Daily life
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A Japanese garden and a Korean restaurant in France
This week I went to France for a couple of days to visit a good friend of mine. We are working together on a joint research project but always find the time for plenty of 여자들의 수다 “girl talk” during our breaks. On the day of my arrival my friend took me sightseeing around the city…
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Childish Korean
Since the past week has been spring break, you would think that I would have had plenty of time for studying Korean. Well, think again. On the other hand I have been spending plenty of time with family – both my own and my husband’s. Of course I have been cramming Korean for 3-4 hours…
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Dealing with the language learning plateau
Any language learner familiar with the awesome comic Itchy Feet will probably at some point have seen the one about reaching Mt. Fluency. I feel like that all the time these days. In many ways I do feel fluent in Korean. I mean, I’m able to express myself in almost any situation and when listening I…
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Korean Monday blues
The main picture says it all. It’s Monday! It also happens to be the last Monday before I leave for Korea (which will be exactly one week from today), and needless to say I’m super excited to be going. In fact the weekend cannot roll around quickly enough so I can start packing (very lightly…
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How my office dinner turned Korean
Yesterday I went out to dinner with some colleagues. The purpose of the dinner was to entertain a Japanese professor who is briefly visiting our department. This is common practice at my uni whenever we have a professor visiting from abroad. Since the professor was from Japan, the talk of the evening naturally centered around cultural…
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Dreaming in Korean
I love to ask bilingual people this question: “Which language do you dream in?” Since our dreams are determined by our subconscious mind they are in many ways a true reflection of the exposure we get to a certain language. I came to think about this yesterday, when I woke up from a dream in Korean.…
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Did I just accidentally celebrate Chuseok?
As most of you probably know this weekend marked the annual celebration of the Korean Thanksgiving holiday Chuseok. In Korea this is the time of year where you travel to your hometown to spend the holidays with your whole family. Traditionally, celebrating this holiday also involves visiting the graves of one’s ancestors and giving thanks. I’m…
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Mindful Korean learning
Heavily inspired by a tweet from Jeremy (founder of Motivate Korean), I got to thinking about how I go about my language learning and how I may improve my learning approach. On an average day I start out early in the morning so that I am able to study Korean for 1-1.5 hours before heading off to work. I…
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New rom-com “Twenty again” with Choi Ji Woo
This weekend has presented me with quite a few pleasant surprises. Friday night I received a text from a friend telling me that Saturday would be Korea day in our city. That meant a day full of Korean entertainment and (of course) Korean street food. Needless to say I dragged my hubby along for the…
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How to become a better Korean conversation partner
I often feel that my Korean skills develop rather asymmetrically. For instance, I feel my listening comprehension has increased quite a bit recently, while I still feel that my writing skills are lacking. A while ago I started feeling more confident when talking, while I felt that my ability to give feedback in a Korean…
Sofie to Korea 