r/AskAKorean

My mother immigrated from Seoul to America as a young teenager, and my father is a Jew. My parents taught us only English, in spite of my mom’s initial intention for us to grow up speaking both Korean and Hebrew.

I grew up with some faint traces of Korea in my household, I had a 돌잔치, and as children we would wear 한복 and do 세배 for 설날. But other than that and eating Korean food (which many non-Korean Americans do anyway these days), that was the extent of it. Korean Americans are usually very Christian, so churches are the primary place of Korean cultural preservation here. But my father being a Jew meant that we grew up with a different religious tradition. Though in Jewish law I’m not considered Jewish, because Jewish descent is matrilineal in mainstream Judaism.

Recently someone in Korea told me over social media that most Koreans wouldn’t consider me a Korean due to my detachment from the culture. That I am not Korean, I am just someone with Korean blood. And then another account from Korea dmed me this rant about how I am obviously lying about being Korean with my huge nose and brown skin, and he even said I should be k\*lled for being a “jungle Asian” (he thought my Asian side was from India). That was fun.

Would most Koreans not accept me as a Korean? I don’t speak the language, I don’t look Korean, and I’ve never even met my relatives who didn’t leave Korea.

I am working on a research project where we are tasked to study aspects of the Jeju and Gangwon dialect.

I didn’t think it would be hard to find a speaker, but the more I dig, the more I realize I might’ve bit off more than I can chew.

Am I cooked? Is there hope? My question is how common are these dialects and where would be my best bet to find someone willing to speak it?

TYIA

Throwaway because for reasons and I’ll make it as short as possible.

My name is Noemi. In Korean it’d be written as 노에미. Koreans of my age group and younger (+/- 30 and down) always laugh. Understandably. In internet lingo/slang it means something like „no mother“.. degradingly. Like you haven’t been cared for/educated. Stuff like that. Now a friend informed me that there’s also an extremist right wing group called 노에미 크루.

I’m very frustrated because I can’t/ don’t want to use this name when I go back later this year but I wouldn’t feel comfortable using a different/Korean name as an European.
Some AI did give me some examples but I want to hear what people think of this situation.
Anyone have an idea they’d like to share?

Thank you in advance 💔

Hello, I’m going to be traveling to Korea for the first time to meet my aunts and uncles and cousins from both sides of the family and grandparents from my dad’s side and was wondering what cultural norms I should know beforehand as someone who grew up in a predominantly Korean town in America to a very very rural part in American with rarely any Koreans/ not much Korean community to be around daily. What are some stuff I should be wary of such as scams that target obvious foreigners, would I be targeted as I have more tan skin and less Korean features in my opinion compared to my siblings. I have to worry about any “racism” as I saw a blogger by the name Hjevelyn get racist remarks by one crazy lady who repeatedly asked her (a Korean born Korean American) who was there for visitation if she was Chinese and called her slurs for Chinese people.. and shamed her by asking which part of America she was from calling her poor even though she explained she was from nyc. I just want to have some basic knowledge and not be made fun of my more Americanized sounding Korean accent (tell my friend point out that I have very obvious Korean lisps when i soeak english? Although i forgot most of the korean from when i was younger cause i live in the country). Thank you

I saw an article that it is affecting entry level jobs but is it affecting senior jobs as well? Will there be mass unemployment?

I visited South Korea 3 years ago and I remember seeing a lot of US flags around, and a feeling of Korean people being politically very supportive to them. Has this somehow changed over the last year ?

Here in Europe things changed a lot, and I’m curious about how people are reacting there.

That might be so silly, but I am 34 y.o and starting to lose hope to meet a nice korean guy. I used to live in korea, but now I am trying to meet them online. Where? Haha

Just like Best Buy (US/CAN), what stores are main places to buy tech in Korea (e.g, smartphones, tablets, laptops)?

I’m a woman currently visiting Korea and downloaded tinder. I’m quite shocked at the amount of matches I’m getting compared to in my home country but one thing is they are all looking for one night stands. Is this something only foreign women experience or are all Koreans only using tinder for casual meet ups instead of dates?

I can’t have caffein and I also can’t read korean lmao. There’s a picture on my last post on my profile if you need it. It’s a brown can

I genuinely want to know what South Koreans think of their northern neighbours. Do you think reconciliation and reunification is possible? And whether south Koreans will be accepting of North Koreans if reunified and vice versa or they are both very different people now?

Is it possible for a foreigner to get an overwatch account? Since the Korean server has been separated from Asian server, it requires to connect nexon for playing.But as a foreigner, I don't have Korean phone number and ID, so is it possible for me to buy one, or find someone to help? Thx

Firstly though, Happy Independence Day 🇰🇷🇰🇷

I will preface by saying, I am not very well-versed in Korean culture and history at all, so I do apologize.

I know that the US still ranks the top in plastic surgeries and medical tourism has vastly increased in South Korea, but whether someone gets plastic surgery or not, dieting culture still seems strong, beauty/skincare is a major industry, etc.

To my understanding, it’s considered respectful to care about your appearance and it shows effort and commitment. It’s not just ‘we chose this candidate for the job because they’re better looking’, but ‘we chose this candidate because they put EFFORT into looking better’. Looks are just a part of it is as well, you need to have good social skills and have done well and ranked high in academic scoring. Perfectionism in general seems to be a major part of the modern culture.

To an extent, this reigns true in many places, you shouldn’t go shopping in sweats with unruly hair, you should look presentable, right? And of course, the halo effect is a real phenomena. Every country cares about this kind of thing, but in SK, from the outside looking in, it really does seem prevalent.

I also have the sort of unpopular opinion that Koreans are NOT trying to look more western, if this were true, their inspiration pictures would mostly be of white celebrities, not East Asian celebrities. Light skin as well has sort of always been a standard and symbol of wealth and ‘purity’ for women almost worldwide.and ofc, worldwide, us women apparently ‘lose value’ with age 🙄 because MOST facial concerns have to do with wanting to look younger.

My question though is, what exactly happened between the 80s/90s and now? Why did this preoccupation with appearance become so prevalent?

My GUESS is that it’s a combination of a recent traumatic history that has affected collective self-esteem and identity (colonization tends to do this), combined with an already competitive culture in part, or wholly due to capitalism, and beauty industries/corporations getting bigger, then adding to their growth and using celebrities, advertising, social pressures, etc, to keep the masses concerned with their appearance, as doing so allows them to profit.

And now, in the 2020s, the growing reputation of being attractive and leading in cosmetics, etc. has become/is becoming a part of modern Korean identity and pride.

These are just my long-winded speculations though, I’m interested to hear responses.

I have no idea where to ask about this so, if this is the wrong place please redirect me.

I have a pair of mother of pearl cabinets that I'm planning to put up for sale on FB marketplace, but I don't know how to appropriately price them. I don't want to price gouge, but I also do not want to price them too little or be lowballed by a flipper.

AI says 1200 lol but that seems like a lot? I never see these type of cabinets for sale anywhere so I have nothing to compare off of. Local antique stores told me they don't buy oriental antiques, I already tried that route.

I like kpop so I always see complaints from fans online about the companies and idols using AI, but a common response is something like "Gen AI is viewed very positively in S.K. and many regular folks use it/many companies (non entertainment related) are integrating AI and no one has a problem over there, so they're not gonna stop using it." But the same can be said for the U.S. Companies are forcing AI on us but many people are still extremely anti AI. It seems like a generalization to me. Do artists/people in creative industries view AI in a positive or negative way? And in your opinion is there MORE citizens in favor of AI than not?

Kpop kind of leads me to this impression because while there are a few shorter idols, they seem to cluster around 165-170cm and largely be at least over 160cm.

There seems to be a much larger variety of heights of western pop stars, like there's 152cm Sabrina Carpenter, ~154cm Ariana Grande, and ~178cm Taylor Swift. Few people see their heights as a negative. While people act like ~160cm kpop idols are incredibly short and much over 170cm incredibly tall.

I know the height standards for men are probably worse, as they are in most countries, but I'm more curious about women because I am a woman and on the shorter side (158cm) lol

I've been watching the show *Teach You a Lesson* on Netflix and in episode 9 (at about the 10-minute-mark for anyone who's seen it/is curious), one of the characters makes a joke to break some tension, and it's clear that it's kind of a stupid joke/pun/groaner, and then he repeats it, but I don't know if the translation in the English subtitles does a good job of getting the joke across.

The English has it as him saying, "why did the Inspector cross the road?" And then later he repeats it as, "Don't make me cross the road."

But if I switch to Korean subtitles, they read as:

말리는 건 오징어를 말려 주시고요 (the first line)

나 말리지 마 / 나 오징어 아니야 (the second line, broken up bc the camera angles)

When I put the Korean in Google Translate, it says something about drying squid, and to not dry him because he's not a squid? I'm just confused. And like, okay, yeah, I get that jokes in general (and puns in particular) are some of the most difficult things to translate while keeping faithful to the original humor/punch line, so I'm glad they didn't try to literally translate what he said to make it clearer that he's being ridiculous, but surely there's a better English equivalent to what's being said in Korean?

Essentially my questions are, what is the joke that he's making, why would it (potentially) be funny to Koreans, or is it actually just as stupid/nonsensical as "why did the chicken (or here, inspector) cross the road"?

Thanks in advance for any help!

Small update: I think I finally understood a part of the situation !!
First I checked our old Kakao messages and realized I misunderstood him about poker. He worked as a dealer (!) and he knows a lot about it. but he actually told me he isn’t very interested in playing right now. My fault.
Also the “grumpy” behavior the last few days had a much simpler explanation. He contacted me and apologized for being quiet because he has been sick and in pain. I saw him today and he explained he has bad pain around his jaw (teeth) and has been taking medication.
So some Reddit user created a gambling addiction drama and I treated it as a cultural communication mystery while the poor guy was just sitting there with tooth pain 😭
Thanks to everyone who actually tried to help me understand the cultural and communication differences. I learned something from it.

Can someone explain me what’s going on ???
I (female) live in a shared house in Korea. One guy (Korean) lives here too takes care of the house and is usually very nice.
He had a difficult past and some problems with gambling. I don’t judge him. I was actually interested in poker so he bought cards and said we could play.
But whenever we planned to play he suddenly had to leave or meet friends.
We also talked about poker rules on Kakao. We simulated poker situations and my training was to guess who would win. Once we disagreed about a situation. I checked with Gemini Ai and my understanding was correct. He said he felt embarrassed after that.
Since then things feel a bit strange so I stopped asking to play.
He also bought an air fryer and blender and said everyone could use them.
Today I was using the air fryer and he told me it doesn’t work. I told him I cleaned it because it had been stored for a long time and it actually works. I asked him to have a look but he refused and just said no it doesn’t work.
I am European and I am confused by this behavior.
Is there something cultural I am missing?

Sorry if this is counts as a low quality question and therefore against the rules. Its just that I already googled this and it really didn't help. I've seen it spelled both 부리토 and 브리또. I was wondering if both are acceptable, or which one is used more often. Weirdly enough, using for a paper I'm writing so I am genuinely asking.

Edit: These comments arent helping either. I'll just go with 부리또 😅