Monthly Archives: December 2010

22 Dec

Chivalry is dead

Who taught : Alex and Sangeetha

Chivalry is dead? (source: http://www.motifake.com/)

It is inevitable to experience so many different things by moving to another country. What is the most difficult thing to live in America as a Korean? I would say, it is English, English and English.

1. First of all, English itself is hard to master. Pronunciation, Vocabulary, Slangs, Listening… You name it. There are so many things to continuously practice and it is never ending.

2. And, because of English, it is hard to make American friends. Let’s face it! It is really hard to have a conversation for a long time in just English if you cannot listen and speak fast enough. Honestly, I used to have a headache after a long party with my American friends or a long conference call with customers. This then can definitely affect your work or study.

3. Due to the reason number 2, it is hard to learn new cultures. This creates a vicious circle. If you do not have many American friends, then you usually stay with people who came from the same country you are from. In my case, it is Korea. Then, you lose your chance to learn new cultures and, thus, you feel awkward to be surrounded by American people. As a result, your English cannot get better at all and you do not have any American friends and you do not learn American cultures.

Now, what is the solution? Well, there is only one thing I can say here. WHEN IN ROME! You should really be proactive to make as many American friends as possible and learn new cultures from them. You should also be honest. If you do not understand what they are saying, feel free to ask them. They will help you out.

Speaking of culture… When Jessy and I first moved here, she and I often took a walk after dinner. Talking about trees, animals and houses, we had fun. (FYI, there are squirrels, deer, and rabbits all over here.) But, something bad also happened. 🙂 She saw a guy opening a car door for a lady. I tried to ignore it. (As far as I know, guys in Korea usually do not do that for a lady.) But, she was like this is the time I need to say something. “Hey.. look at that. Don’t you think you need to do that for me? You never done that,” said she. Oh great….

Last Saturday, Jessy and I had lunch with Alex and Sangeetha. After lunch, the server came with checks. Sangeetha said, “You can give them to the guys.” Following it, Alex said, “I guess chivalry is not dead.” I did not get it.

So, chivalry itself refers to the medieval institution of knighthood. And it is often associated with ideals of knightly virtues, honor and of courtly love. For your better understanding, here are the examples of chivalry.

1. Open a car door for a lady or open a door of any place like a mall for a lady.

2. Pay for a lady’s meal

Now, if it is dead, it of course means no one would do it any more. Researching about this expression, I found a lot of arguments about whether chivalry is really dead or not on the Internet. There are some people who say women killed it because of feminism movement. What do you think? Is chivalry really dead? I guess it is a very subjective matter to answer, though. Let me put it this way then? Is chivalry dead in your marriage? Hope not!

20 Dec

no-brainer

Who taught: CNN

no brainer (source: http://blog.addictinggames.com/)

As I get older, there are so many things I feel differently from the way I used to feel when I was young. Sadly, many of them are related with winter. First, I used to get very excited about first snow every year. But, not any more. Now, I have no feeling about snow at all. In fact, I kind of wish not to snow because I hate driving on snow. The other thing is Christmas. Just like any other people, I used to look forward to Christmas. Now, not really. I feel like it is just one of the days in a year. How about you? Do you still get excited about snow and Christmas? If so, maybe you are still young. I am not just talking about your age here. 🙂

Speaking of Christmas, there is a national movement in the U.S. these days. Have you noticed it? Not many people say, “Merry Christmas!” any more. Instead, people say, “Happy Holidays!” Do you know why? It is because people believe that “Happy Holidays” is more religion-neutral than “Merry Christmas.” I still prefer to say, “Merry Christmas.” What is your choice?

A few days ago, I was checking a few articles out on CNN Money website. Doing that, I bumped into one article about buying a house. The title of the article was, “Buying a house now is a no-brainer.” As you can see, we have an expression here, no-brainer. Can you guess what it means? Guessing itself could actually be a no-brainer. 🙂

Here is the definition for you.

Something very obvious so that it is very easy to decide or do.

So, was it a no-brainer? In my opinion, buying a house is never a no-brainer at all. I have been thinking about buying a house here in the U.S. but there are so many things I need to check even before looking around houses. Especially, living in a foreign country makes it even harder. Once I go through buying my first house ever, I am sure I would learn bunch of new expressions in relation to mortgage, real estate, house, etc. Then, I will write a series of those expressions for you.

Merry Christmas to you, my friends! And… it is snowing now. 🙁

17 Dec

product, tool

Who taught: Brian Williams

Tool (source: http://peb.pl/albumy-rock-and-metal)

When I was young, I did not understand why my parents always wanted to watch news programs, especially, when there were some TV shows my brother and I really wanted to watch. You know what happened? Now, I love watching news programs. They are informative and fun as well. I watch two news programs. One is NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams (7 pm est) and CBS Evening News with Katie Couric (7:30 pm est). CBS one is more fun to watch. Katie uses a few fun expressions often. FYI, people here in the U.S. say “Do not watch any news from Fox channel.” Why? I do not know. Why don’t you try to ask your American friends the reason?

The other thing I want to point out is that news programs are amazingly useful to practice English. While watching them, I usually do the followings.

1. Listen very carefully to find out new words or expressions. I will get back to you later on this.

2. Listen very carefully to learn the sentences what anchors say. They are using very simple but great sentences.

3. Speak what anchors say! As soon as they say something, I myself speak them again out loud. I really try to mimic them in terms of voice and pronunciation. This way, I practice pronunciation and also it is a perfect way of practicing t0 listen and speak as fast as possible.

Getting back to the new words, a few days ago, I was watching NBC Nightly News and Brian Williams was talking about people who died on that day and he used a very interesting word. He said, “He is a product of Ohio and died today……” As soon as I heard it, I was quite surprised because that was the first time I heard the word, product, to describe a person. I have always thought product is the word that can be only used to describe things, not people. Well, I am a product of South Korea. How about you?

In this sense, there is another word which really sounds like it should be used to describe things but can be used in relation to people. It is “TOOL.” So, you can say like, “You are such a tool.” Wait!! You gotta keep reading. Here is the definition of the expression.

A fool. Characterized by low intelligence or self-esteem.

This expression is typically used for male. (Why? Who is using tools?) So, you would not want to use this often. Not a good expression at all. But, if you happen to be a guy and someone uses this expression to you, it is hard to understand if you do not know the meaning. You would be like, “Is he saying that I am good at dealing with tools or what?” So, again, it is really good to know these expressions to be able to protect yourself from being teased and participate in conversations properly.

15 Dec

come hell or high water

Who taught: Andrew and Eric

Come hell or high water (source: http://www.noiset.com/)

It is 8:40 am on Dec 15, 2010 (Wed). According to weather.com, it is 16°F (-9°C). But, there is another degree you need to look at when it comes to the current temperature. It is “feels-like” degree which is the degree people really feels like because of wind, etc. Current feels-like degree in Pittsburgh is 2°F (-17°C). To sum it up, it is fre*king cold now. But, I am happy. Do you know why? At least, there is not that much snow yet compared to the last year.

Wait for a sec! Jessy wants me to cut some bread for breakfast…………………. OK, I am back.

Every monday, I play soccer with some people in the league I am in. To get to the indoor sports complex, people need to drive. (Oh! You do know that you need a car in the U.S., right? It is not an option. Without a car, life is so much harder. In Korea, I did not need a car. There are so many places I could go and so many things I could do without a car. But, that is not the case in the U.S. I mean, at least, in PGH.) Starting from last Sunday, there was a winter storm affecting PGH area. Knowing that, one of my soccer friends, Eric, sent an email Monday morning to all of the players, saying, “Hey, guys, I will be there come hell or high water!”  He actually misspelled it to “cone hell or high water” and the other people teased him, saying “I will bring cones. Don’t worry, Eric!”

Even though I do not really like this expression, I believe you would want to know this one because I heard this from Andrew too. It seems like this one is a pretty popular expression. Here is a good example for you. Do you have a child? Let’s say if your child does not want to do her/his homework. How would you say to her/him in English? That is right! You can say, “Finish your homework come hell or high water.” So, do you get the meaning of the expression now? Just want to make sure we are on the same page, it means, “something must be done no matter how hard or unfavorable the circumstances are.”

Since we all know this, here is what I want to say to you, my non-native English speaker friends. KEEP STUDYING ENGLISH COME HELL OR HIGH WATER! With that, let me give you a homework. How about you try to find the etymology of this expression and add a comment?

13 Dec

whale tale

Who taught: Jake, Andrew, Pat

Last Saturday, there was a christmas party Phil and Kelly threw. It is one of the parties Jessy and I are always looking forward to. It is always amazing. Thanks, Kelly and Phil! There were around 30+ people at the party. Jessy and I knew that we would be the only Koreans. So, we decided to wear traditional Korean dress, Hanbok, this year. We brought them when we come to the U.S. but have never worn at all for about 5 years. We felt kind of sorry not wearing them because my parents packed them very carefully saying, “You should bring and wear these as much as you can.” Well, honestly, we did not like wearing them just because it requires long time to wear and feel kind of weird. But, I really wanted to show Hanbok to my American friends. I think it went well and my friends were very curious about them and asked us a lot of questions not only about Hanbok but also about Korea.

There are certain things you would like you to know about party in America.

1. Most of the time, you do not sit at all. You can sit if you want but not many people really sit down at all. In Korea, all of the people sit down throughout a party.

2. Since you do not sit, you actually walk around and get to have a lot of chances to talk to many different people. Some are the people you never met before. This used to be the part Jessy did not like a lot because of her English. She had a hard time to understand English. It is not just because of the issue of hearing English but the noises of other people’s conversations. To be able to go to a party in America, you should really be prepared to mingle with so many different people. That means you need to listen and speak English a lot. It is not that easy. But, you know what! If things are easy, there are not that much fun at all.

Whale tale cookie (source: http://www.thefunctionkey.com/)

So, shall we talk about today’s expression? I have no idea how I get to hear this expression. I totally forget. My friends and I must have talked about women for sure. Anyways, in the middle of the conversation, there was a new expression i had never heard. WHALE TALE. Well, the word itself is so simple and it does not sound like a very interesting one at all. Without the context, I would not be able to catch that it is not just the tale of a whale. Now, what it would be? Can you feel it? I bet you cannot. Let me give you a hint! It has something to do with a woman’s back. (Well, who knows it could be a man’s back. But, I hope not.) Can you imagine the tale of a whale from a woman’s back? Where it would be? That’s right. It is butt. Now, the butt itself cannot be the whale tale, right? There is a specific condition for a woman’s butt to look similar to the whale tale. She should wear low-rise jeans and a thong. If this condition meets, then it is almost 100% possible that the thong will be shown out of her jeans. Now, can you picture it? 🙂 That is the whale tale the girl is showing. Now, as always, I have a question. Do women wear low-rise jeans and a thong to intentionally show the whale tale? I think it is just an accident, right? Tell me I am right.