hello, i’m starting a learning log primarily for future me to look back on when i’m in need of motivation! i often go overboard with explaining, so please do check out the tldr at the bottom if you’d like to save yourself from reading a book of text.
i plan to upload one learning log post per week outlining what and how i studied that week – they will all be bite-sized in comparison to this post!
배경 background
when i was young, my older sibling kept a short, dusty english to mandarin dictionary with them at all times and was convinced they would learn the language with only that. at the time, i thought they were the weirdest person alive for not having a more common interest for a ten-year-old. but between their continued passion for mandarin and my father’s passive interest in language learning – he was so proud of himself for knowing the word “cat” in a few languages – i found myself with a strong love of foreign literature (i love portuguese literature so, so much).
i began consistently consuming korean content – primarily kpop – during middle school after a few of my friends introduced me to red velvet and loona. i watched both groups’ content nonstop and fell in love with how the language sounded and how effortlessly beautiful expressing emotions seemed, but my interest stayed as exactly that: an interest. although i wish i’d started learning sooner, it’s been a blast, i find myself picking up on grammar points easily since i can recall full sentences where they’ve been used due to my years of hearing korean in use. there’s even some grammar points that i’ve gone to learn and realized that i subconsciously picked it up some time ago. because of this, i am not too sure where i fall in TOPIK terms (i have no intention of taking any of the tests) or on a broad beginner, intermediate, and advanced spectrum, but i’d guess i am somewhere in the intermediate plateau.
목표 goals
i’ve read countless fan and computer generated translations of korean songs and blogs throughout the past seven+ years. most of my motivation with learning korean stems from those experiences and an unwavering desire to translate as a hobby and write my own blogs, too.
reading is my main priority with writing as a close second. listening is third as i rely on subtitles and written text in my day to day life anyway due to partial hearing loss. speaking has always been my last priority because although i’d love to be able to converse in korean via speech, i have no intentions to travel to korea for more than a brief vacation and prefer interacting online where writing would prove more useful.
요즘에는 내가 공부하는 방법 how i study these days
since reaching an intermediate level, i primarily use immerision and study and review a few grammar points per week to supplement my learning. i’ve been listening to music and watching youtube videos the most and dabble in manga and anki flashcards as secondary tools.
some of the artists i listen to include 유키카, 이브, wave to earth (i’m going to their boston concert this fall), 빌리, 예빛, 김다니엘, and 최첼로. i usually read the lyrics to a song a couple times quite randomly whenever i feel like it – i tend to listen to the same few songs on loop and get familiarized that way.
for youtube, i follow a steady routine of watching the video with korean subs, watching it with english subs and noting down words, phrases, or grammar points to review, then watch the video again without english subtitles. whether i have korean subtitles on during my final watch entirely depends on my mood in that given moment. i don’t have any favorite youtubers or content in general, but i’ve been watching a lot of content that features 빌리 now that all seven members are active again. 빌리네 빌리지 seems like a promising series!
i also read a good chunk of japanese manga translated into korean! i buy ebooks from ridibooks, and once i get to a higher level i plan to buy physical novels and poetry books. my method of learning from manga is pretty similar to how i learn from youtube videos: i read once without searching up any terms, then read again with the intention to fully understand each sentence. i am working my way through 비 오는 밤의 달 since i fell in love with the series a month ago.
i curate my own anki deck, and it currently has almost five-thousand cards. i try to add a minimum of twenty cards per day. i include single words, phrases, hanja, and sentences.
한자 hanja
i decided to make hanja its own section because i do not use any of the aforementioned methods to learn it. i use TMMIK’s hanja book, ultimatekorean, and random blogs on naver to discover new hanja. i don’t memorize how their chinese counterparts are written and instead focus on the meaning and words with that hanja in them.
after i learn the meaning of the hanja, i cover the vocabulary’s translation listed on the next page and try to guess what they mean. it has proven to be a good way for me to learn new hanja and review old ones without extensive review. studying hanja tends to be a rather boring task, so i only push myself to review and study it when i’m feeling particularly motivated – i’ve burnt out from hanja learning sessions before… it’s not fun, but i do believe that for my goals, learning hanja is important. it’s gotten less tedious with time, though, and the benefits far outweigh the boredom.
i have a fairly easy time spotting familiar hanja in unknown words and can comfortably guess the meaning of the words as a result! it’s a great feeling, really.
tldr: my exposure and interest in foreign languages started at a young age; my goals are to comfortably translate songs and comics and write my own blog in korean; i utilize music, youtube, manga, and anki to study korean; i use TTMIK and ultimatekorean for hanja studies.
note: i will begin adding a section for my japanese studies once i get past that super-beginner stage! i’m still memorizing the kana, so it will probably be a little while until i reach that point.
happy sunday everyone, here’s a quick overview of what and how i studied over the past week:
읽기 reading
since finishing the first five volumes of 비 오는 밤의 달 in english, i’ve been itching to read it in korean, so i did exactly that. well, i started reading it. i haven’t sat down and caught everything i don’t know, but i think i can put that off for now since i understand most of the content quite well.
i read the first forty-five pages over the past week and have been enjoying it a lot. it feels right in my level grammar wise and has useful vocabulary i probably wouldn’t have come across otherwise (청각장애인, 수화). there’s a good amount of repetition of phrases i hadn’t come across before so i’m able to recall them easily and probably could’ve waited before searching and guessed the words based on context.
besides that, i didn’t read much in korean this week – i got busy with an linguistics book written in english. i might write a post about what i’ve learned from that one day. it contains a lot of interesting and motivating information. i bought the first volume of skip to loafer and hope to start reading that this week as well!
쓰기 writing
i enjoy yves’ writing and decided to do use her work for writing practice similar to shadowing spoken word. i read a few of her blog posts and rewrote them with different vocabulary. a mixture of handwriting practice, general writing practice, and reading practice – it’s a win-win-win!
듣기 listening
native korean speakers never to fail to amaze me with how fast they talk – it’s insane. however, i am happy to report that this week i was able to match the subtitles to spoken word without much difficulty. take away the subtitles and it’d be a different story . i watched episode 00 of 빌리네 빌리지 on youtube and learned some new words: 납치, 살금살금, 농촌, and more.
moving on, i was able to hear the words shown in the subtitles which felt rewarding. one of my goals for the upcoming weeks is to find content with different dialects. i don’t come across them too often, so when i do i typically assume i’m mishearing. i also want to work on listening without any subtitles. i’ve seen people use short videos such as tiktoks, instagram reels, and street interviews to practice with, and i think i’ll try that too!
i also watched a lot of videos without the intention of writing down words or grammar points i’ve yet to learn, but i don’t have much to comment on. i did the same with music, just passive listening while at work, and have no comments there either.
japanese
i’m still learning hiragana and katakana, but i’ve been enjoying the process so far. one of my favorite ways to learn the alphabet (if that’s the right word) in a new language is by writing out the lyrics to songs i like. in the case of japanese, i am of course pretending i don’t see the kanji for now. i’ll tackle that another day. writing stuff by hand feels the best for me in terms of enjoyment and memorization. this week i plan to dive into some simple grammar and vocabulary! i’ve heard that there’s a handful of similarities between korean and japanese grammar, so fingers crossed i can skip some of the confusion down the road.
writing this out helped give me a better idea of what i should be focusing on to fix my weaker areas. i’m excited to scroll through these posts one day and see how i improved!
so far i’m enjoying this site a lot and can see it being a staple for keeping myself motivated and discovering new books, manga, shows, and ways to approach language learning. i look forward to getting more familiar with the active users on here
happy sunday! i got quite busy after adopting a cat and decided to wait to update when i had more to write about.
읽기 reading
i completely blanked on mentioning this in one of my earlier posts, but i have been slowly making my way through pokémon black. the grammar and vocabulary are pretty simple, but my reading speed isn’t too fast yet and some of the pokémon-specific words slow me down a lot. there’s been a lot of “i can figure out what this strange word means!” moments even though it is a made up word and i end up needing to google its english equivalent. overall, it’s been a fun way to work on my reading speed and play a game i love. i plan to work through the rest of the games as well!
while on the topic of games, i started a korean run of stardew valley yesterday and i’m very excited! i’ve already spent a ridiculous amount of hours playing it in english, so my lookups have been minimal because even if i don’t know the exact definition of a word, i can guess based on experience. so far it’s been enjoyable, but i know once i start fishing it’ll get more complicated. i have a few korean friends on steam and plan to pull some games from their libraries into mine once i get bored of stardew. i’ve been eyeing lapin, which is completely new to me, and stray, a game i’ve mostly completed in english.
i’ve been searching for a short novel to read and haven’t yet found one that has drawn me in, but i’ve been reading some comics and lots of social media posts to get in some reading practice.
쓰기 writing
i’ve starting writing short diary-like paragraphs in a notebook to practice writing my own stuff without shadowing a native speaker’s work. i’m working towards writing a longer piece and paying a tutor to give feedback and make corrections on it! i think it will give a lot of helpful insight. i’ve noticed that when i focus a bit more on writing, i tend to think more in korean afterwards too which is a nice feeling.
듣기 listening
most of my recent listening has either been passive or with the assistance of korean subtitles, but i joined the september listening challenge and hope to work on that this month! i recently came across didi’s korean culture podcast, and i like her content a lot. she has a variety of topics, and she speaks very clearly, so it’s easier for me to relax and absorb what she’s saying without needing to actively think about it as much as i might with other podcast-ers (?).
i’ve been searching far and wide for popular western cartoons (spongebob, my little pony, etc.) dubbed and subbed in korean, and oh it’s been a struggle. every service i find either only has one or the other, or it’s locked behind the need for a korean phone number. i looked into buying a korean sim and it’s all far too expensive for long term usage, so i’m going to keep looking for a website with what i’m looking for.
i’m going to a wave to earth concert in a few months, and i’m not sure if they speak any english or if there will be an interpreter. my motivation to work on my listening is at an all time high.
tldr: i’ve been practicing reading primarily through games (pokémon, stardew valley, more soon), comics, and social media. my writing practice seems to be helping me think more in korean, and i haven’t been doing much pure listening – i usually read kr subtitles – but i plan to focus on that more by participating in the september listening challenge.
happy wednesday! i’ve been feeling extra motivated lately, so i thought i’d use my break from learning to write about what and how i’ve been learning lately.
읽기 reading
i’ve been playing a lot of animal crossing new horizons lately and watching content about it too. i’ve been mostly watching island tours and they tend not to have subtitles so i’ve gotten some reading practice from that. on the topic of games, i’ve also started trying visual novels. i downloaded everything from cheritz since i can be confident all of their works are from native speakers and not a janky ai translation. i found a website that has a toooon of visual novels listed and categorized, but whew there is not a big selection for korean ones. i plan to start focusing more on japanese (for real this time) so i’m sure i’ll end up referencing that website once i’m past the beginner stage. i don’t believe i saved the website anywhere, but i’m going to rummage through my search history to find it and i’ll link it in a separate post for anyone who may be interested .
i also discovered that is not too hard to find korean scanlators on naver cafe so i’ve been reading from there a lot lately. there’s a few manga series i am waiting to see get a korean license. besides that, i also found a few active blogs over there that i enjoy reading. i think my knowledge of korean slang is going up too since i come across it much more often now.
throughout the next couple months i’ll be happily participating in two book clubs! i am very excited for them both. i have a few novels i’ve yet to touch because i am a little intimidated by them, so i think the book clubs will help me get past that. i’m hoping to see a noticeable difference in my reading comprehension after getting through some more formal written works.
japanese
unfortunately i do not have much of an update for my japanese journey as i have been horribly inconsistent with studying japanese, but lately i’ve felt a strong urge to get back into it. i was browsing the japanese side of natively and was like wow, i really wanna talk about manga with everyone over there too! so that has been a great motivation for me, and i’ve even brought my beginner textbook and workbook to my desk to get started with tonight. even as i type this i’m so excited i want to end the post right here and get to work
miscellaneous / a short excited ramble about language learning
one of the main reasons i began learning korean was because i wanted to be able to translate my favorite songs, interviews, comics, and have a blog dedicated to all of that. these days i feel like i am getting to a point where i could comfortably translate some songs and interviews without too much difficulty. my main concern is still vocabulary, but it is much easier to search for a fews words in the dictionary than learn a new grammar point on the spot. i need to get back on my hanja grind and keep reading. it feels like i am overflowing with motivation at the moment!
tldr: lots of excitement as i grow more comfortable with korean, my personal translation dreams are growing to be more realistic, and the japanese category on natively has ignited a strong urge to study japanese more.
also, i’m going to try updating this more regularly since i have been failing miserably at my one update per week goal
Woo-hoo! I always love reading blog posts like this; they pump me up so much too!
I’ve always wondered: hanja are borrowed Chinese characters Korean uses, right? How often do they show up in texts? I was under the impression that once you learned Hangul you were set, but maybe not?
yes, hanja is borrowed chinese characters! in my experience, they don’t show up too often in places that aren’t formal. i know they’re much more common in korea on signs, advertisements, and menus. so some of them are differently essential to know, but they’re most commonly seen and heard as their korean equivalent.
for example, i personally would not recognize this chinese character 敎 in the wild. i have no clue how to write it or pronounce it, but i would recognize its korean equivalent 교 (gyo). it means to teach. with knowing that alone, if i were coming across the word 교실 (gyo-sil; classroom) for the first time, i could assume it has something to do with teaching. same with 교육 (gyo-yook; education), 교수 (gyo-su; professor), and more! it’s similar to learning latin-based suffixes or roots to expand your english vocabulary. it can get a little confusing though because sometimes the korean equivalent will have the same pronunciation and look the same, but have different meanings.
so you don’t have to go out of your way to learn them at all – i’ve picked up a few from pattern recognition – but they definitely help since sino-korean words make up around 60% of the korean language.
hopefully this all makes sense, and thank you for the question! i enjoy talking about this sort of stuff . i’m excited for when i spend more time on the japanese side of natively and can nerd out over japanese with everyone hahaha
I knew hanja was used throughout korean vocab, but for some reason it never occured to me to study hanja specifically to increase my korean vocabulary. I will definitely be looking into that, it looks like something i would absolutely get obsessed with and geek out about. thanks for the motivation!!
And good luck with japanese!
That is the best feeling, I hope you were able to ride the motivation wave and get into it
i hope it works well for you too! it’s a great feeling seeing a new word and being able to guess its meaning because you recognize the hanja. if you need any resources for it let me know i have a few
thank you! i was surfing on that wave like a pro for a few hours, but i ended up feeling sleepy earlier than my usual. i forgot that studying / learning can get physically tiring too. it was a satisfying feeling though
happy thursday! i’ve not done tons over the past week, but have many thoughts to share regardless. this time there is more about japanese!
한국어
i noticed that i have not updated any of my book progress on here recently, so i need to catch up on that. i’m almost completely finished with 나를 먹고 싶은 괴물 2, 호리미야, and 비 오는 밤의 달 2 !! i also started the book club book with a title i cannot remember at the moment. i have been enjoying everything i’m reading! it’s a nice feeling. there’s a japanese series and i’m anticipating it’s korean release. i read the first 40ish chapters in english then stopped when i saw a tweet from the creator saying there would be an official korean release eventually. i’ve read a few fan translations and it seems that koreans are calling it 신경 쓰였던 사람이 남자가 아니었다 and i am curious to see if that name will match the official one. i know with jp → eng they sometimes differ.
日本語
despite my overwhelming motivation to learn japanese, i have run into a couple obstacles. i think most of them are mental, but i didn’t experience this during my beginner days of learning korean so it feels especially strange and stressful. i harbor a strong love for howtostudykorean.com and would have appreciated a japanese carbon coby of it. there may be one out there, but i’ve not found it yet. perhaps i just do not like change and am seeking familiarity… not sure, but i haven’t found a grammar focused resource i’m fond of yet. i love the long, detailed explanations on even the simplest of grammar and clarification and examples of each vocabulary word. i haven’t ventured much into genki because i’ve heard enough mixed reviews to toss it to the side, but i should probably check it out and come to my own conclusions with it.
on the positive side, there’s a lot of GL i am excited to venture into and that has helped keep my motivation high. i feel confident with most of the kana thanks to renshuu. i got very competitive with some of the minigames and managed to snag first place on one of them! i think i want to use renshuu as my anki replacement for japanese because i cannot imagine myself getting through two separate sets of reviews daily on anki, but i don’t understand how renshuu works entirely and that also stresses me out. i think i need to just get past that ultra beginner stage and then my standards for resources will drop . i’m not entirely sure what my issue is, but regardless i think i need to just power through it instead of dwelling on it and allowing that stress to further root itself in me
tldr: i need someone to make a carbon coby of howtostudykorean.com because i’ve become attached to it
I have no experience with any of the common textbooks (I did my beginning Japanese at university literal decades ago), but I’ve heard Minna no Nihongo as the other self learner textbook that people use. That’s mostly (entirely?) comprehensible input based, so it might be better for you if you’re more interested in taking that path.
!!
Thank you for the explanation!
. i’m not entirely sure what my issue is, but regardless i think i need to just power through it instead of dwelling on it and allowing that stress to further root itself in me