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This lesson introduced a few standard greetings that can be used when meeting someone for the first time. The following are a few notes that go more in-depth into these greetings, as well as some important grammar points related to the lesson.

Vocabulary

Hello - 안녕하세요?

• 안 녕하세요? (annyeonghaseyo?) has the literal meaning of “Are you at peace?” But this is used like the English “Hello.” This can be used during the morning, day, and evening, and is used for people who are on formal or polite speaking terms.

It’s Nice to Meet You - 처음 뵙겠습니다

• “It’s nice to meet you” - The expression 처음 뵙겠습니다 (cheoeum boepgesseubnida) literally means “I’m meeting you for the first time,” but is translated as “It’s nice to meet you.” This is used when meeting someone for the first time.

Grammar Focus

The Copula - 이다 

• The affirmative Korean copula – the verb expressing “to be” – is 이다 (ida). When 이다 is conjugated in the present tense and expressed for use in a formal context, it changes into 입니다 (imnida).
  

The Formal Declarative Sentence Ending - ㅂ/습니다

• To conjugate 이다 (ida) using this sentence ending, we take the dictionary form of the copula 이다 (ida) and remove 다 (da) to get the verb stem, 이 (i). From there we add ㅂ 니다 (mnida). 이 (i) + ㅂ 니다 (mnida) = 입니다 (imnida).

• For verb stems that end in vowels we attach ㅂ 니다 (mnida), such as the case is with 이다 (ida), the copula.

• For verb stems that end in consonants, we attach 습니다 (seumnida).
  

Dropping the “I”

• As is often done in Korean, when the meaning can be clearly derived from context, dropping 저는(jeoneun), which means “I” with the topic particle, is acceptable in the conversation.

Hello!
Thanks to everyone who has been following us on Twitter!

Here at KoreanClass101.com we think that Twitter is great for communication and sharing information. We also think it makes for a powerful learning tool! So starting today, we’ll be introducing Korean vocabulary and phrases daily on Twitter that follow a set theme.

The third theme will be words that are related to transportation.

For each mini lesson, you will get one noun or verb, and then one or two sample sentences showing you how the word can be used.

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Leave us some feedback and if you have any suggestions for our next vocab themes, let us know!

화이팅!
Good luck with your studies!

#1 지하철 (jihacheol) = subway trains / 지하철 타고 왔어요. (I came here by subway.) 지하철이 가장 빨라요. (The subway is the fastest.)

#2 표 (pyo) = ticket / 지하철 표 있어요? (Do you have a subway ticket?) 표 어디에서 샀어요? (Where did you buy the ticket?)

#3 버스 (beoseu) = bus / 버스에 사람이 너무 많아요. (There are too many people on the bus.) 버스로 갈아타야 돼요. (We have to transfer to a bus.)

Click here to follow us on Twitter and see more updates on these mini lessons!

Hello!
Thanks to everyone who has been following us on Twitter!

Here at KoreanClass101.com we think that Twitter is great for communication and sharing information. We also think it makes for a powerful learning tool! So starting today, we’ll be introducing Korean vocabulary and phrases daily on Twitter that follow a set theme.

The second theme is the most frequently used action verbs in Korean.

For each mini lesson, you will get one action verb and then one or two sample sentences showing you how the verb can be used.

So don’t forget to follow us on Twitter!

(http://twitter.com/koreanclass101)

Leave us some feedback and if you have any suggestions for our next vocab themes, let us know!

화이팅!
Good luck with your studies!

#1 하다 (hada) = to do / 지금 뭐 해요? (What are you doing now?) / 내일 뭐 할 거예요? (What are you going to do tomorrow?)

#2 가다 (gada) = to go / 이제 집에 갈 거예요. (I’m going to go home now.) / 주말에 어디 갔어요? (Where did you go on the weekend?)

#3 만나다 (mannada) = to meet / 친구 만나서 밥 먹을 거예요. (I’m going to meet a friend and eat together.) / 내일 만날래요? (Do you want to meet tomorrow?)

#4 보다 (boda) = to see, to watch, to read / 이 영화 봤어요? (Have you watched this movie?) / 지금 책 보고 있어요. (I’m reading a book now.)

#5 듣다 (deutda) = to hear, to listen / 이 노래 자주 들어요. (I listen to this song often.) / 지금 뭐 들어요? (What are you listening to?)

#6 먹다 (meokda) = to eat / 먹고 싶은 거 있어요? (Is there anything you want to eat?) / 밥 먹으러 가자. (Let’s go eat.)

#7 마시다 (masida) = to drink / 술 많이 마시지 마세요. (Don’t drink too much alcohol.) / 물 마실래? (Do you want some water?)

#8 쓰다 (sseuda) = to use, to write / 편지 썼어요. (I’ve written you a letter.) / 이거 써 봤어요? (Have you tried using this?)

#9 사다 (sada) = to buy / 뭐 샀어요? (What did you buy?) / 선물 안 사도 괜찮아요? (Is it okay even if I don’t buy a present?)
#10 되다 (doeda) = to become, to be possible / 선생님이 될 거예요. (I’m going to become a teacher.) / 인터넷이 안 돼요. (The internet is not working.)

#11 주다 (juda) = to give / 남자친구가 줬어요. (My boyfriend gave this to me.) 여자친구한테 줄 거예요. (I’m going to give this to my girlfriend.)

#12 받다 (badta) = to receive / 제 편지 받았어요? (Did you receive my letter?) 아까 문자 받았어요. (I received the text message earlier.)

#13 생각하다 (saenggakhada) = to think / 어떻게 생각해요? (What do you think?) 무슨 생각 해요? (What are you thinking about?)

#14 놀다 (nolda) = to play, to hang out / 어제 친구들하고 신촌에서 놀았어요. (I hung out with my friends yesterday.) 그만 놀고 공부해. (Stop playing and study.)

#15 일하다 (ilhada) = to work / 오늘은 몇 시까지 일해요? (Until what time do you work today?) 여기서 일하고 싶어요. (I want to work here.)

#16 보내다 (bonaeda) = to spend, to send / 주말 잘 보냈어요? (Did you have a nice weekend?) 한국에서 집에 엽서를 보냈어요. (I sent a postcard home from Korea.)

#17 도착하다 (dochakhada) = to arrive / 무사히 도착했어요. (I’ve arrived safely.) 몇 시에 도착할 것 같아요? (What time do you think you will arrive?)

#18 늦다 (neutda) = to be late / 조금 늦을 것 같아요. (I think I’ll be a little bit late.) 늦어서 죄송합니다. (Sorry for being late.)

#19 알다 (alda) = to know / 여기는 아는 사람이 없어요. (I don’t know anyone here.) 어떻게 알았어요? (How did you know that?)

#20 모르다 (moreuda) = to not know / 모르는 것이 있으면 물어보세요. (If there’s anything you don’t know, please ask me.) 아직 몰랐어요? (You still didn’t know?)

#21 잊어버리다 (ijeobeorida) = to forget / 잊어버리지 말고 은행에 가야 돼요. (Don’t forget to go to the bank.) 비밀번호를 잊어버렸어요. (I forgot the password.)

Click here to follow us on Twitter and see more updates on these mini lessons!

Hyunwoo here. : )

Here is a very common mistake that a lot of Korean learners (and even some Korean people) make.

When you want to say, “what should I do?” or “what are we supposed to do?” you can say 어떡해?

But a lot of people write 어떻게?

What’s the difference?

어떡해? vs 어떻게?

어떡해 is a combination of 어떻게 +해.

So if you just write 어떻게, it means “how” or “using what kind of method” so it does not convey the complete meaning of “What am I supposed to do?”

Well, when you are SPEAKING, those two phrases sound the same, but when you write, it is important to be able to distinguish the two.

So remember : )

어떻게 = “how”

어떡해 = “What am I supposed to do?”

Thanks for reading!

- Hyunwoo

How to Really Learn Korean in Just Minutes a Day and Stick with it

The Myth

What if I told you mastering Korean wasn’t that hard. That actually learning the language itself is not nearly as difficult as you may have heard. And that the problem to progressing is an age old one…failure to execute.

The Real Issue

Said another way, “People don’t progress ’cause they don’t do! If you don’t do the work, you won’t reach your goals.” Read the rest of this entry »

The Month of May in Korea is often called Family Month. There’s Children’s Day, Parent’s Day, and Teacher’s Day. Korea takes Mother’s Day to a whole different level! On these days you give your Children, Parents and Teachers gifts to show them how much you appreciate them. Children often benefit the most with candy and money being popular gifts. Teachers get quite a lot of gifts as well as they have many students and parents to receive gifts from. And that’s why the month of May is called Family month in Korea!

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Hi Hyunwoo here. I hope everybody is having a wonderful day and enjoying your Korean studies. Some might think there’s enough variety to the list of categories on this blog already, but I’ve just added one more category to it. And as you can see, it’s about how to translate certain words or phrases between English and Korean - sometimes from English to Korean, and other times, the other way around.

I’d like to start with a very basic word describing a very important behavior, which, however, is not translated very correctly all the time.

It’s  ‘to eat.’

What’s the Korean word for it? It’s very easy. 먹다.

But the thing is, when you use it in a sentence, you always need an object noun. So for example, if you want to say “I’m eating pizza.” you can say 피자 먹고 있어요. (I’ll write all the Korean sentences in the standard polite level) and if you want to say “I’m eating lunch.” you can say 점심 먹고 있어요.

But what if you want to say,

“I’m eating.”

or

“Don’t talk while you’re eating.”

or

“I eat slowly.”

how would you translate these sentences into Korean?

Most people would go,

저는 먹고 있어요.

먹을 때 이야기하지 마세요.

저는 천천히 먹어요.

While these sentences above are all correct grammatically, they are all missing something. When Korean people use the verb 먹다, they always like to add a noun - an object.  So it’s always “something + 을/를” 먹다. So the sentences above would become more natural by changing them to:

저는 밥(을) 먹고 있어요.

밥  먹을 때 이야기하지 마세요. or 음식 먹을 때 이야기 하지 마세요.

저는 밥을 천천히 먹어요. or 저는 음식을 천천히 먹어요.

So please remember not to use the verb ‘to eat’ on its own in a sentence in most cases, and add 음식, 밥, 점심, 저녁, 아침 or any other noun for food when you use the verb 먹다. And when you want to ask your friend “Have you eaten?” don’t ask “먹었어?” but please ask “밥 먹었어?”

Thanks for reading!

Really Simple Korean Conversation #3

Cast:
Emily (listener/blogger of KoreanClass101.com)
Matthew (listener/blogger of KoreanClass101.com)
Max (listener of KoreanClass101.com)
Hyunwoo (host of KoreanClass101.com)
Gyeong-eun (host of KoreanClass101.com)

You too can participate! If you want to participate in the video, email us at contactus@koreanclass101.com !

As Matthew explained in his last post, kids in Korea have a lot of pressure to perform well in school, and not only in normal classroom activities but also in extracurricular studies, sports, foreign languages, music, etc, etc, etc.. What he didn’t mention, however, is how much Korean mothers like to brag about their friends’ children, and how well they are at the aforementioned etc, etc, etc..

A very interesting expression has come out of this phenomenon: 엄친아. This is short for 엄마 친구 아들 (mom’s friend’s son).

As any Korean child would know, your 엄친아 always gets perfect grades, speaks perfect english, and french, and japanese, plays at least 3 musical instruments, plays soccer, volunteers every week, and is absolutely gorgeous while doing all of it. And he obeys his mother, of course. Plus more. No matter what, you can never compete with 엄친아. 엄친아 will always win (even if they don’t actually exist).

This expression is now also commonly used to describe a guy who seems to have all of these perfect brag-worth qualities. It is a way to describe this sort of ideal guy who excels at everything. But girls, we are not off the hook either. Although it is not as commonly used, there is also the expression 엄친딸 : 엄마 친구 딸 (mother’s friend’s daughter).

Interestingly enough, a lot of news reporters and bloggers are using this expression to describe 꽃보다 남자 actor 김범 in a lot of recent reports. I would definitely have to agree that he has all the qualities of a model 엄친아.

Have you ever heard this expression before? Were you always compared to 엄친아 as a child?

Also, if you haven’t already listened to Advanced Lesson #8, you can hear more about 엄친아 there.

^^

Really Simple Korean Conversation #2

Featuring

Gyeong-eun (Host of KoreanClass101.com)
Hyunwoo (Host of KoreanClass101.com)
Emily (Listener/Blogger of KoreanClass101.com)
Matthew (Listener/Blogger of KoreanClass101.com)
Max (Listener of KoreanClass101.com)