나는 한국어를 조금 밖에 못해요

eavesdropping about parking meters

i was sitting in the seats outside of whole foods, feeding claudia, when a middle-aged asian woman and her young-adult son pulled up and got out of their car. i didn't understand what i was hearing right away but then heard the mother say "한 시간."

"하나?" the son clarified, fishing out change for the meter.

apparently he was going to put in more than that hour's worth, because mom then told him "됐어," and into whole foods they went.

it's such a cool feeling! i GET things!

quintessential korean-americana

this is a convenience store i walk past regularly, on locust street between fifteenth and sixteenth. hard to see from this photo (click on it and see a larger version on flickr), but the window contains two college acceptance letters: one from harvard and one from princeton, both addressed to someone i assume is the son of the owner. also, there is a newspaper page taped to the window. there is more than one article visible, but the one about 공부 스트레스 ("study stress"?) is perhaps the reason for the page's inclusion in the display.

caught!

today i was out with claudia, and when she fell asleep i zipped into a starbucks to study my korean.

she stayed asleep while i did my daily three lessons (the week's new one and two review lessons), and so i moved on to writing in the journal i keep for her.

while i was doing this, i noticed someone come in the door of the shop, look down at me, do a double take, and come back and stare. i didn't look up, as this happens multiple times in a day: either the "oh that baby is so gorgeous" thing or the "that mom is white and that baby is black" thing.

but when i saw in my periphery that the person was standing there a long time, i looked up, ready to deal with it. and it was a young asian man who was looking, not at me or the baby, but at my korean notebook, which was filled with hangul.

he asked, "are you learning korean?"

i said (in english, all english; my mind was really somewhere other than korean at that point) that i was, that i had started taking a class in october, and that i was still learning, but only knew a little.

and he asked, "why are you interested in korean?"

i gave my standard short answer which is "i am fascinated by the culture." that was good enough for him, and he glanced at my notebook again and said "that's pretty good." and goddamn it, the page i had written out was, of course the one about DRY CLEANING.

i wanted to say, hey, i know more than just how to get by at the dry cleaners, but again, my mind was elsewhere by then.

he got his drink and we said goodbye to each other in korean.

a conversation at... the dry cleaners!

we go to the dry cleaners maybe twice a year. and we have had to go for some time now and were just putting it off. then, this week, my textbook's dialogue lesson was about going to, indeed, the dry cleaners -- and so i actually went and showed off a little.

as soon as i got there, i went all lazy and wasn't sure i was going to speak in korean at all. we have used this cleaner's shop before but the woman there was not the one i had seen before. she was, however, very interested in the baby, and while i was in the dressing room putting on the pants i needed altered i heard her ask ben the baby's age and when he said "three months" she said, "oh, almost a hundred days."

and i yelled out, "백일!"

the woman was definitely surpised by this, and said "oh, wow!" or something to that effect. when i came out, i said, "she will be 백일 on saturday," and i added,
"저는 한국어 공부해요. "

i may actually have messed up a bit and said "한국어로". the woman was still pleased and continued with "oh, wow"-type exclamations. i wanted to make sure she understood i was not good at this, and so, i gave her my trademark:

"나는 한국어를 조금 밖에 못해요." (and while i myself cannot break down every syllable of this sentence myself, i am to believe that it does mean "i only speak a little korean.")

to which i BELIEVE she replied, "많아요!" ("a lot!" as in "you actually know a lot of korean!" )

and i said 감사합니다.

she asked where and how i was learning and gushed some more about how excellent i was, and then said, "okay, let's talk in korean."

i was pretty unsure about this, but she said something, and i didn't get it, so i said "잘 모르겠어요." (so even when all i am doing is telling korean people i can't understand them, it sounds, to someone who doesn't know what i'm saying -- like ben, who was looking very impressed -- like i am saying a lot.)

she had been asking for my phone number, which i gave her in english. (are pure korean or sino-korean numbers used for phone numbers? i should find out.) and then i asked a question straight out of my textbook lesson: "돈은 지금 내요?"

again, super impressed. "no, next week" she said, (both in english and korean). and she said that when i came back, we would talk in korean some more, and she would teach me things.

we said 감사합니다 and 안녛히계세요, and she said 안녕히 가세요 and i left feeling pretty good!

but not fantastic. because i can't spontaneously express ANYTHING in korean yet, unless i "spontaneously" want to discuss dry cleaning, gasoline, hotel reservations, hospitals and embassies. (actually, upon trying to finish this sentence i was completely unable to bring the word "embassy" to mind, and said to ben "i can only remember this in korean.. what's a 대사관 in english?")

i shouldn't be discouraged. at amanda's suggestion i have purchased the first two volumes of the Sogang korean texts and maybe that will help. it may indeed be time to resume lessons, with 경애, if she wants to give them.