KoreanClass101.com Blog

This is a very common question that I get from my non-Korean friends. "What's 곰탕? Is there really 곰 in there?" And as you know, 곰 means "bear", the animal. :-) So imagine - a bear soup ... hehe. But in fact it has nothing to do with bears(곰) although it's 곰 + 탕(soup). If you look at the sign in the picture above, it says 닭곰탕 too. So it must have something to do with 닭(chicken) and 곰(bear) together in a soup? :-) The truth is, 곰 is actually a noun coming from the verb "고다". And 고다 means to boil something to a pulp or let the flavor come out of something by boiling in water (usually with various spices added) for many hours. So, 곰 is not the animal 'bear' but a nominalization of 고다, therefore the act of 고다. So 곰탕 is a soup... Show more

Hi guys! It's been a looong time since my last post, I know. Really big apologies for that, I won't make any excuses for it but life has really been eating me alive, and I'm having so much trouble balancing everything and finding time for all my obligations and other things. These past two weeks have been especially crazy; I'm still studying so I live with my parents at the moment, and they've just adopted two little girls. So two weeks ago they moved in here, and it's really sucked up a lot of our time and energy getting them settled in and adjusting ourselves to the change. I feel exhausted from it all! But things are settling now, and it's not so crazy anymore, so my fingers are crossed when I say that hopefully I'll be able to resume... Show more

This past week has been a busy one on more than a few levels. Last sunday was Easter and we spent the day at my brother's house. He lives in the central valley of California on farm land. We got home late and the blog didn't happen. It is happening right now, however. Easter (부활절) is not really celebrated in Korea. Unless things have changed dramatically since I lived in Korea, Easter is only celebrated by a special Sunday service in christian denominations. There is no Easter bunny or egg hunt or any of the other commercial entrapments that exist here in America. When we get together as a family for Easter we usually have an Easter egg hunt. My brother's house is ideally suited for an egg hunt because he has a large, grassy yard around... Show more

After weeks of development, we’re happy to announce the launch of the much anticipated My Feed. This fully customizable RSS feed let’s Premium members decide exactly what lesson content they want on their Premium feed. You can master Korean on your terms. Setting up My Feed is a simple 3 step process. 1. Choose the lesson types you want (e.g. Beginner, Newbie, Audio Blog, etc.) 2. Choose the type of content you want (e.g. Main Audio, Dialog Clip, Review Clip, PDF, Video Vocab, etc.) 3. Add My Feed to iTunes or other iTunes compatible feed readers like Juice, and just watch the content you want come rolling in. Click here to learn more about My Feed or if you’re a Premium member, click here to get started now. ... Show more

I arrived shortly before dinnertime, which is pretty normal when I go during the week. The boys were playing around, and some were even studying! But I couldn't find any of the regular adult staff. It seemed like the boys were fending for themselves again. At dinnertime, someone (presumably an 엄마 from a different section made some announcement about dinner: "얘둘아..밥 먹으러 가!" (Kids, go and eat!) Most of the kids headed out for dinner, but a few were being stubborn. They claimed they weren't hungry and they didn't want to go to dinner. That really doesn't matter, they are still supposed to eat at every meal, and they really should. Sometimes I think they try to skip dinner so they can whine later. Then they might get to pig out on... Show more