I'm Learning How to Read

It all started a few weeks ago on the bus ride home from Gyeongju, where I had gone with Kim, Meredith, and Nicole for Chuseok (Korean Thanksgiving) weekend.  Because of the heavy holiday traffic, our 4 hour bus ride slowly turned into a 7 hour one.  Around Hour Number 5, I looked up at my empty bottle of water out of sheer boredom, which was still in the cup holder attached to the seat in front of me.  On one side it said its brand name, "Sam Da Soo."  On the other, in exactly the same placement, color, and font, it said, "삼 다 수."

Wait a minute.  Something was happening.  I picked up the bottle to examine it closer.  A lightbulb sort of flickered inside of my brain.  Oh my gosh--"Sam Da Soo" = "삼 다 수!!!"  Could I finally be making sense of this crazy alien talk?

"That upside down V...that's probably an S!" I thought to myself.  I wasn't sure of the order of the placement of the letters yet, but I could do some more comparisons later and figure it out, I bet.  And that line with an arm poking to the right...maybe that's the A!  I bet they read their syllables from left to right, top to bottom, as my Western mind suspected.  I knew that each cluster was a syllable...Kylie had told me that much, before she bounced off to Kuwait on her next teaching adventure.  If all this was true, then that means the square at the bottom of the first syllable is an M!

"Ok, so that one that looks like a C is actually a D...and yep!  There's that A again," I thought, as I read the next syllable.  It was matching up perfectly.

The next syllable also began with a "ㅅ" and it was also at the top.  Underneath it was a T-looking letter...must be the "oo" sound!

I now knew 5 whole letters.  That means 5 of the weird crazy symbols I see all over the city now had meaning.  Whenever I saw a "ㅅ" I knew it sounded like "S," and whenever I saw a "ㅁ" I knew it had the "M" sound.  I could see a "ㅏ" and read the "ah" sound, and the "ㄷ" now made the "D" sound.  "ㅜ" sounds like "oo."  And now I knew that you read from left to right, top to bottom.

This opened up a huge new door for me!  I wanted to learn more.  I started paying attention to the subway stop names.  They are always written in both Korean and English letters.  The important reason why names were a good way for me to learn is because the words are exactly the same in both languages.  For example, it's not like I could read "she gum chi" in Korean and know that meant spinach (if I didn't know already).  But Dongdaemun is Dongdaemun no matter what.

My station (at the time) was called Ssangmun with a double S.  I studied the Korean letters for it.  It started with an ㅆ on top...no wait...that's not an M...that's a double upside down V...a double S!  Then comes that "ㅏ" again--an A!  Underneath it all was a big sideways oval.  Is that the "ng" sound?  It must be!

I kept studying the station names.  Yep!  The same sideways oval is at the end of the first syllable in Dongdaemun--it's an "ng!"

One of those nights I was sitting in the little Korean restaurant below my apartment which has pictures of their food, and the Korean names for it printed right across them.  I almost always ordered bebimbop, which is rice with assorted shredded vegetables and bean sprouts on top mixed with spicy Korean red pepper sauce.  I found the picture of it.  At the bottom it said, "비 빔 밥."  Ok...that means that little box with the ears that looks like a bunny head is a B!  B for Bunny!  I can remember that.  The vertical stick is the "ee" sound...oh and look...the bunny is also a "P" too...maybe if it's at the end?  How do I know if it's a "B" or a "P?"

When I got to my new job, one of my new coworkers invited me to Korean classes with her.  Since I officially began my year in Seoul all over again as of October 4th, I decided to finally put forth the effort to end this illiteracy of mine.

At class I was handed a sheet of paper with all of the letters on it.  And it has way more than just 26 of them!  But, I think once I learn them all, reading will be fairly easy.  It won't be a question of how something is pronounced, since every vowel sound has a different symbol.  It's not like in English, where "a" can mean "ah" as in "father," or "a" as in "cat," or "ay" as in "gate."

Trying to read Korean for me is like being in kindergarten all over again...where nothing looks familiar, and you're struggling to sound out the words...struggling to even remember all the letters!  "Sss...ah....ng...mun?  K...yoh--no, wait--yuh...ng...nee...dah...n?"  It's an amazing feeling, to look at what used to be a bunch of jibberish and suddenly be able to sound it out.  But it's tough when you're also learning what the words mean for the first time!  Not like in kindergarten, when I already at least spoke the language.

I need those purple conjoined twin monsters from Sesame Street!

What I was looking at when I had my Helen Keller moment of, "Ah-ha!"

If the circle is at the beginning of the letter or syllable, it is silent (vowels can't stand alone).  And consonants are pronounced differently, depending on if they're at the beginning or end of the syllable.