#92. 삽질 -- killing the time in the worst possible way

Korea is in the state of truce against North Korea. This may sound great, but if you think about it, truce is totally different from peace. It means that a war can break out any day -- given the current climate, it doesn't even seem that unlikely (actually, the Koreans are surprisingly nonchalant about the possibility of war even now, but that's a story for another day.)

Anyway, the possibility of war means that every Korean men bears the responsibility of protecting their country. On their 19th birthday (or thereabouts), the Korean men undergo a physical examination that determines whether they are fit to serve Korea as a soldier. Most Koreans get declared that they are physically and mentally fit, and they serve in the infantry or the marines (for 21 months), the navy (for 22 months), or in the air force (for 24 months). These people are called "현역 병사," or "active duty soldiers." The letter "현" means "present" as in "현재 (right now)," and "역" means "duty" as in "역할 (given role)."

Being in the Korean military sucks, though. So while having been a 현역 병사 is a source of pride for many Korean men, they would probably prefer to have avoided it in the first place. Indeed, many celebrities and the children of Korean politicians get caught up in military duty scandals for having tried to game the system by getting diagnosed with obscure illnesses. If they get caught, it destroys their (or their parents') careers. Yet they continue to do this, so you can imagine how terrible being in the army might be.

Here's a scenario that supposedly happens frequently in the Korean army.

A captain decides that all soldiers will be assigned to a construction within the army base for the day. Every soldier is given a shovel ("삽" in Korean) and is put to work. At the end of the day, his officer stops by to check on the progress, and finds that the work isn't even close to being half-done. Afraid that the captain might find out, the officer calls for a bulldozer, which finishes the remaining work in less than half an hour.

So, why would you do this?

Koreans believe in the art of looking busy. This is true in most cultures. In office environments, you don't just pack up and go home when you're done with your work (well, some innovative companies in North America have started this, but there are still many places where this is not an option.)
Koreans do this even better. Not only do they stay until 5pm, they actually stay glued to their seats until their boss (who also stays later than 5pm to look good to her boss) packs up and leaves. It doesn't matter if they're done with everything; they'll sit there looking busy.

Koreans also joke about underlining and highlighting every word in your textbook. That's the biggest aspect of studying after all, no?

In the military also, since there is no active battles being fought, the soldiers must be kept busy. This is often done in the form of training, or manual labour. If there's snow, send out the soldiers with a shovel to clear the snow from everywhere in town. If a hole needs to be dug, send out the soldiers with a shovel. And so on.

Thus, a neologism "삽질" was born. "삽" means "a shovel," and "-질" means "the act of doing something," and it is often used as a derogatory suffix (for another example, see 선비질). So "삽질" means "the act of shoveling," and with the unsaid nuance, it means "to shovel uselessly." Nowadays, it is used to make fun of the situation where someone is working very hard for no gain at all.

For example, say your friend is courting a girl rather aggressively, but the girl is not interested at all and turns him down despite all his efforts. You might tell him,

"괜한 삽질만 많이 했네." (That was a lot of useless shoveling).

The Korean soldiers whose work got out-done by a bulldozer might use this in a more literal sense and say:

"불도저 앞에서 삽질했네." (That was a lot of useless shoveling in front of a bulldozer.)

 If your younger sister is begging for a ride on your car this evening by doing all of your chores, and you already have a plan so you can't give her a ride, you might say:

"삽질하네." (You're doing some useless shoveling.)

While this expression does have a vulgar nuance, just by the virtue of all Korean men having experienced this, this expression gets used quite a bit, especially among men (but women will also use it from time to time.) This expression is suitable among friends or peers, but because of the inherent sarcasm in the word, you should take care not to say it in front of your seniors.