An Honest Review of Korean: Using Korean in Korea

In order to really learn a foreign language, you need to travel to the country where it is spoken and truly immerse yourself in it. You need to surround yourself with the language and make it a part of your everyday life. Only then can you truly understand and master the language.

 

If you’ve ever studied a foreign language, this advice is not going to be anything you haven’t heard before. While language classes and clubs are a great way to start, and while there are certainly people who have achieved fluency while having never stepped foot outside of their home country, it is just a known fact that immersion is the quickest way to learn a language and reach a high level of fluency.

 

Somehow I was fortunate enough to be granted such an opportunity in the form of the Korean Overseas Flagship Program, a program funded by the United States government with the goal of sending American students to Korea for one year to study the language at a more professional level and let them truly immerse themselves in the culture. My year in the Republic of Korea is almost over, and I thought this would be a good time to really sit back and reflect on my Korean language journey, the ups and downs, the accomplishments and the challenges, and just my overall progress evaluated from my own point of view.

 

As more and more people take an interest in studying Korean, I think that it would be somewhat helpful to know just what this journey entails. Of course, my story is only one perspective out of millions, but if my experience can be of help or merely just interest for anyone, then that is more than enough for me.

 

So here is an honest review and reflection of my Korean language learning experience, all being capped off with this year-long adventure in Korea.

 

In terms of how I came to learn Korean, I like to think that my story is pretty stereotypical. I feel as though I have probably told this story at least a hundred times by now, as the question “How did you come to study Korean?” is a question that any Korean language learner is bound to be asked with every new introduction. In short, I came to discover hallyu for the first time in the summer of 2017, right after graduating from high school. Naturally, not knowing a single word or syllable of Korean, I was merely there for the catchy beats and the entertaining content that these idols produced alongside their music.

 

But of course, I couldn’t help but be curious. Reading translations and subtitles was all fun and good, of course, but I still felt so distanced from the actual content, like I was merely an observer watching through a thick and somewhat obscured layer of glass. I mean, that’s kind of exactly what I was, but nevertheless. I figured that the only way I could bridge this gap would be to, at the very least, learn the Korean alphabet and pronunciation rules. Then I could maybe start to sing some of my favorite songs without having to struggle with the task of deciphering the romanized Korean, or read some of the captions that were scrawled on the variety shows I watched. It was a humble beginning, starting off with me searching for hangeul study materials on the internet and practicing in my room.

 

Then when it came time to register for my very first college courses, I was shocked and delighted to see that they offered Korean language classes, starting from the very basics. My dad certainly had a good laugh when I went to him and told him that I signed up for level one Korean, but I was so thrilled with my decision and the possibilities that were to come. At the time, I merely enrolled on a whim, certain that learning Korean would be more of a hobby that I would keep up with until my classes became too busy and I inevitably had to drop. Boy was I wrong.

 

I won’t go through everything that led up to this capstone year in Korea, but I will say that I believe it was pure stubbornness and sheer will power that kept me enrolled in these Korean classes semester after semester up until now. What started off as simply first semester Korean soon turned into second semester, then third semester, and suddenly I was a fourth-year undergrad preparing to take my proficiency tests to apply for the Capstone Program.

 

If I were to reflect on the progress I’ve made over these five years, obviously the difference between my proficiency on the very very day of Korean class and my proficiency now are worlds apart from one another. It is so funny to me when I go and rewatch some of those variety show episodes that I once could only understand through English subtitles, only to now be able to get most of the content purely through listening. Of course, I still have more than a long way to go in terms of learning and progress, but it’s just some of the little things that make me realize truly how far I’ve come.

 

Of course, using Korean in a classroom in the US and using Korean in everyday life while actually in Korea are two very different experiences. You can study a language your entire life in the classroom and still encounter things that you could have never expected once you get out into the real world. Honestly, it’s the same in your native tongue as well. The difference is simply a matter of how much confidence we possess when we have to navigate these strange and unexpected circumstances.

 

This, unfortunately, has been the most challenging for me personally.

 

The fact of the reality is, no matter how much you study beforehand, no matter how many words or phrases you have memorized, a lack of confidence is what is ultimately going to keep you from moving forward at your full potential. Coming to Korea, while being an experience straight out of my dreams, has introduced me to all new types of anxieties when it comes to using my language skills. The classroom is a forgiving environment where mistakes are accepted and even encouraged for the sake of learning. After all, how is one supposed to learn if not through their mistakes? And I am most certainly not saying that you are not allowed to make any mistakes whatsoever in the real world, but I would also be lying if I said that everyone is incredibly patient and accepting when you do make a mistake.

 

I have been thrown into situations in which I received absolutely no preparation, including opening a bank account, going to go get my booster shot for the COVID-19 vaccine, even getting a haircut required a bit of prior research in terms of what exactly I needed to say. I know that these are not particularly difficult things to do, and it’s not like I’m doing some important business deals or buying a house in a foreign language. The pressure is most definitely not as high as it could be.

 

But I have come to one very important realization about myself through all of these experiences, which is that, as someone who has studied Korean for so long, who has reached the “advanced” level of proficiency, there is an internalized pressure that I put on myself to execute all of these tasks perfectly, and in the case that I cannot do it, I have convinced myself that the person on the other side of the conversation will see through my facade of someone who thinks they can speak Korean and judge me for it.

 

In short, for me, being able to speak Korean has its benefits and its downfalls. I have the capability to get through these situations if I simply concentrate and put my mind to it, but the pressure to be “perfect” has grown with every improvement.

 

It is all simply a matter of perspective, I suppose. How do we view our mistakes as language learners? Are we overly critical of ourselves when these unexpected mishaps happen? Or do we laugh to ourselves and take it in stride, telling ourselves that this is a learning moment? Going out into the real world and using Korean for all sorts of purposes has highlighted to me how I need to make an effort to be more like the latter. Being critical of oneself is not a bad thing, and is actually sometimes what we need in order to fix things that we are not satisfied with or which may be the root of some difficulties in our lives. But being overly critical is, in my opinion, not the answer to improvement. It stops us from just going out and doing, prevents us from going out and experiencing the things that will help us grow. So this entire year has been dedicated to trying to change my perspective on my language skills and my environment. Sure, maybe not everyone will be as forgiving and accepting as I may hope, but I’ll never know if I don’t try, right?

 

I think that this is something that is not specifically stated in that piece of advice telling us to go and immerse ourselves in a language. Not only is it an opportunity to simply be exposed to the language in your everyday life, but it is also an opportunity for you to build up your confidence in your language skills, to prove to yourself that, yes, you can actually live in this language and thrive. Learning a language is so much more than just memorizing vocabulary and grammar. From my own experience, it is essentially like learning how to live again, learning how to think rationally, make decisions, create your own opinions and arguments, solve problems, and question everything all in a new language. This year in Korea along with the classes I have been taking and the internship work I have been doing have all led me to this realization, and I have come to have a much greater appreciation for the art of language study.

 

But of course I cannot deny all of the wonderful things about being able to speak this language somewhat fluently while being in Korea. Convenience is certainly at the top of this list. It’s just so much faster and convenient to simply be able to understand Korean for what it is instead of having to go the extra steps to first translate everything into English and go from there. Not that I don’t use my handy translator app every now and then, but I use it far less than I used to in the past, that’s for sure. On top of that, despite my saying that I do lack a certain confidence when it comes to using Korean, there is definitely a sense of accomplishment and pride I feel in being able to use Korean when I choose to. Every time I successfully complete a task that I think is hard, I can’t help but think to myself, “You see that? I did that. In Korean!” It’s in these moments that I take the time to pat myself on the back and tell myself that I made the right decision in continuing to study Korean through all of these years. And most importantly, I have been able to connect with so many people with whom maybe I never would have been able to really sit down and talk with had I not learned Korean. I have been able to engage in so many interesting and deep conversations about societal issues, have been able to express my own thoughts and opinions on such topics, and have even just been able to talk about more abstract things like the meaning of life. First-year undergrad me would never be able to imagine such a thing being possible, that’s for sure.

 

More than anything, this year in Korea has been a time of growth, not only for my language skills but for me as a person as well. I have come to realize things about myself and my personality that I may never have noticed had I not been in this foreign country for an entire year, and had I not attempted to push myself past what I knew. This piece was meant to act more as a personal reflection, but if there is something with which you can empathize, or a lesson that you can take away, well then I would consider that a happy bonus.

 

I do not plan on stopping my studies of Korean any time soon, and have truly been motivated by this year to simply keep going until I no longer can.

 

 

Written by : Allison Garbacz

From Illinois, United States. Current 5th-year undergraduate at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, B.A. Candidate for Linguistics, B.A. Candidate for Asian Languages and Cultural Studies, Exchange student at Korea University, Intern at VANK (Voluntary Agency Network of Korea)