#53. 창렬 -- There's barely anything there!

Have you ever been unhappy that your bag of chips contains just a little bit too much air (okay, nitrogen, actually), and not enough chips? If so, the Koreans have a perfect expression for you. They would say: 감자칩 양이 창렬이네. (The amount of potato chips is "창렬.")  So, let me tell you about what this word means. The word "창렬" is short for "김창렬,"which is the name of this guy. Say hello to 창렬. He is a Korean singer, who is actually quite good...

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#52. 지잡대 -- Does happiness correlate with your grades?

First, a very important disclaimer. The contents in this post are pretty much only useful for starting up a fight online (and understanding fights between other users, I guess.) You should probably expect a fair bit of hate if you dare to use these words in real life. I mean, I've done posts on a lot of rude words, but this post contains the issue that most Koreans feel particularly sensitive about, because it touches a nerve with all the Koreans....

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#51. Hobgoblin's magical club (Shamanism 1)

First, an announcement! I'm back on Twitter! I had given up for a while because I didn't know how to effectively use it. But now I'll use my Twitter account for your practice. Tweet your attempt at Korean slang at my Twitter account and I will tweet back with corrections (or affirmation that it is correct). And now, I start the first installment of a series that I hope will tell you about the Korean shamanism, a topic that has long fascinated...

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#50. Test your knowledge of the Korean internet slang!

This is the fiftieth post on the Korean internet slang! It's been an amazing ride. The daily readership increased from just a couple of people to hundreds of people (the most popular post has nearly four thousand views!) and I wouldn't have continued this blog if it weren't for the encouragement of you, the readers. So, thank you for reaching out to me via email and via the comments, thank you for your encouraging comments on Reddit, and most of all, thank you for visiting my blog! As a first-time blogger, just the fact that you're clicking on...

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#49. 정신승리 -- Well, I was right anyway

I really really like getting into arguments. I like respectful debates where I try to change the other person's perspective, and the other person is doing the same to me. I usually come out having learned something, and my opinion also changes more often than you'd expect. That being said, I cannot stand getting into an argument without any logic. Unfortunately, online debates, on average, have worse quality than in-person debates. The other day,...

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#48. 어그로 -- You're provoking it!

It's been a while since I did a post on a Korean slang word that originates from video games, so here is a fun one. Koreans play a lot of MMORPGs (Massive Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games). Some of the really popular ones, among many others, include Lineage (리니지 in Korean) and World of Warcraft (WoW, or 와우 by pronouncing the abbreviation in Korean). One feature of these MMORPGs is that each character comes with a bunch of stats. One of these...

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Listening Exercise with Transcript #8: Hurry up!

Here is a short sketch from the TV show "Gag Concert (개그 콘서트)," which, unlike most Korean TV shows, takes the form of live stand-up comedy. It is the longest-running comedy program of Korea, having started in 1999, and it is still ongoing, although its popularity is not what it used to be. The comedians would prepare a recurring theme, and broadcast a short skit loosely fitting this theme for weeks or months, based on the reception from the audience....

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#47. 훈장질, 선비질 -- Stepping into Korea's past

If you stop to think about it, it might astound you just how much of the life from the Joseon Dynasty (조선 시대) carried over to our modern life. In today's Korea, one of the jobs that are considered the best by the Korean people is to be a public servant (공무원: "공" means "public" as in "공공기관 (public institution)" or "공익 (public good)"; "무" means "work" as in "업무 (work)"; "원" refers to a person who holds down a particular job.) The reason for this is...

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#46. 아재개그 -- Dad jokes (feat. Mamamoo)

Okay, I'll admit this now. I am a big fan of Mamamoo. And they just came out with a new song today that has such clever lyrics, that despite the fact that I had already scheduled my posts to appear for the next week, I am going to change the order around and write a post about how cute their lyrics are. Before going into that, though, one of the readers of this blog had commented before that certain ideas seem to transcend languages (the example that prompted this discussion was the fact that when someone is beyond frustrating, Koreans call them...

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#45. 막장 -- That k-drama sucks as if there is no tomorrow

K-dramas, as addictive as they can be, are full of clichés. If you take a step back, the majority of the plots can be described by the same sentences. An orphaned but optimistic girl meets a rich and handsome prince. The man's family, rich and huffy, can't accept this relationship and they try their best to sabotage it. Then the man's family hires assassins to kill the girl too, because actually, the man's family was responsible for the girl's parents'...

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#44. 드립 -- How to compliment a fellow internaut on a post well done

Although I'm no expert in literature, it seems to me that a lot of value is placed on novel expressions (and cliché is, for the most part, hated.) If the Koreans could figure out a way to be a little less vulgar on the internet, the Korean internet could really be a treasure trove for the aspiring writers, and the Korean internet writers would be veritable literary connoisseurs. From the ancient times, Koreans always have placed a lot of value on...

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#43. 종범 -- Invisible

Baseball is a huge part of the Korean sports scene. In fact, there are multiple internet communities dedicated to the discussion of baseball. The two major ones that I can think of are MLB Park (엠팍 for short in Korean) and 국내야구 갤러리 (야갤 for short in Korean) of DC Inside. In theory, the former is more concerned with the major league baseball, and the latter with the Korean league, but n reality, these distinctions don't really exist. (As an aside,...

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#42. 김칫국 드링킹 -- Being pathetic

Of course, there are many breeds of pathetic out there. The kind of pathetic people that I want to talk about are people like 준호. 준호 happens to have a crush on a girl 아영, and from any outsider's point of view, it's painfully clear that 아영 is not interested in 준호 at all. In fact, she goes out of her way to avoid 준호, to ensure that he doesn't get any false hopes. 준호, on the other hand, is not getting any hints. He thinks that 아영 is avoiding him because...

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