Plugga i ett koreanskt bibliotek

Att plugga i ett koreanskt bibliotek skiljer sig från svenska. Här ska det vara tyst, och då är det verkligen tyst! Det enda man kan höra är folk som skriver och när folk bläddrar i sina böcker. En vanlig syn är också att se folk sovandes i biblioteket.

Utöver mina kurser som rör mitt program så pluggar jag också koreanska. Tidigare föreställde jag mig att Koreanska har samma svårighetsnivå som kinesiska, men det är inte sant. Koreanska är mycket lättare att lära sig än kinesiska, då koreanskan har ett alfabete till skillnad från kinesiskan och japanskan som består av tusentals tecken.

Min koreanska är väl inte så himla bra, men jag kan fråga lite basic saker som "Hur är läget?" "Vad hände i helgen?" "Vad händer i helgen?" osv

För dem som ska åka på utbyte till korea i hösten tipsar jag starkt att plugga koreanska under sommaren, åtminstone lära sig alfabetet och skrivsystemet. Några standardrepliker är också bra att lära sig tex (engeskt uttal):

Hej (formellt): An young ha sae yo
Hur mår du? Jal jinaeyo?

I am fine Jeonun jal jinaeyo
Hur mycket kostar det? Oelma aeyo?

Här är några riktigt hjälpsamma sidor som jag använde mig av innan jag for hit:
Mycket bra sida för att lära sig alfabetet
http://www.learnkoreanlanguage.com/learn-hangul.html

För att lära sig hur alfabetet låter så kolla här:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=djB05a4ntQ4

Koreanclass101.com är en hemsida som ni kan gå till för att lära sig standardutryck osv. Ni kan hitta allt material på TPB, sök bara på: [Learn Korean] Koreanclass101.com lessons

Min kursbok heter "easy Korean for foreigners", den är bra men den riktar sig för de som talar engelska, kinesiska och japanska, därför finns det inte tillräckligt med översättning på engelska tycker jag.

Extra information om kursboken kan ni finna här:
http://www.hanbooks.com/easkorforfor.html

 An awesome bookholder which many koreans use here, I must get one! 

 This is the main library in PNU, it has 4 floors for study and some computer rooms. It exists two libraries in PNU the second one contains most of the books

The computer for reserving your seat in the library and computer rooms, it is mostly used during exam period when it is hard to get a seat, but on an ordinary day you can just walk in and take any seat that is available 

The way of booking: Put your card on the sensor, choose study room, choose your seat. 

One seat costs 20 $. . . Aaah just kdding it is free ;-)

 Inside the library, it is extremly quite! But it is a good study envoirnment actually, you can also see some sleeping students here and there

 Another studyroom

 The chairs that are used in the library are actually very comfortable, both of the panels holding your back are very flexible which makes it so much funnier to study! :-P

 (Etiquette zone) Be quite!!!!

 The left one:   Public display of affection are prohibited! 
Right one: Be quite!

 Top left one: Notebooks are prohibited!      Top Right one:   Public display of affection are prohibited . (The man on the picture are saying something like: Go and study!)
Bottom left one: Eating will disturb the study envoirnment, so do not eat in this room
Bottom right one: Be quite!

 Public display of affection are prohibited


To study korean in a Korean library is different from studying in a Swedish one. Here it should be very quite, and I mean very quite! The only thing you can hear is people writing and turning pages in their books. Also a common sight is to see sleeping students here and there.

Excluding the courses that I study which are related to my program I also study Korean language. Before I studied korean I thought that it is was as hard as chinese or japanese, but it isn't. Actually korean is much easier to learn than chinese and japanese, mainly because korean have an alphabet but chinese and japanese consists of a lot of signs.

My korean isn't so good but I can ask some basic stuff like "How are you?" "What did you do in the weekend?" "What are you going to do in the weekend?" etc

Here are some standard  expressions:


Hi (formal): An young ha sae yo
How are you? Jal jinaeyo?

I am fine Jeonun jal jinaeyo
How much is that? Oelma aeyo?


If you want to learn some korean, then check out this page (I used it before I went here):
http://www.learnkoreanlanguage.com/learn-hangul.html

Festival!!

Nyligen var det festival här i Pusan National University. Vi firade grundandet av PNU, universitetet grundades 15 maj 1946 och rankas som Koreas 8:e bästa universitet, det studerar c:a 17 tusen studenter här. Universitetets maskot är en örn som också kan ses på universitetslogon, det finns också en mycket vacker staty av örnen vid ingången av universitetet. Festivalen varade i 3 dagar, och vi fick en dag ledigt!

The logo of Pusan National University

The eagle representing Pusan National University

 During the festival. We could try the baloon, but just for some minutes, it was anchored to the ground so it didn't lift higher than 10 m.

Each department had their own telt on the football field and during the night all the students met up here and socialized together! Something that was really good was that every tent had their own kitchen , so some students always kept the other ones with food throughout the night :-)

We had a small celebration at our dormitory first, here we ate a lot of bacon, vegetables and some candy-floss! We also enjoyed some shows, it was in Korean though, so I didn't understand so much...

 The foreign students in the dormitory was asked to have a speach about their biggest cultural shock in Korea, this is my roomate Shimpei from Japan! 

 I also had to speak some! I mentioned that I got surprised over the amount of rice that Koreans eat... We get rice in our dormitory for Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner... Every day!!!

 Festival area during night

Just recently it was a festival here in PNU. We were celebrating the foundation of PNU, the university was founded 15 may 1946. The university is on the 8th place in Korea and has around 17 thousand students. The university mascot is an eagle that also can be seen on the university logo, it also exist one very beautiful statue by the entrance to the university. The festival lasted for 3 days, and we had the day of on the foundations day.

Baseball!

Baseball är en av dem mest populäraste sporterna i Korea, om inte den mest populära. Busanbor är i synnerhet fanatiska när det kommer till baseball, deras baseball lag Lotte Giants står sig mycket bra mot andra lag i Korea.

Vi gick därför i veckan till en av deras matcher mot Nexen Heroes från Seoul. Det var första gången jag gick på en baseball match, stämningen i arenan var väldigt rolig. Folk sjunger hela tiden och varje spelare har sin egna sång. De har också en intressant tradition på arenan, alla i arenan sätter fast en påse på huvudet i slutet på matchen för att visa sin support till laget.

Hur slutade matchen då? Jo Busan Giants (som dem också kallas) förlorade med 9-1....

Jag har varit väldigt upptagen den senaste veckan p.g.a. mina tentor och assignments. Det är därför jag inte har uppdaterat på ett tag...

 Some streetfood

In the bakground you can see the Busan Asiad Stadium it was here 3 games were played during the World Cup in football 2002 was held. 

 Sajik Baseball stadium home to Busan Giants, it can take in almost 30'000 people.

Busan Giants supporters has a tradition to put bags on their heads in the end of the game. 

Baseball is one of the most popular sports in Korea, if not the most popular one. Busan people are in particular very fanatic when it comes to baseball, their team Lotte Giants are very good in Korea.

We went therefore for one of their games against Nexen Heroes from Seoul. It was the first time I've seen baseball, but I liked it very much, the atmosphere in the stadium was very fun. People are singing all the time and every player have their own song. They also have one intresting tradition on the stadium, in the end of the game all supporters puts an orange bag on their head to show support for their team.

But how did the game end? Well yeah, Busan Giants lost with 9-1...

I have been very busy this past weeks because of examinations and assignments thats why I haven't updated for a while...

Tokyo

Nu har vi kommit tillbaka till studentboendet efter en mycket intressant helg i Tokyo. Jag och 6 andra begav oss dit i fredags och kom tillbaka efter tre dagar. 

Tokyo är världens största stad med 13 miloner invånare och med 35 miljoner i storstadsområdet. Inte nog med att det är mycket folk i Tokyo under vanlig vardag det var extra mycket folk under tiden när vi var där pga den Japanska högtiden som kallas "Golden week".  

 Därför kändes det som att vara i en myrstack ibland. Speciellt när vi var i tunnelbanan, varningar utfärdades på stationerna ibland pga att det var så mycket folk på dem. 

I likhet med Seoul så var Tokyo en stad som aldrig sover, restauranger pubar barer klubbar var alltid fyllda med människor.

En skillnad var dock hur folk betedde sig, i tunnelbanan var folk mer tystlåtna än i Seoul, att tala högt i mobilen är inte tillåtet i Tokyo. Att buga var mer populärt, tex när man lämnar restaurangen eller liknande.  

Jag tyckte om Tokyo väldigt mycket och tre dagar var alldeles för lite för att utforska en så stor stad. Priserna i Tokyo var inte heller så roliga... Tex en 20-25 min taxitur kostade nästan 700 kr.

(Tryck på bilderna för att förstora dem)

Some manga street show

 People dressing like this were a common scene in Tokyo

 Temple in central of Tokyo

 Not only were the design different from the Korean temples but the atmosphere as well, it was somehow very mysterious.

 Fortuneletters

 We were lucky to see a Japanese wedding, everyone was so quite though

 Look far away in the picture. You can understand that it was quite hard to walk around on the streets because of the amount of people present

 We ate in this place

 We ate some traditional Japanese food, it was soooo tasty!

 View over whole Tokyo, you can see Tokyo tower behind the bright light at the centre of the picture, we were going there at first but then we went in this scyscraper instead

 This picture should have been a lot brighter if it wasn't for the earthquake 2011. Before the earthquake the nuclear power stood for approxiately one third of Japans energyproduction, just recently Japan turned of their one and only working reactor. This has left big parts of Japan with less energy than needed. To illustrate this you can look on this video:

 At first glance this looks like a really nice lobby for some kind of company, but actually it is a kareokeplace!

 A reallly good and a really bad thing that we encountered in a restaurant in Tokyo. This is like an iPad which we order our food from, the convenience is really good. The bad thing with it though was that we ordered really much because of the easy access to it! 

Tokyo imperial palace, this is the main resience of the Emperor of Japan

 A typhical policeman 

A metroentrance, the Tokyo subway is the number one subway in the world for the ampunt of people using it during one year 

 On the train from the airport

 Asakusa temple, our hostel was located just nearby

 Shopping street at Asakusa

 Tokyo skytree, it is around 650 m and Tokyos highest building

 Entrance of Asakusa temple

 View on Tokyo

Political meeting close to Shibuya crossing

The famous dog Hachikō

Shibuya crossing, one really Big crossing!

Smart designed toilet in one of the restaurants, the water for refilling after flushing is pouring out of the tap right in to the water container. This wasn't the only strange toilet though, I also saw the electric ones just these ones was all in Japanese so I couldn't use any funcions... Except flushing of course ;-)

(Press in the picture for enlargement)

We just recently returned back to our dormitory after one weekend spent in Tokyo. Me and 6 other friends went there in Friday and returned this Sunday.

Tokyo is the worlds biggest city with inhabitants and with 35 million in the Tokyo city area. Not enough that it is much people in Tokyo on normal days there were even more people out on the streets when we were there because of the Japanese holidays "Golden week". 


Because of the "Golden weeks" it felt like being in in the middle of an anthill many times. 


Like Seoul, Tokyo never sleeps, people could be seen on the streets all the time.

One difference was how people acted, in the subway it was forbidden to speak loudly in the phone and people were overall a little more quite in the subway. To bow and to bow longer was more common in Tokyo, they bowed when leaving the restaurant or something similar.


I liked Tokyo very muc but three days was to little for exploring such a big city. The prices wasn't so funny too, a ride with the taxi 20-25 mins costed around 100 us dollars