei, there is a section of town called Snake Alley. It must have been much more exciting in it’s hey day, but now is just another street market. The name comes from store fronts where the guy will pull out a large (2m) long snake and bash it’s head to stun it, hang it by the “neck” and then slice open the main artery to drain all the blood. I guess they serve the meat as well - but I didn’t try. We also weren’t allowed to take pictures…which is where my Korean came in handy. I was standing in front of one such snake butcher, and recognized some Korean tourists. After living in Seoul for a while, Koreans can be pretty easy to identify. But they were also speaking Korean. I stepped over to one woman and said:
“혹시요..뱀고기를 목고 싶어요? ” (Excuse me.. do you want to eat snake meat?)
She responded by shaking her hand and head, and saying in English “”No.” She ran back to her friends, who must have said something like “I think he just spoke Korean to you!” She came back, and we proceeded to have a pretty standard conversation about how well I supposedly know Korean, where I live, what I do for a job, etc. Then she wanted to take a picture of the snake gutting. But the man behind the counter said “No Picture!” I guess these Koreans don’t speak English, because she kept right on clicking. So I stepped in:
“사진 찍지 마세요” (Don’t take pictures)
-”왜요?” (Why?)
“저 남자가 찍지마래요” (That man said not to take any)
So, you never know when your Korean will come in handy! Have any of you had some great experiences with Korean outside of Korea?
Posted by 오민 (Austin) in Travels in Korea |
March 1st, 2008 at 1:03 am
Great experience !
Hehe. Seems like you had a very good time in Taiwan! 
I had a similar experience, but on the opposite part.. haha. I was traveling in France and I was totally lost inside a subway station, and as I was looking to figure out what exit I should get out from to go to my destination, I heard a voice asking me “한국 분이시죠? 도와드릴까요?(You’re from Korea, right? Can I help you?)” in PERFECT Korean, so I looked around to see where a Korean person was standing, but instead of a Korean person, whom I saw was a man from Pakistan who said he had spent three years in Seoul and he spoke impeccable Korean… and he told me how to get to the place I was looking for, and disppeared even before I could thank him properly.
March 3rd, 2008 at 11:56 pm
Nice story. But I would’ve let them take pictures anyway. Sometimes, not understanding has it’s advantages too.
It’s so fun to be able to use languages that one studies with native speakers. I once gave directions to a building in American Sign Language (I hope he didn’t get lost, hehehe). So far all of my experiences with Korean are outside of Korea but they’re all rewarding and makes me want to keep studying.
May 15th, 2008 at 4:55 pm
I had an interesting experience on my very first day back in the States (San Antonio, Texas) after spending a year in Korea. I was sitting at a bar in Bennigan’s and three people came in, sat down right next to me and were speaking Korean amongst each other. I thought it was the beer or something with jet lag messing with my head. But sure enough, they were speaking Korea. I asked them, just to be sure and were they ever surprised. I’m a typical American looking girl. Anyhow I responded with “nanun namja chingu hanguk saram ieyo” (sorry my laptop doesn’t type hangul). So I think I made their day telling them how much I loved kimchi jigae and deokboki and yadda yadda, expressing my knowledge and love for Korea. Haha, instant friendship! Funny that prior to coming to Korea I wouldn’t have had a clue what language they were speaking. I’m back in Seoul now, still learning and loving the language and culture.