Tag: Korean

Thoughts from 4 months into Korean studies

Hope ZaneLanguage Learning

SO, I’ve been thinking a lot about language learning, as you do. I spend a lot of time thinking about language learning and language in general, tbh. I don’t know why I get so surprised pikachu about it— the person who is obsessed with words in English is also obsessed with words in other languages, news at 11.

I’ve been study Korean for a little over 4 months now, just coming off a month-long break where I was mostly very sick and didn’t study very much of anything, although I did make feeble attempts to keep reading 혼불 and got through about 3/4 of a chapter.

I think what strikes me, with a fair amount of glee, is how absolutely chaotic the process is. I’ve never self-studied a language before now. The fundamentals of Japanese I know were learned in a classroom, and so I think I had this idea that that was the only or certainly the best way to go about it.

But I don’t know, I have a sense that I’ve learned Korean much faster and probably better than I learned Japanese. I find the process of learning a new language fun, and funny, and incredibly satisfying. It mostly consists of me throwing myself at media that is too hard for me, struggling my way through with a dictionary, googling wtf is this verb ending that I keep seeing, then eventually tossing myself at my textbook when I get confused enough. Repeat forever.

It’s satisfying to go back to things I read or listened to before, weeks or months later, and find that I understand much more this time.

I used to be really afraid of learning things wrong. Not so much anymore, mostly because experience has been showing me that it’s not a big deal. Misconceptions happen, and they straighten themselves out over time. Sometimes understanding something wrong is the first step to understanding it correctly a little ways in the future.

Anyway, the third chapter of 혼불 is way too hard for me, but I’m going to keep throwing myself at it whenever I have the time and patience.

난 계속 한국어를 공부할게! 화이팅!

Picking up words incidentally

Hope ZaneLanguage Learning

I’m going to start a running document of Words I Have Learned From the Trending Sidebar on Twitter, which so far includes 사고 from 바스사고 and 방송사고, wherein people were very upset about the audio fuckups during Stray Kids’ year-end stage on SBS. (See also: 음향사고)

I learned 공항 because everyone is eternally very concerned about where idols are going. Today I got 새벽 네시 after recognizing 새벽 from 새벽바람 from a song that makes me want to weep.

And on my second time seeing 금발 vs 흑발 trending, I finally get it. Specifically, it helps that I read through a picture dictionary and saw 금 enough times to know it means gold and 은 is silver.

…side note, I was Team 금발 Felix for the longest time, but 흑발 Felix might be growing on me.

Idk, shitposts on Twitter might be one of my new favorite ways to learn a language. There’s something very warm and comforting about memeing and internet jokes being the same the world over.

Health, wellness, and ink, oh man

Hope ZaneGeneral

(scroll down if you just want to see the earliest publication schedule for 2024)

I’m trying to give myself more credit, especially when it feels like I’ve accomplished nothing for long stretches of time, and then I look back and it turns out I actually have been doing and working on a whole lot. That feels like my life right now. I got back on asthma medication for the first time since I was 17, and lo and behold, a lot of the fatigue issues that I thought were just an intrinsic part of me lifted, and I was suddenly very excited to try and do every single physical activity possible. I went wild with that for about a month or so, to some hilarious (and sometimes injurious) results.

The shortest possible TL;DR of that entire state of affairs is that I’m now back in physical therapy for my knees and just had an occupational therapy appointment for my hands. Since I was in my early 20s, I’ve had issues with my joints. Current best guess is hypermobility, so I’m very tentatively and very carefully trying to strengthen my body enough that it can do the things I want it to do. It takes time, but I think I’m more patient now than I have been ever before.

I’ve also been studying Korean, which takes up my entire brain for days at a time. Learning languages seems like a good way to learn more about yourself—what your brain likes, what you love about the entire endeavor of words and collecting them. Writing my Korean notes out by hand in pencil has been very satisfying. I think my handwriting is getting a bit better, too.

Ask me how much time I’ve spent with the word 행복 stuck in my head.

I got a covid shot yesterday and have spent the majority of today feeling achy and sick but overall pretty satisfied about my body’s fomenting immunity and the whole doing my civic duty thing. I’ve been trying to take good care of myself lately. I’ll get my flu shot in a couple weeks and do the achy sickness thing all over again.

I did A Project and hilariously started fighting with my printer for like three hours yesterday as the delirium set in.


All of these new things have been taking up space that used to be solely inhabited by my writing. I didn’t write very much at all for a month or so, but I’m finding my way back to my former pace. It takes more willpower than it used to, but I don’t love it any less.

And a writing update

I wrote out a tentative publication schedule for 2024 that I’ll share once I have a few more things nailed down. I’d like to publish the fourth Fragile Tender book on Valentine’s Day, February 2024. I’d also like to do a big Kickstarter with fun merch for The Witchblood Heir series in the summer, and I have a new standalone book for the spring and something special for the fall. I hope you’re excited. I plan to work really hard in 2024, maybe harder than I ever have before. The prospects are really exciting to me, and I hope you’ll enjoy the results.