My hometown, Jeju island

My hometown, Jeju Island is famous for natural environment like New Zealand.

In the past, there was no public transportation between Jeju and Korea peninsula and that is the reason why Jeju has its own culture and distinct dialect, which Korean cannot understand the Jeju dialect, compared to dialects from other provinces in Korea. This physical isolation allowed ecological environment of Jeju to be protected, keeping its own natural beauty. However, the lives of people in Jeju was extremely tough because most land consisted of rocks, so-called ‘basalt’, just including small amounts of soil. Therefore, residents in Jeju were hardly able to raise crops such as rice or wheat. The main industry was fishing but the sea waves were so strong due to frequent typhoons in summer. As a result, people from Jeju seem to have a strong viability regardless of any hard situations. I like this kind of viability. I want to say it, the frontier spirit or indomitable spirit. Maybe I inherited it from my parents, grandparents, grand-grand parents…..

Now, Jeju is very well-known for tourism, especially honeymoon place because of its beautiful scenery and exotic food. Owing to convenient transportation like airplanes or ships, many people can go in and out Jeju. Many people in Jeju have tangerine orchards like my parents. Tangerine is a kind of fruit. Its taste and yellow color are similar to orange, but the size is smaller than orange. I really like tangerines, sweet and a little bit sour. My parents harvest them this late autumn to beginning winter season.

In the future, I think that the number of tangerine orchards may decrease because it cannot make enough profits for people. My parents are also concerned about that. My parents raised my brothers, sister, and me through money from the tangerine harvest. I don’t know why the Korean government does not support farming like other developed countries. I want the government to present some alternatives to innocent farmers for the future.

Appositives

I think appositives are a good way to explain certain nouns or noun pharses giving some
specific information about them. So if speakers or writhers use appositives to express
a certain noun, listeners or readers may understand it more easily. Also they can imagin
some specific points about it.

For example, let's see the following two sentences.
1) Kimchi is very delicious.
2) Kimchi(head noun), the traditional Korean food(appositive), is very delicious.
(Non-restrictive appositive which describes information about the head noun)
The second sentence may convey information about Kimchi better than the first sentence.

Now I want to make two restrictive appositives. According to the textbook, the function of restrictive appositives is to identify the head noun.
1) The movie Taitanic was nominated for the Academy award.

2) The musical 'Sound of Music' has a lot of beautiful songs sung by Julie Andrews.

We can identify the head noun by using 'which' question.
Therefore, which movie? Taitanic
Which musical? Sound of Music

Learing new expressions.

Over the weekends, I found some interesting expressions.
The first one is a word, 'moonlight'.
I think many people knows the meaning of 'moonlight' as a noun, which means the
light from the moon as you guess from the two word combination between moon and light.
Here is another usage of 'moonlight' as a verb, which means someone has a second job
in addition to their main job. I could discoverd a good example.
e.g. An engineer who was moonlighting as a taxi driver.
That is, the engineer has two jobs at the same time; one is an engineer, another is a taxi driver.

Next, the word 'cast' is also fascinating. It can be used as a 'verb' as well as 'noun'.
This week I learned a new expression, "cast doubts on". Let me give an example.
e.g. Last night, a top criminal psychologist cast doubt on the theory.
It means someone or something cause people to be unsure or question about it.
I think casting doubt on the existing theory sometimes can change the world because
it allows people to look at it with creative or critical thinking.

The last thing is the expression of "Given the choice between A and B, I would choose~~".
I think something omitted in front of the word 'Given', I guess it may be "If I were"(?),
I am not sure though. Let's see the example.
e.g. Given the choice between studying abroad and in one's own country, I would choose
studying abroad.
Learning something new makes me motivated and developed. I wish my choice, studying
abroad in Iowa, might be wise. :P

Traditional wedding vs. Modern wedding in Korea

Korean Traditional Wedding Ceremony
In ancient time, wedding in Korea was not a matter about bride and groom, but two families. Therefore, arranged marriage which means a wedding by arranged by parents was dominant for a long time. Most bride and groom could not know about each other at all such as face, personality, and name. They had to follow their parents’ decision. On the wedding day, bride and groom wore Korea traditional costume called ‘Hanbok’, which is very colorful and beautiful clothes made by silk. Usually, wedding ceremony was held in the yard of the bride and many neighbors and relatives congratulated on them.

Modern Wedding Ceremony in Korea
As Korean society has been modernized rapidly since 1970, marriage pattern changed into love marriage which refers to the marriage of man and woman who are in love with each other. Although arranged marriage still remains in Korea, love marriage is common. Most wedding ceremonies were performed in the Wedding Halls which are decorated with wedding motif. Bride and groom wear western style costumes such as white or black tuxedo for groom and white wedding dress for bride.

Hangeul : The Korean Alphabet

The Korean Alphabet, Hangeul was created by King Sejong who was the greatest King in the Kingdom of Joseon(1392~1910), in what is modern day Korea, during the 15th century.

Before its creation, only a small percentage of the population in Joseon could read and write because at that time Joseon did not have its own alphabet system and used Chinese characters

for the upper class people. In fact, the general public was illiterate. So King Sejong tried to make a Korean writting system based on phonology. Hangeul consists of 10 vowels and 14 consonants and can be conbined to form numerous syllables. Hangeul is quite easy to learn and write because it is systematic and comprehensive.

For example,

We can combine all the consonants ㄱ/g/, ㄴ/n/, ㄷ/d/... ㅌ/t/, ㅍ/p/, ㅎ/h/ and vowel ㅏ/a/.

The results will be like the followings in terms of written form and pronunciation.

* Wirtten form : 가, 나, 다 ... 타, 파, 하

*Pronunciation: /ga/, /na/, /da/... /ta/, /pa/, /ha/

Once you learn the basic Korean Alphabet(10vowels and 14consonants) and several

prounciation pattern, you can read most of Korean syllables using the way I showed you above examples. Therefore, it is deemed as one of the most scientific languages in the world. Hangeul has attributed to high literacy rate(more than 95%) in Korea.

Different word order between English and Korean

The outstanding difference between English and Korean is word order. I think this is one of main reasons that Koreans cannot learn English easily.
In English, ther word order of transitive verb is subject, verb, and object(preposition phrase
would be optional), while in Korean, the word order is subject, (prepositional phrase),
object, and verb. This totally different word order makes Korean students confused because the structure becomes another obstacle besides vocabulary.
* Example
English> " I study English in Iowa city. "
(Subject) (verb) (object) (prepositional phrase)

Korean> "나는 아이오와에서 영어를 공부합니다. "
(Subject) (prepositional phrase) (object) (verb)

In addition, there is a few article usage in Korean compared to English. So
most Korean students have a big trouble to use articles not only in spoken English,
but also written one. I still feel difficult when I use articles such as 'a', 'an', and 'the'.Organizing structure(subject, next verb, and then object or predicative) is not easy in my head before I speak English, but it is interesting and at the same time challenging.

The ART INSTITUTE of CHICAGO

October, 2, 2007

It was my first time of Chicago trip. I have been very interested in paintings, which means the most favorite place in Chicago trip was entirely focusing on the Art Institue even though I have never been there. I really wanted to see original masterpieces painted by famous artists such as Van Gogh, Seurat, Monet, and Matisse. When I entered the gallery, I was really excited. What a great opportunity! Actually, it was not enough time for me to look at all the painting in the Art Institue. Of many collections, I could not but choose some. I picked up Impressionism & Postimpressionism galleries and Modern & Contemporary galleries. There I recorded some pictures with my digital camera and above video is about "A Sunday on La Grande Jatte" painted by Georges Seurat, French artist. An old curator was explaining the paintings to visitors. I couldnot look through all the galleries because of lack of time. So I really want to go to the Art Institute again and have a plenty of time to see all of exhibitions. After that, I went to the Millenium Park. The park was quite familiar with Coex Mall in Korea. High buildings and and some modern sculptures. I really enjoyed the Chicago trip.