(Listening to Pet Sounds by the Beach Boys. Outstanding record of sophisticated, catchy, thoughtful music and lyrics. Give it a listen!)
갖추다 1) prepare, get ready for, make arrangements for
2) be equipped, furnished with
3) possess, be equipped with, be endowed with
4) to maintain respect and manners
After thinking for a while about my last post, I think I made an error in my idea that 감추다 has its roots in the 이히기리우구추 principle for native verbs. All it took was thinking of one solid example of how 추 is added (the one that came to mind was 맞다 - 맞추다) and I realized my error. It's very possible that 감추다 is simply a standalone verb.
On the other hand, 갖추다 is conspicuous in its relation to 갖다. Here we have a verb pair that follows, what I'll call for a lack of a better term, the consonant harmony principle. I am in need of some serious review of how 이히기리우구추 works, and to be more exact what its purpose is (not sure now whether it acts as both the rule for turning verbs into short form passives or simply turning them from intransitive to transitive verbs) but that's what this blog is all about for me - getting me to think about these things (and hopefully others as well).
Anyways, 갖다 - 갖추다 follows this principle, at least ascethetically. 추 is added to a verb that has a ㅈ 받침. Now the verb 갖다 means to have or take something. 갖추다 looks to have a more nuanced meaning. The first meaning is to prepare, get ready for, and make arrangements for. Sentences pulled from Naver:
반격 태세를 갖추다
prepare to counterattack
여정을 갖추다
prepare for a journey
나는 대학 지원 서류를 모두 갖추었다.
I prepared everything for my college application.
A quick Google search confirmed my hunch that you can also say 준비를 갖추다. Now this might be a stretch, but I've always found the best translation for XX어 가지고 or XX어 갖고 is "having done XX". There's an abstract meaning that indicates the speaker has the results of doing XX verb. With regard to 갖추다, the speaker has all the necessities for carrying out their plan. You can say 준비를 갖추다, which is redundant (redundancy is a signature of Korean in my opinion), but drives home the point that all preparations have been made, that all the necessities involved in preparing for something have been taken care of. Because 갖추다 has this core sense of preparation, you can simply take out the 준비를 and make the object of your preparation the linguistic object (을/를). Thus, 반격 태세 is what you're trying to do, and by 갖추다ing it, you have put into position everything you need in order to carry it out.
The second meaning is to be equipped with, furnished with. Some example sentences:
최신 시설을 갖춘 호텔
a hotel with very modern facilities
이 호텔은 방마다 냉장고가 갖추어져 있다.
Each room in this hotel is furnished with a refrigerator.
이 사무실에는 소화기가 갖추어져 있지 않다.
This office is not equipped with a fire extinguisher.
This is a more literal meaning for 갖추다. Something has this, is furnished with something. This meaning seems to be solely used for places, or maybe when this verb is used with verbs it takes on the sense of "furnished with". But this is really just splitting hairs, because I see this as a nuance in translation when compared to the next meaning, to be equipped with, to possess, be endowed with, all referring to people.
그는 성악에 천부적인 재능을 갖추고 있다.
He's endowed with vocal talent.
그는 교사로서 충분한 자격을 갖추고 있다.
He is a well-qualified teacher (has all the qualifications for being a teacher).
그녀는 법률 지식을 충분이 갖추고 있다.
She has a strong background in law (is sufficiently knowledgeable on law).
As with above, this is simply a different way of stating that someone has something, typically something in the abstract (talent, skill, knowledge), although this is not the rule (to be qualified means you have the qualifications, maybe in the form of a certificate, a degree, or some other kind of education). Notice the conjugation of the verb in the present progressive (고 있다). This does not mean, however, that the basic present tense conjugation cannot be used (갖춘다). It can and is used.
The fourth meaning is interesting. To maintain respect or mind one's manners.
예의를 갖추어 인사하다.
greet formally
어른을 대할 때는 예의를 갖추도록 해라.
Mind your manners (be respectful) with adults (elders).
This meaning seems to be a fixed expression, The object is 예의 and by 갖추어ing it, you are doing everything to see that your manners are top-notch and you are respectful. In Korean society, I would imagine the laundry-list includes: upright posture, a command of 존댓말, especially when greeting and saying goodbye, proper bowing, two-handed handshakes, turning your head away when drinking a glass of alcohol, tea, etc, etc.
거세다 1) fierce, strong, violent, wild
My immediate reaction to this verb is that it is like 세다 (to be strong, violent, rough), but simply slightly more extreme. It also seems to be be used less often than 세다 is, and has maybe a smaller, more defined scope of nouns and circumstances it can be used in. Let's look at some example sentences from Naver:
강의 물살이 거세다.
The river's current is strong. / There's a strong current in the river.
그들은 평결에 거세게 항의했다.
They strongly opposed (protested) the verdict.
거센 반대에도 불구하고 법안이 통과되었다.
The law passed despite fierce opposition.
불길이 거세다.
The fire raged.
While 세다 can refer to weather, personality (stubbornness in particular), resistance, soju, luck, etc, 거세다 seems to be confined to mostly weather and resistance, opposition, or criticism (especially politically). That being said, I've seen 성격s referred to as 거세다, as well as 불만 and even 관심. My feeling is that this adjective is really just an order of magnitude more extreme than 세다 is, and thus is reserved for when the speaker wishes to emphasize the power or fierceness of whatever it is they're talking about. Of note, politics in Korea are can become pretty ridiculous (even violent). I've heard a number of educated Koreans refer to politics in Korea as 혼란스럽다 (chaotic). Google "south korea, politics, fire extinguisher" for a taste of what politics can be like here. But politics anywhere can be toxic. In English we don't usually refer to a college debate club as having a "toxic environment", even in the most heated discussion. However, American media often describes the Washington DC echo chamber as being "toxic" with "fierce opposition". I suppose politics is the same everywhere.
Monday, August 20, 2012
Friday, August 17, 2012
감추다 / 가혹하다
감추다 1) hide, conceal, cover up (something)
2) hide, disguise, conceal, keep secret (emotion, truth)
3) disappear, vanish
Now I'm not certain about how exactly 이히기리우구추 works, but my basic understanding is that they help turn intransitive verbs into transitive verbs. Take something like 익다 (to ripen, grow) and add 히 to it and you get 익히다 (to cook all the way through, boil). Likewise, 익다's other meaning is to be experienced or skilled, while 익히다 means to become proficient or master something (something you study usually). With this in mind, I feel like 감추다 is the transitive version of 감다. But the last verb I studied was 감다, and the only relatively related meaning could be closing one's eyes, and in that sense 감다 is a transitive verb (눈을 감다). It's hard to make a case that these two are related, but nonetheless, they fit the pattern outlined above so well that I cannot be draw a connection in my mind.
With that out of the way, let's take a look at the three uses of 감추다. The first is to hide, conceal, or cover up something. Sentences pulled from Naver:
보이지 않은 곳에 감추다
Hide (sth) in an unseen place.
서랍 속에 감추다
Hide in a drawer.
뒤에 감추고 있는 것이 뭐예요?
What are you hiding behind your back?
이 화장품은 잡티를 감쪽같이 감추어 준다
This makeup covers blemishes very well (as good as new).
감추다 can naturally be used with objects. This raises the question though - what's the difference between 감추다 and 숨기다? 숨기다 means to hide, conceal, cover up - just as 감추다 does. I'll have to ask a native speaker for nuances between the two, but from what I've seen in various books I've read, 숨기다 is more often used, as is its passive form, 숨겨지다 compared to 감춰지다. Once again, I'll need to ask some questions about the difference between these two. I don't know if I want to bring 가리다 into this analysis... I'm sure the more posts I accumulate, the more intuition I'll gain.
Anyways, on to 감추다's second meaning. To hide, disguise, conceal, or keep secret an emotion or truth.
창피한 사실을 감추다
hide an embarrassing truth (sweep something under the rug)
나는 당신에게 감추는 것이 없다.
I'm not hiding anything from you.
나는 분노를 감출 수 없었다.
I couldn't hide my anger.
그가 뭔가를 감추고 있다는 느낌을 받았다.
I felt that he was hiding something / I got the feeling that he was holding something back.
정부는 스캔들의 전모를 감추려고 애쓰고 있다.
The government was trying hard to cover up the full extent of the scandal.
감추지 않고 솔직하게 털어놔 봐.
Don't hide it and tell me what's going on. / Stop holding back and get it off your chest.
So truths, emotions, etc. Pretty straightforward. The third one is where it gets a bit tricky.
자취를 감추다
vanish without a trace
범인들은 감쪽같이 자취를 감췄다
The criminals have covered their tracks / vanished into thin air.
삐삐가 자취를 감추고 휴대전화가 그 자리를 대신했다
Beepers have disappeared now and mobile phones have replaced them.
The last sentence is interesting. I'm sure no Korean would have a problem understanding what the intended meaning of the sentence is, but still... The subject of the first part of the sentence is 삐삐 (beeper). It's as if saying that beepers disappeared on their own. They hid their tracks. 자취 means trace or tracks. From further investigation on the web, I think this is a popular saying. Despite its literal meaning (to me anyway) being "so-and-so hid their trace", the understood meaning is that the subject pretty much disappeared. I'll have to use this down the road...
A quick word on 감쪽같이... this is a new phrase for me. I can't seem to find a definition for 감쪽, but 감쪽같다 means to be as-good-as-new, or just like new, unnoticeable (in the fact that something is not new), etc. It seems that this word can be used with 고치다, as well as 도망치다 and 사라지다. So something can be repair or mended to be as good as new, and somebody can disappear or escape unnoticed. Interesting. I will definitely have to use this word in the future.
On to 가혹하다.
가혹하다 1) severe, hard, harsh, cruel, merciless, brutal
I've seen this word quite a bit. But I seem to always mistake it for 유혹 (meaning temptation). I used to live next to a bar named 유혹 (and became good friends with the waitress at that bar) and for some reason this word has stuck way more than any other X혹 word. Anyways, 가혹하다 means severe or harsh. A couple sentences from Naver:
가혹한 현실
harsh reality
가혹하게 다루다
be hard on somebody
용의자는 경찰 수사 과정에서 가혹한 행위를 당했다고 주장했다.
The suspect insisted that he was treated harshly during the police investigation.
It seems that 가혹하다 can be used with 다루다 to simply mean to treat someone bad. It's always good to know how adjectives pair up with verbs, or adjectives with nouns, etc. These word pairings are usually the accepted standard and convey the clearest image to a Korean in their mind. The problem I've seen with a lot of foreigners when they they speak Korean is that they translate commonly accepted word pairings in English. To the foreigner, this makes perfect sense. To the Korean, it's rather confusing. I've seen some really good Korean writing from an English-native speaker, and I was curious what Koreans thought of it. I showed it to my friend and she had a hard time understanding some of what he was saying. He said things like 그 책은 내 세상이 발칵 뒤집혔다 (that book changed my world, or literally "completely flipped over my world"), etc. There were actually parts in his writing that my Korean friend couldn't quite understand (she's a well educated Korean law student, so this was not due to any lack of ability on her part), and yet I could. It was as if I was reading English writing... in Korean. It was very bizarre.
Anyways, the whole point of this anecdote is to stress the importance of knowing which words are commonly paired with other words. I suppose it's the same in English. Koreans make vocabulary mistakes all the time in English, using words in contexts that English-speakers could never have imagined.
A quick search on Google brought the most common word pairing for 가혹 which seems to be 가혹행위. Cruel/harsh treatment. So someone can 다루다 someone else 가혹하게, and someone can be the receiver of 가혹행위. I'm sure the more I see this word, the more word pairs I'll come across.
That's it for today.
2) hide, disguise, conceal, keep secret (emotion, truth)
3) disappear, vanish
Now I'm not certain about how exactly 이히기리우구추 works, but my basic understanding is that they help turn intransitive verbs into transitive verbs. Take something like 익다 (to ripen, grow) and add 히 to it and you get 익히다 (to cook all the way through, boil). Likewise, 익다's other meaning is to be experienced or skilled, while 익히다 means to become proficient or master something (something you study usually). With this in mind, I feel like 감추다 is the transitive version of 감다. But the last verb I studied was 감다, and the only relatively related meaning could be closing one's eyes, and in that sense 감다 is a transitive verb (눈을 감다). It's hard to make a case that these two are related, but nonetheless, they fit the pattern outlined above so well that I cannot be draw a connection in my mind.
With that out of the way, let's take a look at the three uses of 감추다. The first is to hide, conceal, or cover up something. Sentences pulled from Naver:
보이지 않은 곳에 감추다
Hide (sth) in an unseen place.
서랍 속에 감추다
Hide in a drawer.
뒤에 감추고 있는 것이 뭐예요?
What are you hiding behind your back?
이 화장품은 잡티를 감쪽같이 감추어 준다
This makeup covers blemishes very well (as good as new).
감추다 can naturally be used with objects. This raises the question though - what's the difference between 감추다 and 숨기다? 숨기다 means to hide, conceal, cover up - just as 감추다 does. I'll have to ask a native speaker for nuances between the two, but from what I've seen in various books I've read, 숨기다 is more often used, as is its passive form, 숨겨지다 compared to 감춰지다. Once again, I'll need to ask some questions about the difference between these two. I don't know if I want to bring 가리다 into this analysis... I'm sure the more posts I accumulate, the more intuition I'll gain.
Anyways, on to 감추다's second meaning. To hide, disguise, conceal, or keep secret an emotion or truth.
창피한 사실을 감추다
hide an embarrassing truth (sweep something under the rug)
나는 당신에게 감추는 것이 없다.
I'm not hiding anything from you.
나는 분노를 감출 수 없었다.
I couldn't hide my anger.
그가 뭔가를 감추고 있다는 느낌을 받았다.
I felt that he was hiding something / I got the feeling that he was holding something back.
정부는 스캔들의 전모를 감추려고 애쓰고 있다.
The government was trying hard to cover up the full extent of the scandal.
감추지 않고 솔직하게 털어놔 봐.
Don't hide it and tell me what's going on. / Stop holding back and get it off your chest.
So truths, emotions, etc. Pretty straightforward. The third one is where it gets a bit tricky.
자취를 감추다
vanish without a trace
범인들은 감쪽같이 자취를 감췄다
The criminals have covered their tracks / vanished into thin air.
삐삐가 자취를 감추고 휴대전화가 그 자리를 대신했다
Beepers have disappeared now and mobile phones have replaced them.
The last sentence is interesting. I'm sure no Korean would have a problem understanding what the intended meaning of the sentence is, but still... The subject of the first part of the sentence is 삐삐 (beeper). It's as if saying that beepers disappeared on their own. They hid their tracks. 자취 means trace or tracks. From further investigation on the web, I think this is a popular saying. Despite its literal meaning (to me anyway) being "so-and-so hid their trace", the understood meaning is that the subject pretty much disappeared. I'll have to use this down the road...
A quick word on 감쪽같이... this is a new phrase for me. I can't seem to find a definition for 감쪽, but 감쪽같다 means to be as-good-as-new, or just like new, unnoticeable (in the fact that something is not new), etc. It seems that this word can be used with 고치다, as well as 도망치다 and 사라지다. So something can be repair or mended to be as good as new, and somebody can disappear or escape unnoticed. Interesting. I will definitely have to use this word in the future.
On to 가혹하다.
가혹하다 1) severe, hard, harsh, cruel, merciless, brutal
I've seen this word quite a bit. But I seem to always mistake it for 유혹 (meaning temptation). I used to live next to a bar named 유혹 (and became good friends with the waitress at that bar) and for some reason this word has stuck way more than any other X혹 word. Anyways, 가혹하다 means severe or harsh. A couple sentences from Naver:
가혹한 현실
harsh reality
가혹하게 다루다
be hard on somebody
용의자는 경찰 수사 과정에서 가혹한 행위를 당했다고 주장했다.
The suspect insisted that he was treated harshly during the police investigation.
It seems that 가혹하다 can be used with 다루다 to simply mean to treat someone bad. It's always good to know how adjectives pair up with verbs, or adjectives with nouns, etc. These word pairings are usually the accepted standard and convey the clearest image to a Korean in their mind. The problem I've seen with a lot of foreigners when they they speak Korean is that they translate commonly accepted word pairings in English. To the foreigner, this makes perfect sense. To the Korean, it's rather confusing. I've seen some really good Korean writing from an English-native speaker, and I was curious what Koreans thought of it. I showed it to my friend and she had a hard time understanding some of what he was saying. He said things like 그 책은 내 세상이 발칵 뒤집혔다 (that book changed my world, or literally "completely flipped over my world"), etc. There were actually parts in his writing that my Korean friend couldn't quite understand (she's a well educated Korean law student, so this was not due to any lack of ability on her part), and yet I could. It was as if I was reading English writing... in Korean. It was very bizarre.
Anyways, the whole point of this anecdote is to stress the importance of knowing which words are commonly paired with other words. I suppose it's the same in English. Koreans make vocabulary mistakes all the time in English, using words in contexts that English-speakers could never have imagined.
A quick search on Google brought the most common word pairing for 가혹 which seems to be 가혹행위. Cruel/harsh treatment. So someone can 다루다 someone else 가혹하게, and someone can be the receiver of 가혹행위. I'm sure the more I see this word, the more word pairs I'll come across.
That's it for today.
Wednesday, August 15, 2012
감다 / 가늘다
(Listening to Tim Buckley, Nick Drake, and Burt Bacharach for this post. Tim Buckley's "Once I Was", Nick Drake's "River Man" and "Time Has Told Me", and Mr. Bacharach's "Trains, Boats, And Planes", "Anyone Who Had A Heart", and "Walk On By" are some current favorites.)
감다 - 1) wind, coil, reel in
2) close/shut one's eyes
3) wash one's hair
4) swim (bathe) in a river
I've mostly used 감다 when speaking about eyes and closing them. I remember the first time a girlfriend said "머리 감아야해" and I was at a loss for what to say after that. You have to close your hair? Needless to say, I quickly learned though.
Let's have a look at this verb. First we have the sense of wind, coil, and reel in. Reel in should be immediately understandable, considering the act of reeling in fish is all about winding or coiling your line around a fishing spool (or whatever those things are called, my city roots never educated me on the finer points of fishing). Some quick sentences pulled from Naver.
붕대를 감다 - wrap a bandage
밧줄을 감다 - coil up a rope
낚싯줄을 감아 올리다 - reel in (and coil up) a fishing line
We have a number of rope-related actions, as well as a bandage one. Easy enough. Pretty much anything that can be wound or coiled up can be said to be 감다-able. First question that comes to mind is an electric guitar cable, one that is used to connect a guitar to an amplifier. Here's the first hit when I Googled "기타 캐이블 감아":
기타 캐이블 감는법
Cool, I feel I understand this now. Not that I would have expected a guitar cable to have a different verb associated with it, because it does have all the qualities of a rope. But now I'm curious... how do you say "unwind"? Quick first guess would be 풀다. You 풀다 your shoelaces when you untie them... But that's releasing a knot, while unwinding or uncoiling something usually involves pulling one end away from the spool, turning the whole spool and making the unwound portion longer. Let's look.
Typed in 낚싯줄 into Google and I got:
낚싯줄 묶는법
낚싯줄 매는법
Interesting... With further investigation, this is what I expected - fishing/lure knots. I'll have to study 묶다 and 매다 in detail down the road. Back to 감다...
Unwind/uncoil on Naver turns up 풀다. I was right. But I couldn't find much in the way of 기타 캐이블 풀다. However I did find 이어폰을 풀다 (http://twitter.com/DrMyung/status/130579904059285504).
이어폰을 풀다가 열 받은 적 많죠? 이어폰을 두번 접고 매듭을 지어 보관하다가 사용할 때는 매듭을 푼 후 잭 부분을 잡고 중력을 이용해 아래쪽으로 몇 번 털면 "대개"는 금방 풀립니다.
Found this gem on a certain Dr. Myung's Twitter. Apparently he's a doctor of remedies for day-to-day annoyances as well.
You've gotten angry after unwinding earphones, yes? Fold your earphones twice and tie a knot to store them. When you want to use them untie the knot, grab the jack, run your hand down the cord a number of times, and with the help of gravity, they should "usually" unwind themselves easily.
I took some liberties with the translation. 금방 is one of those words that always seems to escape a simple word-substitution translation. In this case, the good ole' Doctor means to say that the cord will unwind in an instant, in a matter of seconds, etc. I suppose I could have put "in a matter of seconds" in there, but for the sake of retaining how I felt the Doctor meant his words to sound, "easily" was my choice for 금방.
Anyways, where was I... 풀다. Certified antonym to 감다. Moving on.
눈을 감다 - close one's eyes. This is easy enough. Be sure not to say 눈을 닫다. This might illicit laughter from surrounding Koreans (especially ones who know English), but you'll be sacrificing any hard-earned respect you had up until that point.
Here's an interesting expression I've never seen or heard before:
눈감다 - to pass away
나는 그가 그렇게 젊은 나이에 눈감을 줄은 몰랐다.
I didn't think that he would die at such a young age.
Koreans can express death as closing ones eyes (for the last time). Good to know.
감다 also means to wash your hair. This may be a big stretch, but I can see how, back in the 조선 days of Korea (or even before that), people's hair could get pretty oily and tangled up with knots. One would need to tangle up their hair even more when washing it to release the knots... Meh, actually this doesn't seem to make much sense. Scratch that theory.
Anyways, when you wash your hair, you can say 머리를 감다. Good, moving on now.
I always try to find 의성어/의태어 (onomatopoeia) that can be used with these native verbs. Here's a good one:
방울뱀은 먹이를 몸으로 칭칭 감았다.
The rattlesnake wound itself around its prey.
I wonder if 칭칭 means "tightly" or refers more to the organized, layered fashion of wrapping something (like a snake's body or an ankle bandage). My feeling is it's the second one. Tightly is usually 단단히 or 꽉.
Here's a couple nice contextual uses of 감다.
그녀는 두 팔로 그의 목을 감았다.
She wrapped her arms around his neck. (I'm assuming a hug and not something more sinister)
테이프를 처음으로 다시 감았나?
Did you rewind the tape back to the beginning?
This makes sense, and now I know why they use 감다 on DVDs as well (I think I've seen that?). There's probably a 한자 word that means this as well. You don't really "rewind" a DVD, but that word can be used naturally in English because of the history we have of rewinding tapes. DVDs are the next evolution of movie/tv viewing, and despite the fact that there's no tape being wound, the concept has stuck. "Rewind back to that last scene" - listeners know that rewind means "go back to" in this context. This seems to be the same in Korean.
I'm also seeing a lot of 되감다s. Anytime you attach a 되 as a prefix, you get the sense of "return to before". So 되감다 means to rewind, literally.
Here's the oddball for 감다.
멱을 감다 - go for a swim / bathe in a river
So 멱 is a noun for swimming or bathing (outside that is). So if you 감아 a 멱을, then you are swimming or bathing in a river or something. Interesting. Maybe this is where the meaning for washing one's hair came from with regards to 감다? Back in the old days in Korea people probably bathed in rivers, yea? Hmm...
That's it for 감다. Now onto 가늘다.
가늘다 1) thin, slender, fine
2) small, faint, weak
I don't think I've ever used this myself, hence the reason for writing this blog. It's obvious this word describes thin and slender things. Fine seems to refer to sand or something.
가는 실 fine thread
가는 철사 thin wire
눈을 가늘게 뜨고 보다 squint at / look with narrowed eyes
그녀의 머리카락이 부드럽고 가늘다 her hair is soft and thin (fine)
빗줄이 점점 가늘어졌다 the rain tapered off (slowly thinned)
가는 모래 fine sand
Pretty much anything that is long and thin can probably be called 가늘다. We have thread, wire, eyes (narrow ones), hair, rain, and sand. Sand is the only one that doesn't fit the long and thin description, but fine is also a definition as well. Here's the second meaning:
가는 목소리로 말하다 speak with a faint/weak/small/soft voice
그녀의 목소리가 점점 가늘어졌다 her voice grew faint
흥분해서 그이 목소리가 가늘게 떨렸다 his voice quivered with excitement
It seems that the only other noun associated with 가늘다 is 목소리. Who knows if that's because Koreans made a connection between vocal cords being the source of one's voice. Who knows. But I imagine that 가늘다 could be used with other sounds as well, maybe music? Let's look.
Having typed 가늘다 into Google the first thing that popped up was 가늘다 얇다. Looks like we have a synonym. To be thin or flimsy is 얇다.
채소를 가늘고 길게 썰어라 cut the vegetables into thin strips
얇다 could easily substitute 가늘다 in this sentence. I can't find anything right now regarding music and 가늘다, I will have to look later. Let's find an antonym real quick.
두껍다 or 굵다.
If 가늘다 is long and thin, and 얇다 is thin and flimsy...
It seems that 가늘다 - 굵다, 얇다 - 두껍다. 굵다 seems to be thick, stout, etc. 두껍다 seems to be thick and heavy (flimsy means light in weight as well, so this makes sense). Obviously these aren't exact opposites, but I would say that 얇다 - 두껍다 is the natural pair in a Korean's mind.
That's all for today.
감다 - 1) wind, coil, reel in
2) close/shut one's eyes
3) wash one's hair
4) swim (bathe) in a river
I've mostly used 감다 when speaking about eyes and closing them. I remember the first time a girlfriend said "머리 감아야해" and I was at a loss for what to say after that. You have to close your hair? Needless to say, I quickly learned though.
Let's have a look at this verb. First we have the sense of wind, coil, and reel in. Reel in should be immediately understandable, considering the act of reeling in fish is all about winding or coiling your line around a fishing spool (or whatever those things are called, my city roots never educated me on the finer points of fishing). Some quick sentences pulled from Naver.
붕대를 감다 - wrap a bandage
밧줄을 감다 - coil up a rope
낚싯줄을 감아 올리다 - reel in (and coil up) a fishing line
We have a number of rope-related actions, as well as a bandage one. Easy enough. Pretty much anything that can be wound or coiled up can be said to be 감다-able. First question that comes to mind is an electric guitar cable, one that is used to connect a guitar to an amplifier. Here's the first hit when I Googled "기타 캐이블 감아":
기타 캐이블 감는법
Cool, I feel I understand this now. Not that I would have expected a guitar cable to have a different verb associated with it, because it does have all the qualities of a rope. But now I'm curious... how do you say "unwind"? Quick first guess would be 풀다. You 풀다 your shoelaces when you untie them... But that's releasing a knot, while unwinding or uncoiling something usually involves pulling one end away from the spool, turning the whole spool and making the unwound portion longer. Let's look.
Typed in 낚싯줄 into Google and I got:
낚싯줄 묶는법
낚싯줄 매는법
Interesting... With further investigation, this is what I expected - fishing/lure knots. I'll have to study 묶다 and 매다 in detail down the road. Back to 감다...
Unwind/uncoil on Naver turns up 풀다. I was right. But I couldn't find much in the way of 기타 캐이블 풀다. However I did find 이어폰을 풀다 (http://twitter.com/DrMyung/status/130579904059285504).
이어폰을 풀다가 열 받은 적 많죠? 이어폰을 두번 접고 매듭을 지어 보관하다가 사용할 때는 매듭을 푼 후 잭 부분을 잡고 중력을 이용해 아래쪽으로 몇 번 털면 "대개"는 금방 풀립니다.
Found this gem on a certain Dr. Myung's Twitter. Apparently he's a doctor of remedies for day-to-day annoyances as well.
You've gotten angry after unwinding earphones, yes? Fold your earphones twice and tie a knot to store them. When you want to use them untie the knot, grab the jack, run your hand down the cord a number of times, and with the help of gravity, they should "usually" unwind themselves easily.
I took some liberties with the translation. 금방 is one of those words that always seems to escape a simple word-substitution translation. In this case, the good ole' Doctor means to say that the cord will unwind in an instant, in a matter of seconds, etc. I suppose I could have put "in a matter of seconds" in there, but for the sake of retaining how I felt the Doctor meant his words to sound, "easily" was my choice for 금방.
Anyways, where was I... 풀다. Certified antonym to 감다. Moving on.
눈을 감다 - close one's eyes. This is easy enough. Be sure not to say 눈을 닫다. This might illicit laughter from surrounding Koreans (especially ones who know English), but you'll be sacrificing any hard-earned respect you had up until that point.
Here's an interesting expression I've never seen or heard before:
눈감다 - to pass away
나는 그가 그렇게 젊은 나이에 눈감을 줄은 몰랐다.
I didn't think that he would die at such a young age.
Koreans can express death as closing ones eyes (for the last time). Good to know.
감다 also means to wash your hair. This may be a big stretch, but I can see how, back in the 조선 days of Korea (or even before that), people's hair could get pretty oily and tangled up with knots. One would need to tangle up their hair even more when washing it to release the knots... Meh, actually this doesn't seem to make much sense. Scratch that theory.
Anyways, when you wash your hair, you can say 머리를 감다. Good, moving on now.
I always try to find 의성어/의태어 (onomatopoeia) that can be used with these native verbs. Here's a good one:
방울뱀은 먹이를 몸으로 칭칭 감았다.
The rattlesnake wound itself around its prey.
I wonder if 칭칭 means "tightly" or refers more to the organized, layered fashion of wrapping something (like a snake's body or an ankle bandage). My feeling is it's the second one. Tightly is usually 단단히 or 꽉.
Here's a couple nice contextual uses of 감다.
그녀는 두 팔로 그의 목을 감았다.
She wrapped her arms around his neck. (I'm assuming a hug and not something more sinister)
테이프를 처음으로 다시 감았나?
Did you rewind the tape back to the beginning?
This makes sense, and now I know why they use 감다 on DVDs as well (I think I've seen that?). There's probably a 한자 word that means this as well. You don't really "rewind" a DVD, but that word can be used naturally in English because of the history we have of rewinding tapes. DVDs are the next evolution of movie/tv viewing, and despite the fact that there's no tape being wound, the concept has stuck. "Rewind back to that last scene" - listeners know that rewind means "go back to" in this context. This seems to be the same in Korean.
I'm also seeing a lot of 되감다s. Anytime you attach a 되 as a prefix, you get the sense of "return to before". So 되감다 means to rewind, literally.
Here's the oddball for 감다.
멱을 감다 - go for a swim / bathe in a river
So 멱 is a noun for swimming or bathing (outside that is). So if you 감아 a 멱을, then you are swimming or bathing in a river or something. Interesting. Maybe this is where the meaning for washing one's hair came from with regards to 감다? Back in the old days in Korea people probably bathed in rivers, yea? Hmm...
That's it for 감다. Now onto 가늘다.
가늘다 1) thin, slender, fine
2) small, faint, weak
I don't think I've ever used this myself, hence the reason for writing this blog. It's obvious this word describes thin and slender things. Fine seems to refer to sand or something.
가는 실 fine thread
가는 철사 thin wire
눈을 가늘게 뜨고 보다 squint at / look with narrowed eyes
그녀의 머리카락이 부드럽고 가늘다 her hair is soft and thin (fine)
빗줄이 점점 가늘어졌다 the rain tapered off (slowly thinned)
가는 모래 fine sand
Pretty much anything that is long and thin can probably be called 가늘다. We have thread, wire, eyes (narrow ones), hair, rain, and sand. Sand is the only one that doesn't fit the long and thin description, but fine is also a definition as well. Here's the second meaning:
가는 목소리로 말하다 speak with a faint/weak/small/soft voice
그녀의 목소리가 점점 가늘어졌다 her voice grew faint
흥분해서 그이 목소리가 가늘게 떨렸다 his voice quivered with excitement
It seems that the only other noun associated with 가늘다 is 목소리. Who knows if that's because Koreans made a connection between vocal cords being the source of one's voice. Who knows. But I imagine that 가늘다 could be used with other sounds as well, maybe music? Let's look.
Having typed 가늘다 into Google the first thing that popped up was 가늘다 얇다. Looks like we have a synonym. To be thin or flimsy is 얇다.
채소를 가늘고 길게 썰어라 cut the vegetables into thin strips
얇다 could easily substitute 가늘다 in this sentence. I can't find anything right now regarding music and 가늘다, I will have to look later. Let's find an antonym real quick.
두껍다 or 굵다.
If 가늘다 is long and thin, and 얇다 is thin and flimsy...
It seems that 가늘다 - 굵다, 얇다 - 두껍다. 굵다 seems to be thick, stout, etc. 두껍다 seems to be thick and heavy (flimsy means light in weight as well, so this makes sense). Obviously these aren't exact opposites, but I would say that 얇다 - 두껍다 is the natural pair in a Korean's mind.
That's all for today.
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