Addressing Others in Korean - Using Family Titles with Strangers

Question today comes from....

Koreans call everyone uncles and aunties. How big is Korean family?

How to Address Others in Korean

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Question today comes from Mark in Canada:

I heard Koreans do not call older people by their names. Then how do you address each other? How about in professional relationship such as colleagues or your clients?

Is it a Korean Culture? Korean Men Beat Up Women

Question today comes from Gina:

I saw one Korean man stated that in Korean he is the King! Women are slaves. Korean men beat up women. And I saw this article where Korean men beat up Chinese women in KFC. Is this a culture n to day world?

http://www.chinasmack.com/2012/videos/chinese-girls-beat-up-by-suspected-korean-men-in-chengdu-kfc.html

SOURCE: http://www.meetup.com/korean-165/boards/view/viewthread?thread=24275602

Sogaeting

We are having a Valentine-themed Workshop and "Ask a Korean" meetup today. In observance of this workshop, I thought you may be interested in one of many aspects of Korean dating culture: Sogaeting (소개팅).

Question today comes from Cris who asked about "소개팅."

I have the understanding that 소개팅 means something like introducing something in the form of "matchmaking". I heard my korean cousin saying it in a joking manner, but i wasn't sure what it meant.

Happy Seollal!

Happy Seollal, everyone!

One of many fun things about being (or being around) a Korean is that we get to celebrate New Year twice a year. The second New Year is known as Lunar New Year for the rest of the world. Koreans call it Seollal(설날).

Seollal(설날) is the day that Koreans celebrate good days in the past, let go of bad spirits, and welcome all the good things to come. To celebrate this season, Koreans have many fun games they play, many blessings they say to each other, and many beautiful traditions that they observe.

For most of Koreans, Seollal(설날) is the "real" New Year. So there happens the world-renowned phenomenon called "Korean Exodus," caused by people who are heading out to their hometowns to visit their parents, relatives and ancestral memorial park. Seollal is such an important day that the whole country pretty much go on a vacation for 3-5 days.

You can learn more about it here: http://ow.ly/8Cbc5