Quote from: MataHari on September 01, 2016, 12:59:17 pmQuote from: The Arm on September 01, 2016, 12:51:50 pmI can accept foreigners won't have perfect pronunciation but if you're in a coffee shop then the Korean staffs' ears should be listening out for relevant words. You're not going to go into a coffee shop and ask for a washing machine. Just listen. I was in a restaurant once and I called the waitress over and said "물좀주세요". She looked at me like I had two heads. But think...I'm eating in a restaurant so she should already be honing in on specific words. Even if my pronunciation was terrible, she must have heard the 'm' sound and then the following vowel sound. So I either want water or radish. She just carried on staring at me, open-mouthed.Anyway, I'm flogging a dead horse I know. I'm making no real attempts to learn Korean these days so I can't exactly moan and complain +1I definitely get the frustration though. There are times when the thing on the menu is literally in English, and yet somehow it's my pronunciation that's strange. It's definitely a valid point. I just wanted to suggest that their POV might be valid too, at least half the time.
Quote from: The Arm on September 01, 2016, 12:51:50 pmI can accept foreigners won't have perfect pronunciation but if you're in a coffee shop then the Korean staffs' ears should be listening out for relevant words. You're not going to go into a coffee shop and ask for a washing machine. Just listen. I was in a restaurant once and I called the waitress over and said "물좀주세요". She looked at me like I had two heads. But think...I'm eating in a restaurant so she should already be honing in on specific words. Even if my pronunciation was terrible, she must have heard the 'm' sound and then the following vowel sound. So I either want water or radish. She just carried on staring at me, open-mouthed.Anyway, I'm flogging a dead horse I know. I'm making no real attempts to learn Korean these days so I can't exactly moan and complain +1
I can accept foreigners won't have perfect pronunciation but if you're in a coffee shop then the Korean staffs' ears should be listening out for relevant words. You're not going to go into a coffee shop and ask for a washing machine. Just listen. I was in a restaurant once and I called the waitress over and said "물좀주세요". She looked at me like I had two heads. But think...I'm eating in a restaurant so she should already be honing in on specific words. Even if my pronunciation was terrible, she must have heard the 'm' sound and then the following vowel sound. So I either want water or radish. She just carried on staring at me, open-mouthed.Anyway, I'm flogging a dead horse I know. I'm making no real attempts to learn Korean these days so I can't exactly moan and complain
Quote from: kyndo on September 01, 2016, 11:11:30 am,,,I suspect that, all things being equal, heavily accented English might be easier to understand than an equally poor Korean... but not by much.But my point is that when you mispronounce English, you aren't accidentally saying completely different English words most of the time. And that adds an extra obstacle to things. Plus English-speakers trying to learn Korean is a relatively new thing here, so almost every Korean you come into contact with is going to be that "monolingual redneck". (I'm not trying to call all Koreans rednecks, this is just for comparison).
,,,I suspect that, all things being equal, heavily accented English might be easier to understand than an equally poor Korean... but not by much.
Quote from: Ajahya on September 01, 2016, 01:12:55 pmQuote from: MataHari on September 01, 2016, 12:59:17 pmQuote from: The Arm on September 01, 2016, 12:51:50 pmI can accept foreigners won't have perfect pronunciation but if you're in a coffee shop then the Korean staffs' ears should be listening out for relevant words. You're not going to go into a coffee shop and ask for a washing machine. Just listen. I was in a restaurant once and I called the waitress over and said "물좀주세요". She looked at me like I had two heads. But think...I'm eating in a restaurant so she should already be honing in on specific words. Even if my pronunciation was terrible, she must have heard the 'm' sound and then the following vowel sound. So I either want water or radish. She just carried on staring at me, open-mouthed.Anyway, I'm flogging a dead horse I know. I'm making no real attempts to learn Korean these days so I can't exactly moan and complain +1I definitely get the frustration though. There are times when the thing on the menu is literally in English, and yet somehow it's my pronunciation that's strange. It's definitely a valid point. I just wanted to suggest that their POV might be valid too, at least half the time.My favourite thing is when a menu will say 해물탕/해물전 and the English portion will say Haemultang/HaemuljeonUhhhhhhhhhh, thanks?
Quote from: Ajahya on September 01, 2016, 11:52:52 amQuote from: kyndo on September 01, 2016, 11:11:30 am,,,I suspect that, all things being equal, heavily accented English might be easier to understand than an equally poor Korean... but not by much.But my point is that when you mispronounce English, you aren't accidentally saying completely different English words most of the time. And that adds an extra obstacle to things. Plus English-speakers trying to learn Korean is a relatively new thing here, so almost every Korean you come into contact with is going to be that "monolingual redneck". (I'm not trying to call all Koreans rednecks, this is just for comparison).I don't really disagree with you, but I don't think people realise how finicky English really is: sure, many words have distinct sounds (especially longer ones), but there are so many different parts of English that can really throw off understanding. Word order is a biggie: English relies heavily on correct word order in order for the desired meaning to come through. Most other languages are much more forgiving (Greek being the prime example).English also has incredibly messy conjugations that if done incorrectly can elicit those wtm reactions.Anyway, like I've already said: I agree that English might be somewhat more forgiving than Korean, but the vast majority of a native English speaker's ability to understand accented/mangled English is just that they are so much more accustomed to it.
Quote from: krissyboo75 on September 01, 2016, 11:46:38 amQuote from: CO2 on September 01, 2016, 11:43:04 amQuote from: jupinkorea on September 01, 2016, 10:41:24 amQuote from: yirj17 on September 01, 2016, 10:18:29 amIf you mispronounce "28" it can end up being a curse word. Fortunately I've an older brother who studied Korean and taught me the distinction.It's actually 1828?Like he gives 2 f*cks Apparently 28 is worse, but I can't remember why.Because 2 is worse than 1 Anyway. My bad. I'm used to saying 28 since that's my Korean age so I rarely say 18. But like this guy said: Quote from: donovan on September 01, 2016, 11:46:56 amIt can also be heard in 38, 78, 118, 1,818... Guess it just depends on how many you give
Quote from: CO2 on September 01, 2016, 11:43:04 amQuote from: jupinkorea on September 01, 2016, 10:41:24 amQuote from: yirj17 on September 01, 2016, 10:18:29 amIf you mispronounce "28" it can end up being a curse word. Fortunately I've an older brother who studied Korean and taught me the distinction.It's actually 1828?Like he gives 2 f*cks Apparently 28 is worse, but I can't remember why.
Quote from: jupinkorea on September 01, 2016, 10:41:24 amQuote from: yirj17 on September 01, 2016, 10:18:29 amIf you mispronounce "28" it can end up being a curse word. Fortunately I've an older brother who studied Korean and taught me the distinction.It's actually 1828?Like he gives 2 f*cks
Quote from: yirj17 on September 01, 2016, 10:18:29 amIf you mispronounce "28" it can end up being a curse word. Fortunately I've an older brother who studied Korean and taught me the distinction.It's actually 18
If you mispronounce "28" it can end up being a curse word. Fortunately I've an older brother who studied Korean and taught me the distinction.
It can also be heard in 38, 78, 118, 1,818...
Hoooooly shit I had a terrible first day at the job. Let me just vent everything here. Some background info about me first. I'm a 20 year old Korean american student that moved to Korea recently from US. I got hired by a Hagwon nearby and as I said, it was my first day teaching today. I can understand korean little bit but I can't speak korean well. First class was pop song class and I admit I wasn't very well prepared but the students couldn't understand the song at all (Skyfall by Adele. I chose a slow song on purpose). I wrote the lyrics on the board and tried to explain but half the class was me trying to explain english words in korean and hand motions. I doubt they learned anything from this class at all. They looked at me like this the whole time . This was elementary school levelSecond class I was a bit more prepared so I did okay I think. This time I was with middle school students. The song was Happy by Pharrell Williams and I made a fill in the blank in lyrics work sheet. The song was too fast for them so after letting them listen to the song 2 times and filling as much as they can, I just went over the answers. I had some time left so I decided to discuss the meaning of the song but they didn't understand that at all. Third class was reading class (middle school). I liked this much more since it's more like following the instructions rather than coming up with your own stuff. Anyways, I just read out loud and told them to repeat after me. I asked them questions about the story after reading a paragraph or two. It was mostly one student answering all the questions though . I told her to let the other students answer but they had more trouble answering my questions. At the end of the class I told them to summarize what we read so far to me but they didn't understand that at all. I don't think they understood the story muchWhat I observed was that they have pretty good reading comprehension but they have pretty bad listening comprehension and speaking skills. I suspect this is due to Korea focusing on vocabulary and reading and neglect listening and speaking. This is hard for me since I have to speak in English. How can I teach anything when they don't even understand what I'm saying. I felt so ****** incompetent and I'm tired as ****. Any tips would be appreciated.
Quote from: FreddyPrinceWilliam on September 01, 2016, 10:49:22 pmQuote from: katsuya245126 on September 01, 2016, 10:17:52 pmHoooooly ... snipWELCOME TO KOREA! LOLOLOLOLJust push through it. Lower your expectations and don't expect to make huge changes.The system in place here for learning English is broken. I've realized they only study for exams and don't really pay much attention to something that's not exam related. I know I shouldn't expect to make huge changes but I really hate feeling incompetent so I at least want to be able to communicate and explain things to them.
Quote from: katsuya245126 on September 01, 2016, 10:17:52 pmHoooooly ... snipWELCOME TO KOREA! LOLOLOLOLJust push through it. Lower your expectations and don't expect to make huge changes.The system in place here for learning English is broken.
Hoooooly ... snip
So I moved to my apartment yesterday in Habuk (Yangsan). After picking me up from the office of education and we headed to Yangsan, he kept telling me that he has two daughters at home and his wife is angry so he had to go home. I didn't get to the Immigration Bureau or the bank. Luckily I had told him I should buy groceries so he took me there. He didn't look too happy because he was such in a rush to go home. I realized after my co-teacher had left that my apartment did not have bedsheets, pillows or blankets. Thankfully my scarves were big enough to be used as my shower towel, my bedsheet and blanket. I didn't have wifi in my apartment so I walked to Paris Baquette and met an elderly Russian man whom I tried to speak to but he just cut me out. I am terribly lonely and although I know it's only the first few days here, I'm freaking out about how bad this could be. I just expected to be better taken cared of instead of just being tossed to figure everything out by myself. :(Anyone in Habuk or has ever been in Habuk?
Quote from: PMDL123 on September 02, 2016, 08:27:52 amSo I moved to my apartment yesterday in Habuk (Yangsan). After picking me up from the office of education and we headed to Yangsan, he kept telling me that he has two daughters at home and his wife is angry so he had to go home. I didn't get to the Immigration Bureau or the bank. Luckily I had told him I should buy groceries so he took me there. He didn't look too happy because he was such in a rush to go home. I realized after my co-teacher had left that my apartment did not have bedsheets, pillows or blankets. Thankfully my scarves were big enough to be used as my shower towel, my bedsheet and blanket. I didn't have wifi in my apartment so I walked to Paris Baquette and met an elderly Russian man whom I tried to speak to but he just cut me out. I am terribly lonely and although I know it's only the first few days here, I'm freaking out about how bad this could be. I just expected to be better taken cared of instead of just being tossed to figure everything out by myself. :(Anyone in Habuk or has ever been in Habuk?Looks like you are very close to where I am as well. I haven't been to your area yet though. I hope your experience improves. I had a shitty experience similar to yours last year when I went to Japan, my futon hadn't been delivered and the house was empty (no plates, blankets, utensils, etc.). I had to use 4 towels as a matress and blankets for 3 days - I barely slept; also, the Eikaiwa had a rule that: if you yawn in class, you are fired.
I just want to cry.
Quote from: Kayos on September 02, 2016, 09:51:22 amQuote from: PMDL123 on September 02, 2016, 08:27:52 amSo I moved to my apartment yesterday in Habuk (Yangsan). After picking me up from the office of education and we headed to Yangsan, he kept telling me that he has two daughters at home and his wife is angry so he had to go home. I didn't get to the Immigration Bureau or the bank. Luckily I had told him I should buy groceries so he took me there. He didn't look too happy because he was such in a rush to go home. I realized after my co-teacher had left that my apartment did not have bedsheets, pillows or blankets. Thankfully my scarves were big enough to be used as my shower towel, my bedsheet and blanket. I didn't have wifi in my apartment so I walked to Paris Baquette and met an elderly Russian man whom I tried to speak to but he just cut me out. I am terribly lonely and although I know it's only the first few days here, I'm freaking out about how bad this could be. I just expected to be better taken cared of instead of just being tossed to figure everything out by myself. :(Anyone in Habuk or has ever been in Habuk?Looks like you are very close to where I am as well. I haven't been to your area yet though. I hope your experience improves. I had a shitty experience similar to yours last year when I went to Japan, my futon hadn't been delivered and the house was empty (no plates, blankets, utensils, etc.). I had to use 4 towels as a matress and blankets for 3 days - I barely slept; also, the Eikaiwa had a rule that: if you yawn in class, you are fired.What eikaiwa was this?
Quote from: kevinvrich on September 02, 2016, 12:55:07 pmQuote from: Kayos on September 02, 2016, 09:51:22 am... the Eikaiwa had a rule that: if you yawn in class, you are fired.What eikaiwa was this?Nova - it wasn't in writing, but the bosses were drilling that into us at training.
Quote from: Kayos on September 02, 2016, 09:51:22 am... the Eikaiwa had a rule that: if you yawn in class, you are fired.What eikaiwa was this?
... the Eikaiwa had a rule that: if you yawn in class, you are fired.
Quote from: Kayos on September 02, 2016, 01:43:58 pmQuote from: kevinvrich on September 02, 2016, 12:55:07 pmQuote from: Kayos on September 02, 2016, 09:51:22 am... the Eikaiwa had a rule that: if you yawn in class, you are fired.What eikaiwa was this?Nova - it wasn't in writing, but the bosses were drilling that into us at training.Maybe that's why there was that huge cocaine bust among you NOVA workers back when I was working in Japan! Definitely would help prevent yawning! Anyway, us GEOS folk had a nice long laugh when the papers came out likening NOVA to a giant drug cartel.