My english got worse and worse.

I came back to Korea around end of November 2007 so I haven't been speaking or writing English almost 3 years now. Yes, sometimes, I spoke English but not for long.
And my writing English skill wasn't good at all. Truthfully, it was really bad.

Now I really need something to write in English and my horrible written English makes me crazy. :-(
I did thought about recording it or make video but my English was horrible so I couldn't afford to do that, either.

Oh, maybe you don't understand what rubbish I am talking about. so here is one of good example. I couldn't even spell out "suffering" so I have to find out from dictionary. :-(

Darn. I'm seriously hoping that there has real English town in Korea so I could go there and practice my English again.

I am really missing the Cameron Highland in Malaysia. Because that is my favourite place for writing. You can look at some photo from here


From
^_~ Ara

I don't even close to bookworm but...

I have taken the note from Emma. She has been read 41 books from the list. I should just say 'Wow'.


I have read a lot of technical book such as computer programming book when I growing up. A lot of people can't count how many books they read but in my case, I can count on them in Korean novel and English novel, too. Because I haven't read a lot of books.

If you want to check my list of read book in English, you can check out here.

My reading novel in Korean also quite same as that one. I mean it wasn't that much.

I was very surprised that I read that list far better than most people so I am trying to do that, too.

--------------
y - I haven't read original story but I read it as rewritten for young age novel.
k - I have been read Korean translated version of book.
b - I bought a book for reading someday in future. :-)

Xn - I have been read part of serise.

r - I have been reading it.
--------------


The BBC believes most people will have read only 6 of the 100 books here. How do your reading habits stack up?

Instructions:
Copy this into your NOTES. Put an 'X' next to those you have read. Tag other book nerds.

[b] 1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
[X, k] 2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien (I couldn't bring myself to finish this one)
[] 3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
[Xn] 4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
[X] 5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
[] 6 The Bible - God (the whole thing) Got to the bit about not being worthy of His love if you're not willing to take up a spear for Him and got pissed off.
[y] 7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
[] 8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
[] 9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
[] 10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens

Total: 3 (1 Xn, 1 k)

[] 11 Little Women - Louisa May Alcott
[] 12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
[] 13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
[] 14 Complete Works of Shakespeare (I've read and perfomed, but not the complete set)
[] 15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
[] 16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
[] 17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
[X] 18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
[] 19 The Time Traveler’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
[] 20 Middlemarch - George Eliot

Total: 1

[] 21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
[k] 22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
[] 23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
[] 24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
[] 25 The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
[] 27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
[] 28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
[r] 29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
[] 30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame

Total: 1 (k)

[] 31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
[] 32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
[Xn] 33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
[] 34 Emma - Jane Austen
[] 35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
[X] 36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
[] 37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
[] 38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
[] 39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
[] 40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne

Total: 2 (1 Xn)

[] 41 Animal Farm - George Orwell
[X] 42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
[b] 43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
[] 44 A Prayer for Owen Meany - John Irving
[] 45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
[] 46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
[] 47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
[] 48 The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
[X] 49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
[] 50 Atonement - Ian McEwan

Total: 2

[X] 51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel
[] 52 Dune - Frank Herbert
[] 53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
[] 54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
[] 55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
[] 56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
[] 57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
[r] 58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
[X] 59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night - Mark Haddon
[] 60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Total: 2

[] 61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
[] 62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
[] 63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
[] 64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
[] 65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
[] 66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
[] 67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
[] 68 Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding
[] 69 Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
[] 70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville

Total: 0

[y] 71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
[] 72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
[] 73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
[] 74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
[] 75 Ulysses - James Joyce
[] 76 The Inferno - Dante
[] 77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
[] 78 Germinal - Emile Zola
[] 79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
[] 80 Possession - AS Byatt

Total: 0

[] 81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
[] 82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
[] 83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
[] 84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
[] 85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
[] 86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mxistry
[] 87 Charlotte’s Web - EB White
[X] 88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
[] 89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
[] 90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton

Total: 1

[] 91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
[] 92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
[] 93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
[] 94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
[] 95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
[] 96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
[] 97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
[] 98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare
[] 99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
[] 100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

Total: 0

Grand Total: 12/100 include two part of serise and one of Korean translated one
b: 2
y: 2
r: 2

Isn't it strange?
Or my reading habit was what most people would interesting to read.


From
^_~ Ara

wild duck family made home at Sinchundunchi, Daegu

They were staying between Suseong-gyo and Dongsin-gyo. Korean word 'Gyo' is bridge and Korean word for step-stone bridge is 'Jinggeumdari'.

When Daegu city government were building the jinggeumdari, I did notice that wild duck family staying same place most of time.

So I took the photo of them with my Nokia 6210s phone camera.

#1 I think they were staying there quite sometime now. I have no idea how long they were there because they looked same to me.

26th August 2009

night shot of wild duck family at Sinchundunchi, Daegu #2

8th September 2009
They were staying same place at night.

Below photos were taken at 18th September, 2009.

#3 Cubs are playing around but mother duck(I don't know whether it is female or not.) doesn't much moving around.


#4


#5 Mostly she staying there for long time.


#6 Some kids wanted to feed wild duck. That's why they were looking at the same direction.


#7 Finally, she will trying to follow her baby.



p.s. My original writing is here in Korean.

p.s. I couldn't see them anymore. They probably were heading to the south for staying at warm weather. They were left there at first October.

From
^_~ Ara

I was so happy to buy Nokia 6210s but…

I wrote about the phone at twitter.com.

I can't keep up with too much techie style of Korean mobile phone. So I ordered Nokia 6210s. http://bit.ly/d0X7J

10:55 AM Jul 20th from bit.ly



It can't play the video. And camera only show it in black screen so I have to send back to internet shopping mall for repair. :-(


I took the photo near my home by Nokia 6210s with geo tagging which is tag for map.
So you can see the photo with where I took it.-You have to check out from photo's hyperlink.






about the Nokia's enter the Korea's cell-phone market

I wrote about that in ovi.com.

near Sincheongyo Daegu, Korea @ 7/26/2009

I took the photo for testing by Nokia 6210s which name is same as Nokia 6210 Navigator.
But my phone's camera doesn't show any image just plain black so I have to request for change the phone from seller.

You see. Nokia said that they want to succeed in Korea but a lots of Nokia 6210s seems to be broken down so who wanted to buy it? Do some work properly, Nokia.
People complain about the small manufacturing problems but real problem is Nokia 6210s' firmware which included Korean version. Because my phone's camera was work a few times after the using the Nokia Software Updater program.
You see the problem?
And video player doesn't showing the video, too. But it can only play the music. So it was problem with full screen control.

Anyway, I hope that Nokia do better on Korea's cell-phone market.

From
^_~ Ara

This is what makes me crazy.

This is what I wrote in my twitter.

26 minutes ago from bit.ly

open letter to Kansas School Board:Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster http://bit.ly/Vv6VS FSM Korea is this http://bit.ly/4C7C0 RAmen!

25 minutes ago from bit.ly

Wikipedia explain that http://bit.ly/Z1bdS FSM is the deity of the parody religion.But certainly that was wrong because that's >>

25 minutes ago from bit.ly

>> against freedom of religion.This is why US's education system was collapsed and people are having more stupidity. It wasn't funny. RAmen!

Actually, I don't know anything about US's education system so it was false statement and other things too. More precisely they need more evidence and I will write it some day. Because I am quite busy for writing in Korean about this.

But why I wrote that statement because I know the Korean's education system very well which is mix of US's and Japan's education system. And especially religion thing was very like US but different way.

Now I found this twitter's message

17 minutes ago from bit.ly

forsafety This is happening in Korea.Priest who was helping the protest people, attacked by police. http://bit.ly/19VBiU

so I have to write about in Korean.


From
^_~ Ara

Korean's famous star Kim Yuna on twitter

Kim Yuna on Twitter http://bit.ly/tHKmk who won a few times world champion in figure skating and became extremely famous in Korea. It probably far more famous than Brad Pitt plus Angelina Jolie. (I'm not kidding.)
Most of Koreans don't know anything about twitter but when she started twittering, 5000+ people follow her. That, We cleverly call them as "dynamic Korea".

[via Ara on twitter]


P.S You can see it yourself how famous she was. http://bit.ly/tHKmk

From
^_~ Ara

I really like the word 'productivity'

better than 'innovation'.
It sounds really nice and comfortable. I don't know why. But I do know that it can make differences.

When I need some application for iPod Touch, I always look up at productivity categories. Actually you can't find a lot of applications, though.
Most of them are personal managements stuff such as note or memo, todo list and checklist. Simple but, it is most productivity stuff.

Why?
If you have a idea or some thought, how you gonna keep it? Memorize it? No, right? You probably wanted to write down. That's why small piece of paper was most powerful tool in the world. :-D
You can write down by word. Also you can draw something. Whichever you like it.


Anyway, I just found one websites called "WeFollow: A User Powered Twitter Directory" and then there has tag for productivity.
I found one interesting twitter user called "productivity501". And I found one very good quote "If you are looking for a big opportunity, find a big problem.~Anonymous" so I follow on twitter.


So I retweet it like that.

RT @productivity501: If you are looking for a big opportunity, find a big problem.~Anonymous >> That's exactly why I came back to Korea.
31 minutes ago

I will tell you about my first or second favourite word next time.


From
^_~ Ara

This blog is more like diary. Nothing more.

You probably don't understand what I am saying because most of people come here for check out my English. Does it make sense?
They don't understand what I am saying but they wanted know my level of English. It was nonsense so that is why Korea's English education system was totally corrupted.

Anyway, I don't have much time for writing anything here because I am really busy blogging with my Korean blog. So if you were interested, you can visit Ara's global mind column blog or Ara's properly Learn English blog or Ara's think logically twitter.

I didn't expect so much fun from twittering because I don't like writing sms because of limitation of 160 characters or so.
But now I really enjoyed it in Korean which is update with facebook.com's my account.

And then someone followed me so I checked out who he or she was. And then I really enjoyed what he was twittering. He or she is Ralph Wiggum.-You know, I don't have any idea about any name from gender.- That link is his twitter page.
I can't writing any English in thinklogically account because Korean can't understand English. So now I am thinking about make one more twitter account for English.

I am thinking about it but I can't decide because I have too many blogs and twitter accounts.


Hey, one more thing.
I told you this is more like diary. I am not writing this from Microsoft Word which can check spelling and grammatical error. So don't complain about my grammatical error.
Think wisely and don't be an arse.

From
^_~ Ara

Isn't it funny? (about my English)

Yes, I know that my writing wasn't that good. But when did I say that I can write English better than Native English speaker? Are you crazy or what?
How can I someone learn one language for 6 to 10 years and then he or she can write and speak better than Native English speaker? Are you dreaming?

Even my Korean writing skills are quite poor because I haven't study well when I was in high school. So if someone can speak Korean as second language but writing was very poor, I will credit for that. Because I know that learn a language as second language wasn't easy thing.


I wrote 'about secondhand stores in Korea' and then lots of people complained about my grammar and wrong vocabulary.
Later on, I read it again that writing and then I realized that it was really poor. Yes, I know that.
But what's the problem? I should be far better than Native English speaker? That's why I said 'So what?'.


I will show you this. Whatever I wrote here, it will publish at my facebook.com's account. So when I wrote 'vegetarian food for Korean word', my American friends didn't mention anything about English. Can't you see the your problem?




I will say this again. If you don't know anything about learn English AS second language, you should learn and research and then you can talk to me about my grammar or vocabulary.
I don't want to give you a free lesson. So go away quietly, if you want to fuss about my English.


From
^_~ Ara

Who am I? I am what I am.

I wrote this on my Korean blog http://asrai21c.tistory.com/348 @ 2009/02/21 02:43.


This is not suppose to be here in my Korean blog but I just wanted to say what I wanted to say.

It is not intention to understand what I am saying here by Korean because I want to talk about why I am doing this. I know that you probably find out that who am I based on reading my article here or find out my personal history from Ara's profile.
But you will never understand why I was wrote lots of things here because I am talking about something else. What I am trying to do here is that revolution of the Korean's future. You probably think that how ridiculous what I just said.
Yes, it is ridiculously super(??) crazy talk. However, it is possible if you let me talk and if you listen carefully what I am saying here.

I am not trying to convince you. I am just trying to ask you that why do you think that way? People claim that I was wrong but you know I was right. Why? That's the thing. Why?

That's the what I have been really doing. Why do you think that he was right or I was right or you don't know? Why?

I believe that you subscribe(I don't know what's the word for RSS reader's subscription.) in my blog here. Because you probably felt that it is something you can learn.
That's really good start. Listen... and think... and think. That's what you have to do.


It is almost eighty-something people subscribe in my blog so I just wanted to say whether you can understand or not..


People never change. But people can change if they can accept(or learn) other people's mind.
So please be patient and learn from other people's thought and mind.


From
^_~ Ara

about secondhand stores in Korea

You can find anywhere in town for secondhand stores. You can find shop name with "Je-hwal-yong centre 재활용 센터". So if you want to ask to Korean, you can ask with secondhand stuff as " Joong-go-poom 중고품 or Joong-go mool-poom 중고물품" or secondhand store as "Joong-go Sang-jum 중고 상점".

But problem is that store was quite complicated because some shop selling the furniture only, some shop selling the home electric only. Some of them selling the mixed up with anything. So it will be difficult to find what you wanted.
And price was not that reasonable. Because you will find out that new one wasn't that expensive.

If you didn't buy the stuff with carefulness, it will probably break or explode.


From
^_~ Ara

vegetarian food for Korean word

When I heard about this, I didn't even come up with 'Chasik juui' which is exactly same meaning as vegetarian.
Because you can't find any vegetarian around any town in Korea. Yes, it will probably exist somewhere but it is very very rare.
That's why I couldn't think of that word.

Korean didn't think of vegetarian food so we mistakenly wrote down the vegetarian food, Bibimbab which is mixed vegetable with rice and put in the mince beef.
There has beef in it but they didn't realized it because not many Korean fully understand English and we don't have many vegetarian.

Yes, there has Buddhist monk. I also couldn't realized it.

So if you are vegetarian and then you wanted to explain to someone, firstly you said them to I'm vegetarian which is Korean for "나는 채식주의입니다. Na-neun Cha-sik-ju-ui ib-ni-da."
Secondly you explain to them food which eaten by Buddhist monk "Su-nim-i muk-neun um-sik ga-tun-gu-yo. 스님이 먹는 음식 같은거요."

Korean don't much use that 'Chasik juui' word and your Korean pronunciation won't much to help. So not many Korean will recogniz it so if you explain about the Buddhist monk's food, it will help to understand by Korean.


From
^_~ Ara

Palm Pre hands-on video & T-Mobile G1 vs. iPhone

Palm Pre hands-on video Favorite http://www.viddler.com/explore/engadget/videos/139/13/ by engadget



You should check out the Engadget's T-Mobile G1 video hands-on Favorite http://www.viddler.com/explore/engadget/videos/56/ by engadget

You can differentiate with T-Mobile G1, iPhone and Palm Pre.
T-Mobile G1's web browser was fairly fast.
iPhone's web browser was quite fast.
Palm Pre's web browser was really fast based on this video.


A lot of people thought that Google Android phone can make good competition with iPhone. But it didn't happen.
This video revealed possibility of Palm Pre can make competition with iPhone. Because Palm Pre's user interface looks good and fast response.

Atonement 2007 - overrated film

I replied the zebrasnake's topic 'Overrated film' which is in imdb.com's Atonement (2007) discussion board.

---------------------------------------------
I think I will agree most of your comments about the movie, zebrasnake.
I really liked movie until close to ending part which is interviewing the Briony. If they didn't include that part, maybe I can rate them about 6.9 or close to 7 out of 10. Because I thought it was very clever way to telling the story until...
As soon as I was watching the interview scene, I felt that this is all fake even if it is true story.

And then now I did know what wasn't enough about movie when I read differences between the book and the movie from mikuhgtt's explain at http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0783233/board/nest/120606384
That differences explain the book was so special but movie is not so special.

Now I can rate them about 6.2 out of 10.


If this movie is one of best movie, why imdb.com rate them as 7.9(out of 10) and 7.3 in rottentomatoes.com.
It is good movie(I probably say it is just not bad movie.) but it isn't best movie yet.



From
^_~ Ara

wordpress localization for Korean

Korean version was already there but I am just trying to modify a bit. I don’t know this will help to Korean who would like to use the wordpress blog.

1. “Translating WordPress « WordPress Codex,” http://codex.wordpress.org/Localizing_WordPress.
2. “WordPress in Your Language « WordPress Codex,” http://codex.wordpress.org/WordPress_in_Your_Language.

From
^_~ Ara

Rule Number 6 from 'The Art of Possibility'

I quoted this story from book The Art of Possibility by Rosamund Stone Zander and Benjamin Zander.

"Two prime ministers are sitting in a room discussing affairs of state. Suddenly a man bursts in, apoplectic with fury, shouting and stamping and banging his fist on the desk. The resident prime minister admonishes him: "Peter," he says, "kindly remember Rule Number 6," whereupon Peter is instantly restored to complete calm, apologizes, and withdraws. The politicians return to their conversation, only to be interrupted yet again twenty minutes later by an hysterical woman gesticulating wildly, her hair flying. Again the intruder is greeted with the words: "Marie, please remember Rule Number 6." Complete calm descends once more, and she too withdraws with a bow and an apology. When the scene is repeated for a third time, the visiting prime minister addresses his colleague: "My dear friend, I've seen many things in my life, but never anything as remarkable as this. Would you be willing to share with me the secret of Rule Number 6?" "very simple," replies the resident prime minister. "Rule Number 6 is 'Don't take yourself so g-damn seriously." "Ah," says his visitor, "that is a fine rule." After a moment of pondering, he inquires, "And what, may I ask, are the other rules?"
"There aren't any."


From
^_~ Ara

link - Languages by population

http://www.davidpbrown.co.uk/help/top-100-languages-by-population.html
Top 100 Languages by Population
These are the top 100 languages in order of number of first language speakers.
This is from the 13th Edition of the Ethnologue (1996).

http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats7.htm
Internet World Users by Language - Top 10 Languages

http://www.britishcouncil.org/learning-research-futureofenglish.htm
The Future of English? (1997) By David Graddol

http://www.britishcouncil.org/learning-research-englishnext.htm
English Next (2006) By David Graddol

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/HA28Df01.html
South Asia Jan 28, 2006 -BOOK REVIEW
Whose English is it?
Asian Englishes: Beyond the Canon by Braj B Kachru
Reviewed by Martin A Schell

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_English-speaking_population
Wikipedia - List of countries by English-speaking population

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/lan_eng_sta-language-english-status
Language Statistics > English status (most recent) by country

http://www.nationmaster.com/red/graph/lan_eng_spe-language-english-speakers&b_map=1
Language Statistics > English speakers (most recent) by country
(probably native speakers only)

http://www2.ignatius.edu/faculty/turner/languages.htm
The World's Most Widely Spoken Languages

From
^_~ Ara

reality of Korean's English communication skill

I saw a group which name is Daegu Friendship Club in facebook.com and I was glad about their effort. But, I would like to let them know the reality so I wrote a article here http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=25235250140#/topic.php?uid=25235250140&topic=4887

I wrote this because I would like to help their activities.

Topic name : Please read this, if you are Korean.
I don't know why I am doing this but you have to see the reality of Korean's English skill.
This group's admin, Daegu Central offer the friendship to the Daegu citizens but how is it going to happen? Because foreigners can't communicate with Koreans. That is the truth.

If you don't want to believe me, I will tell you other story. I have been check out a lots of group in facebook but I couldn't find any active group with many Koreans. I know there has a lots of active group, if most of them are foreigners or American-Koreans.

I believe you probably join facebook for learn English so I hope you should learn English properly.
If you are interested in learn English properly, you can see article here http://kr.blog.yahoo.com/asrai21c/


From
^_~ Ara

funny episode from TV show 'are you smarter than a fifth grader'

dumb blonde american: are you smarter than a fifth grader http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=uEP7uti0PDw





Are You Smarter Than A 5th Grader? Contestant Avis Whitmore from http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=WoQccz4VtJY




From
^_~ Ara

World clock with statistics

This is free program which can be put in to the your homepage or websites.

You can check out poodwaddle.com




Poodwaddle.com


From
^_~ Ara