It isn't Just Fan Death that can kill you around these parts, mister!I have to hat-tip the BKF for giving me a clue of this. We were walking to dinner during his visit (a time I already refer to, with just a hint of woe on my otherwise noble countenance, as "the good old days") and he started laughing. I asked why and he gestured back over his shoulder, "There's a sign back there that threatens to kill litterers."
In the interim I have learned the word for garbage, and so today as I walked past the store I could read some of that white sign scratched in the concrete. It says, "If you litter around here, I'll kill you!" (that is kind of translated from the literal)
New Words are -
걸리면 = When caught
버리다 = throw away
죽는다 = dies
and I think(?) that the verbs are all in the root form to make it simple for foreigners to understand? The BKF can clue me in on that, I'm sure.
UPDATE - The only other thing I can easily read there is the advert for cigarettes, not only because it is ubiquitous here, but always looks the same - white circle, red letters, blue background. Now THAT is marketing!
3 comments:
One more step to surviving in Korea...knowing when they are gonna kill you!;-)
and where you can get coffin nails!
The sign still makes me laugh. The hand writing looks a bit childish...at least not professional, and the seriousness of the warning itself is just a hilarious combination. As for 죽는다...no it is not written that way for foreigners (although it was an ingenious guess). To kill, or 죽인다, refers specifically the act of killing. Hence, if used, the focus shifts to the author committing a homocide, rather than the physical condition of the litterer when caught. No one wants to post his own self-incirimination, right? On a side note, next to the cigarette sign, it says "moving (service), packing (service), high ladder trucks (for moving apartment residents)" etc.... Nice words to know for your next move (this time not involving KTX as much).
BKF
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