#96. 오지라퍼 -- your business is my business

The Western society has come a long way.

When I imagine a peaceful medieval town, I imagine a small community of maybe a hundred families. Many of these families probably had children of similar age, and they probably all played together. Their parents probably took turns providing snacks for these children when they got hungry. If one child was not around for a few days, they would be concerned for the child, and also for his parents. They would pay them a visit, and make sure that everything is alright. Maybe they'll bring some bread and soup, just in case. In these towns, everyone would know everyone, and if something happened to one of the families, the news would travel quickly throughout the entire town. If a young couple eloped, the entire town would stop by the parents' house to offer their unsolicited advice.

With time, this familiarity with your neighbours started to fade in the West. Now, the invasion of privacy is a crime. Spreading gossip indiscriminately can be prosecuted as slander. It is impolite to be discussing your neighbours.

The increase of the radius of your personal bubble ensures your privacy. However, with it, you lose the familiarity with your neighbours. You lose the sense of community. And you lose the trust. It's always that if you win some, then you lose some.

The Korean society started out in a very similar way as a Western medieval town.

A very typical imagery for a traditional Korean town. The roof made of hay was extremely common for the middle and lower class families!

While the Koreans grew to value privacy a little bit more, they also clung to the idea that the sense of community, and knowing that your neighbours care about you is still very important. It is still common to have very close neighbours who will stop by unannounced to make sure that your children had snacks while you are out working. They may bring over a portion of their dinner, because they cooked so much and the dinner turned out great. To thank them, you may ask them over to have a bottle of beer. Like the Koreans say, you may get so close to your neighbours that you know how many spoons they have in their household.

But this also means that you are subject to a lot of unsolicited advice. They may have something to add to your spending habits. They might think that your children could do better, if it weren't for your terrible parenting, and take it upon themselves to lecture you on how to raise your children better.

The Koreans have a word for this. When someone sticks their nose in your business one time too many, you can say:

"저사람 정말 오지랖이 넓네." (He has a very wide shirt-front.)

The word "오지랖" doesn't seem to be commonplace in English. We talk about the tail of a shirt, which is the bottom part of the shirt in the back which hangs below the waist. "오지랖" is the corresponding counterpart in the front. If you have a very wide shirt-front, then it will end up covering your pants, leading to an unwise fashion choice. Your shirt is invading the space that rightfully belongs to your pants, just like your annoying neighbour who doesn't know when to leave you alone.

While the grammatically correct idiom is to use it as an adjective "오지랖이 넓다," now "오지랖" itself can be used in many different form. For example, "오지랖" itself can be used as a noun meaning "butting into situations where one is not welcome." For example, in the picture above, the common type of 오지랖s that most Koreans experience are written:

when you're a student, the 오지랖 is whether you're getting good grades;
when you graduate, the 오지랖 is to ask whether you have found a job;
when you're over 30, whether you will marry;
when you marry, that you should have kids;
when you have a son, that you should have a daughter because it's nice;
when you have a daughter, that you should have a son to feel secure;
when you have a son and a daughter, that you should have a third child since two children of different gender (남매) are rarely close to each other;
when you have two sons, that you should have a daughter;
when you have two daughters, that you should have a son;
when you have three kids, that you won't be able to afford having three kids...

It seems incredible, but most Koreans do deal with these kinds of 오지랖! An appropriate response to these unsolicited concerns might be:

"쓸데없는 오지랖이야" (These are useless worries, and none of your business.)

The word "오지랖" itself is completely standard, and you can use it to Koreans of any age (although if you use it to the offending party, they will find it insulting!)

However, the cute neologism popular among the younger Koreans that I have been seeing a lot lately is the word "오지라퍼." And perhaps you can already guess what it means. Well, a "rapper" is a person who "raps," so an "오지라퍼 = 오지랖+er" is a person who doles out generous amounts of "오지랖" to people. As always, the combination of a pure Korean word and an English word has a humorous effect (since it destroys the beautiful Korean language!) so it intensifies the nuance of sarcasm.

It also feels trendy in the sense that the word itself sounds a bit similar to "rapper," almost like "my bro the busybody." This means that you do not want to use this word with your superiors or elders, in case they get offended (although I think most Koreans, except the very elderly who did not have an English education, should understand it). So, if you want to exaggerate your feelings of sarcasm, you could say:

"세호야말로 진정한 오지라퍼야." (Seho is the true busybody, man.)

This has the effect of sounding a bit more vulgar and sarcastic than just saying it in the standard way:

"세호는 오지랖이 참 넓어." (Seho has a very wide shirt-front),

 which sounds relatively polite and almost gentlemanly compared to the slangy sentence using "오지라퍼."

Finally, there is a very similar (and fairly standard) clothing-related slang for "helicopter moms." The helicopter moms tend to hover around their children, and become involved in all of their childrens' businesses. The Koreans call these women "치맛바람," literally meaning "skirt winds." They are so busy chasing their children that their skirts cause wind! :) You can use it in various capacities, such as just as a noun (just like how you would use 오지랖), or you can use it as an adjective by saying "치맛바람이 세다" (her skirt winds are strong), or you can say it as a verb via "치맛바람이 분다." I close this post with three examples:

"요즘 어머니들 치맛바람때문에 못살겠다." (I can't carry on my day-to-day activities these days because of the skirt winds of the helicopter moms.)

"슬기 어머니는 치맛바람이 너무 세서 아이가 불쌍하다." (The skirt winds of Seulgi's mother are too strong that I feel bad for the child.)

"요즘은 학원가에도 치맛바람이 분다." (Nowadays, the skirt winds reach even the hagwons (private academies).) 

If anyone is given the description of "치맛바람" they will of course be annoyed. However, the word itself has become completely standard, appearing in newspapers and other news outlets.