Tag Archives: andrew

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.

06 Dec

fan death

Who taught: Jake, Carol, Stan and Andrew

Fan Death (source: http://askakorean.blogspot.com)

Growing up in Korea, I have always been told from my parents, “Do not leave an electric fan run overnight. You could die.” Also, I swear I heard a few news reports, talking about possible deaths caused by an electric fan. Due to this, I have never doubted this so that every time I use an electric fan, I become very careful and always use a timer switch.

When I had dinner with my friends a few days ago, Jake asked me a question, “Hey Terry! So, do people die because of fans in Korea?” “Yes! In fact, my mother always told me to be careful with a fan every summer,” said I. Then, other friends started to ask me questions like, “Are you sure people would die because of fan?” I answered, “Yeah, that is what I heard and I am sure it is true.” They asked me again, “Why?” “I think I heard it is something to do with the lack of oxygen that can happen if a fan continuously running in a closed room,” said I.

While we are discussing this, Stan looked it up on Wikipedia using his iPhone and started to read what he found which I have never tried to look up. He said, “Fan death is an urban legend prevailing in South Korea in which an electric fan left running overnight in a closed room can cause the death of those inside.”

Here comes the funny thing which my friends really enjoyed!

As soon as I heard it, I said, “See! It is true. That is exactly what I heard.” Well, as I said it, my friends started to laugh. Do you know why?

Well, apparently, I did not know what ‘Urban Legend’ means. Thus, I thought Wikipedia describes a true story of the fan death. It did not take a long time for Andrew to ask me, “Terry! Do you know what urban legend is?”

Here is the definition for you!

A modern myth. A frightening untrue story in which the storyteller insists it is true, but has no evidence to back up.

Before I argue about whether the fan death is really a urban legend or not, I have my own theory about why the fan death became a big issue in Korea. I think Korean government tried to encourage media to talk about this to make people not turn on their fans overnight so that they can reduce overall electric power usage during summer. Back in 1980’s, Korea was still kind of poor in comparison to these days.

I have done a few researches about this fan death and found this blog post which includes a scientific theory to support the fan death.

Here is the science of how a fan could kill. Remember the conditions under which Fan Deaths happen – summer (=heat), enclosed room, fan directly on the body. An electric fan cools your body in two ways: by pushing cooler air onto your body, and by allowing your sweat to dry rapidly and take away heat in that process. But clearly, the fan does not generate the cool air on its own, unlike an air conditioner. And eventually — especially if you are a passed-out drunk who is already somewhat dehydrated from the alcohol — your body will run out of water to turn into sweat. So what happens when it is very hot, but the entire room is enclosed such that no cool air comes in from outside, and you have no more sweat to cool your body with? Basically, the entire room turns into a gigantic turbo oven. Turbo oven is a conventional oven that has a fan inside that continues to blow air onto the food. This oven is known to cook at lower temperature than a regular oven, yet cook more quickly. Similarly, in a heated room without an outside source of airflow, very hot air is constantly pushed directly to your body, which is a far more effective way of raising your body temperature rather than “baking” in hot air. If you get enough of this, you would die – of hyperthermia, or abnormally high body temperature. (Source: http://askakorean.blogspot.com/)

Would you still think the fan death is an urban legend? I think it is not.

01 Dec

brother from another mother

Who taught: Andrew, Jean and Vincent

Brother from another mother (source: cheezburger.com)

Once again, it has been a while! I was in Philly to visit one of my friends during Thanksgiving weekend. How have you all been? I hope everything goes well with you. As you know, I am in Pittsburgh. Last night, it snowed. And I am sure it will continuously snow from today. That means it is officially winter here in Pittsburgh. How about where you live? Is it Winter or Summer? Either way, hope you have a great time!

Yesterday, I had dinner together with my friends. Jean said, “There is a potluck party in the company next week. I am sorry you are not invited. I wish you were also there.” (FYI, it is the company that I used to work.) Oh, have I told you about what “potluck” means? One of the things I really like in the U.S. is this culture of potluck. Here is the definition of potluck on Wikipedia.

a gathering of people where each person or group of people contributes a dish of food to be shared among the group.

What do you think? It is great in a sense that the host of a party does not need to worry about food too much but, at the same time, many people can enjoy different kinds of food. This is not very typical in Korea. Every time there is a party, the host needs to prepare most of the food and it is quite challenging.

Moving on, as Jean said it, Andrew said to me something very fast so that I was not able to get it perfectly. So, I said, “What? What did you say?” “Terry, you are my brother from another mother,” said Andrew. Jean said, “The most important thing of this expression is that you need to speak very fast since it rhymes.” What does it mean? I am sure you can guess it very easily. It means:

a good friend that you have known almost your whole life. The word “brother” is used because the friend is extremely close to you to the point that he is almost like your brother–but from a different mother. (source: Urban Dictionary)

There is an expression with the same meaning in Korean. It is “불알친구 (Bul-al-Chin-Gu).” Literal translation into English is “Friend of Testicles.” Why there is testicles here? Well, when you are really really young like one year old. Who cares you wear any clothing or not. And, you and your friend have grown up together being friends from that age. Then, you can call him 불알친구. One caveat here is that this only applies to men, as you may notice. 🙂 I am not sure we have another expression for women. I do not think we have any? Hmm.. Interesting. Now, I have trouble to find Korean words. Ironic!

17 Nov

the name of the game

Who taught: James

This cannot be true. NO NAME?? (source: crunchberry.org)

In the United States, there are two major communication tools that are used in many companies. One is email and the other one is IM(Instant Messenger). Back when I was in Korea, most of the companies did not like the usage of IM at work. They believed that it is used only for informal chats with friends or coworkers and not for work. Thus, they thought it is really bad for work productivity. Some companies actually blocked a few most common IMs. Not sure how it looks like these days in Korea.

But, in the U.S., IM is one of the critical parts of the communications at work. I have used it so many times to share ideas with my coworkers or even to give updates of my work to my boss, etc.

A few days ago, I had a chance to talk to James using IM. He is my friend and works for the company that I used to work. We had a chance to talk about some sort of work-related stuff. One point I said, “We had to get the things out the door for the customers.” He said, “That is the name of the game.” When he said that, I kind of felt what he meant by it but was also puzzled. So, I had to ask him to make sure what I thought was correct or not, “What is the name of the game? Are you saying ‘Get the things out the door’ is another game or something?” “Oh, no, it is an expression,” said he.

Here is his explanation about the expression, the name of the game.

The essential part or quality necessary for the success of an enterprise or the fulfillment of a goal because when you’re trying to make up games, you try to name them whatever the main point is

To make it easier for you to understand, the name of the game is pretty much the same as “the way the game is played.” One of the best situations you may use this expression is when you really try to play any kind of game with your friends. You can simply say, “So… does everybody know the name of the game?” (I am kind of afraid this would sound like I am really asking whether they know literally the name of the game, though.) Am I right, my American friends? I am going to use this one next time I play a game with Andrew or play squash with Phil.