I am just looking thank you.

Hi. When I came to Australia, I had to learn to say "Thank you" and "Please" in every chance I had. It needed some effort at first because I wasn't saying those a lot in Korea. Not because I was rude back then, we just have different ways of expressing gratitude by the tone of the voice, body gesture or the polite form of the verb. Especially, we don't use those expressions that much between family members. It just goes without saying most of the time. :)


I am just looking, thank you.
그냥 보는 거에요. 감사합니다.


그냥, genyang, just
보는, bonun, looking (basic form is 보다)
거에요, guoaeyo, it is that...
감사합니다, gamsahamnida, thank you


그냥 보는 거에요. 감사합니다.
genyang bonun guoaeyo. gamsahamnida.


I translated today's expression literally to convey the original meaning even though I don't think it is common to say 감사합니다 in this situation in Korea.

Also "verb + 거에요" delivers a sense of certain state. For example:

먹다 + 거에요 -> 먹는 거에요. It is edible.
자다 + 거에요 -> 자는 거에요. It is sleeping.

That's it for today. :)

Comments

  1. lacostaJune 4, 2010 at 8:09 AM

    민 선생님 ～ 반가워요 ^^
    I was browsing through your older entries and I noticed that most are written in ㅂ니다 form - could you also add the 요 form?
    That would be very convenient!
    I really appreciate the time you're taking to write an entry every day and I'll start commenting every now and then ;D
    By the way, I'll be blogging about your blog, I hope you'll get some other follower too *^^*

    ReplyDelete
  2. MinJune 4, 2010 at 1:00 PM

    Hi lacosta! :)
    Do you realize that you literally save the life of this blog?! While I was writing this post last night, I was wondering if I could continue this because it was hard to know if my effort was serving any purpose. But now I know! :)
    Thank you so much for blogging about this. That's very kind of you. I got more visitors in one day than the total of the whole last week! Awesome. :)
    And I made a note to add the 요 form.^^

    ReplyDelete
  3. lacostaJune 4, 2010 at 6:23 PM

    that's great! 고마워요 ～
    actually it's always very hard when you just started a blog. I mean, how are other people supposed to find it or even to know that it exists? it takes some months till you have enough followers who will come to your blog daily... just don't give up! I'll root for you and try to promote your blog! ^.^ 홰팅!홰팅! ～

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Please top up 5000 won on my card.

Hi all. Isn't it daunting to figure out a bus fare, find the right coins or notes and make sure you get the correct changes and so on when you visit a country for the first time? I hereby declare that it is a thing in the past! :) We have something called T-money which you can use on bus, taxi and subway in Seoul and some other cities. You can even use it at a convenient store to pay for the goods. Most convenient stores sell T-money cards and you can top up T-money from there too. So use this when you visit Seoul if you don't want to come back with a bag full of coins. :) Please top up 5000 won on my T-money card. 티머니 카드에 오천원 충전해 주세요. 티머니, T-money, T-money 카드에, cardae, card + suffix 오천원, ohchunwon, 5000 + won 충전해, chungjonhae, recharge (충전하다) 주세요, jusaeyo, give me (주다) 티머니 카드에 오천원 충전해 주세요. T-money cardae ohchunwon chungjonhae jusaeyo. The won is the Korean currency. Thanks to the inflation over the past half-century, the numbers are quite big compared to their value. Your ch...
Read more

From which exit should we meet?

Hi guys. Let's say, you have arrived at your subway station safely. That's great! But it is too soon to be relieved. You have accomplished only a half of the challenge and the second half is finding the right exit. :) You will see what I mean if you take a look at this map . It is where the city hall is and shows how many subway stations multiplied by the number of exits are concentrated in a small area. So, include the right exit number to your planning before you travel. A subway exit is great for a meeting spot so this expression might be helpful. :) From which exit should we meet? 몇번 출구에서 만날까요? 몇번, myotbun, which number 출구에서, chulgooaeso, exit + suffix 만날까요, mannalggayo, should we meet? (만나다) 몇번 출구에서 만날까요? myotbun chulgooaeso mannalggayo? 몇 means 'some unknown number' and 번 is a count word. There are different ways of counting in Korean as describe here . In short, '일, 이, 삼..' style is used for things in order while '하나, 둘, 셋..' style is for counting...
Read more

And then, and then

I have a couple of international colleagues at work. They are quite eager to learn Korean so I teach or correct them whenever I have a chance. Yesterday, we were going to have coffee after lunch and one guy said, "밥 먹은 다음에 커피 마셔요" It is totally correct. But we can also say, "밥 먹고 나서 커피 마셔요". Let's have coffee after lunch. 밥 먹고 나서 커피 마셔요. 밥 먹은 다음에 커피 마셔요. 식사하고 나서 커피 마셔요. 식사한 다음에 커피 마셔요. 밥, 식사, meal ~고 나서, after something ~은/는 다음에, after something 마시다, drink 마셔요, let's drink 밥 먹고 나서 커피 마셔요. bab mokgo naso kopi mashoyo. 밥 먹은 다음에 커피 마셔요. bab mokun daumae kopi mashoyo. 식사하고 나서 커피 마셔요. siksahago naso kopi mashoyo. 식사한 다음에 커피 마셔요. siksahan daumae kopi mashoyo. One of the hardest things of learning any language is the fact that there are usually more than one way of saying the same thing. But knowing different expressions for the same meaning will make your speaking more rich! Hope you don't give up!! :-)
Read more