Hello guys, ladies and gentlemen good morning! Alright guys, we are in K-Town New York City So guys, what I am going to be doing over the next 24 hours Is attempting to learn Korean It's not really going to be 24 hours, because I'm gonna actually try to get some sleep So it's gonna be less than 24 hours [of studying], but Today I'm here in Koreatown New York City Where I'm gonna try to learn some Korean Tomorrow I am going to... ...do a little bit more studying, and then... Just try going to speak with random people, random strangers on the street... ...here in K-Town Some actual Koreans, and see how much I've learned So I have zero background in Korean at all You know, I do speak Chinese Given that Korean is consistently ranked as... ...one of the most or the most difficult languages for native English speakers to learn in the world... I definitely don't have any illusions that I'm going to become fluent after 24 hours But my goal is to at least be able to learn to speak a little bit Just be able to have some basic conversations with people Now, in terms of how I'm actually going to try and learn You know, I think that like... Trying to learn grammar and pronunciation and all this stuff separately... Is really ineffective So what I'm gonna try and do is just find people to speak with Just try and learn grammar and pronunciation and all that as naturally as possible I have no idea if this is gonna work, but I'm just gonna give it a shot, and... See what I can accomplish in 24 hours So I have a tutor... Who is coming to meet me today Should be around H-Mart over there, the Korean supermarket Is that her? Hi, Danne! Hello, how are you? Hi, nice to meet you! You too! How's it going? I'm good! Are you ready for this challenge? Are you excited? I'm scared! I'm scared too! I'm maybe a little bit more scared than you are! We have a very quiet place to study Great But if you want to study inside [here]... Let's do quiet, I love that idea Alright Danne, so I am super excited Let me show you what I have prepared for our studying I've got my little notebook So, I was kind of thinking I want to learn... Naturalistically You know, I kinda want to just like... Study sentences and just learn grammar and pronunciation naturally So I have a list of sentences here And... You know, I just kinda want to write down... The sentences and how you would pronounce them I'll try and record you saying them, so I can... Like, let it sink into my ears, so... There's this guy... Do you know Tim Ferriss? No, who is that? So he... He basically has a list of sentences that he often uses for breaking down new languages Because if you learn these sentences it helps learn the structure of how the whole language works, a little bit Any kind of language? Any language, right, exactly So if you know how to say those in any language, you kind of have a better feeling for how the whole language works Xiaoma: What do you think? Do you think I'm gonna be able to do this?
Danne: I think so Is this crazy? Okay... Xiaoma: I'm really nervous guys!
Danne: I hope so! I hope so! So let's just get started then One thing I've heard is that Korean pronunciation is really hard So, "the apple is red", how would I say that in Korean? "sagwa" is apple "Gwa", a little bit softer Oh, good It means "apple is"... Yeah Red... Oh jeez, there's more This is gonna be harder than I thought guys, holy s***, okay I think you picked a difficult sentence! Wait wait wait, okay Say that one more time Oh jeez! No no no, we gotta do this, okay So wow, we have like... We have a couple... We've been learning for an hour or two We've got a couple pages of notes here Wow, this is... You're a good student! No, me? No... You catch really fast! Good! So... My first impressions of Korean With a couple hours, it's... Very difficult! The word order is completely different from English, it's just like... You have to totally change your mind, because... I speak Chinese also, but Chinese is more similar to English Word order is more similar to English But Korean has different categories almost, it's like... You don't say, "can you speak Korean", "can I speak Korean"... They're just different ways of thinking, so... Xiaoma: You have to reformat your brain
Danne: We have a similar meaning sentence... But not exactly the same Right, right, exactly But you're doing well Thank you, appreciate that Oh, "thank you", wait... Did I learn "thank you"?! Yes you did! Wait wait... Yes! Thank you! Oh my gosh, we did about... Four hours of studying here, just now, and... We did like... I don't know, we did a lot of stuff! And you absorbed everything! Well we'll see about that! So quiz me! Okay... Excellent! Yes! Wow Difficult! Xiaoma: I don't know if this is gonna work out with people in the street
Danne: It will Okay, so... I say let's maybe go eat some Korean food? Sure! Yeah? And... I'm gonna go and take a nap And then... Come back tomorrow! Maybe tomorrow we can do a little more practice and then go find some strangers to talk Korean to! Okay, this was great! Alright, we're gonna go eat now Korean food I'm hungry That means I'm hungry It means good Alright, we got a little bit of Korean lunch here Oh my god Wow, this looks... This is a feast! Oh my god! I don't say that? No oppa? Inappropriate Okay, inappropriate So I'm going back home now Gonna do a little bit of review And then... Coming back to K-Town tomorrow for some more Korean practice And then The big day tomorrow, we're just gonna have to go and see how much I've actually learned Alright, just doing a little bit of review of my Korean sentences There's a lot to learn, oh my god This is crazy I'm just kinda reading this over and then just sort of speaking it Back to myself with the audio recordings My name is Xiaoma I am American So I'm gonna be doing a little bit of review With a tutor I found on the Internet And we'll see if I can use any of what I learned today So let's give her a call Okay, hold on Just open up my Skype here Nice to meet you, my name is... So even though I was able to understand some of what she was saying In general, I was having a really tough time with the listening comprehension And I was getting increasingly frustrated as the lesson moved on Oh my god guys I don't know if I'm gonna be able to do this tomorrow That was so hard! I didn't understand anything Well, I understood some of what she was saying So... Tomorrow's gonna be real fun Okay I'm gonna do a little bit more review And then go to sleep But... See you guys tomorrow Good morning guys! Okay, so I'm feeling a little bit better After the...after that disaster that was last night I feel like my rest for some reason, my sleeping...actually helped consolidate my memories And I just feel really good And just ready to go! Like I can speak a little bit of Korean, that's really cool! Alright guys, we're getting some kimbap for breakfast Smells really good Thank you Thank you Look at that guys, I spoke some Korean! Wow, I think that was the first time I've ever spoken Korean with anybody in my life Other than my tutor That feels awesome! And I got some kimbap, alright So when you're learning a language... Gotta immerse yourself in the culture This is so much better than cereal Alright, finished eating guys That was amazing And now let's go meet our tutor Nice to see you again! Before we go into any new stuff today I'm very excited Because we're gonna try to speak to some people But let's do like a... ...mock conversation, maybe? Okay sure, okay! So... Yes You're not supposed to ask that in Korean, I've learned I wanted to learn a couple more sentences Like I wanted to try to know how to say... "I don't understand" in Korean, because I realized I don't know how to say that Let's see, it's 11:30 So It's right around the 24 hour mark of when I first started studying Korean Wow! Yeah, we did a little bit of review just now, learned a little bit of new stuff And Maybe we should go find some people to practice with? Yeah! Oh my god, I'm so nervous What do you think? I think you'll probably do well! Really?! I don't know, I don't know... We're just gonna go see if we can find people Yeah, let's go! Alright guys, 24 hour Korean challenge Let's go hit the streets! And see what kind of Korean I can speak Okay! Alright let's go, come on! So you're saying you think he's Korean? I think so Wait, you said he walks like he's Korean? A little bit! Alright, let's go try buying some stuff in Korean Is this gonna work? I don't know No? Sorry Okay Korean Top 10! Hot Very hot! High five! That was... What did you think about that? It went pretty well! You were a little nervous I was very nervous They used words we never learned But still you interpreted really well Right, well some of it I could understand That was really cool! Yeah Wow, I had my first conversation in Korean with total strangers That was amazing Do you want to try one more? Sure, let's do it! She's correcting you! One day? One day Wow, I'm freaked out right now guys That was so awesome! Like look, I'm obviously not fluent, but like... Wow! You can communicate! I can have a little conversation with people, that was so cool! They didn't believe that you only learned Korean for a day They keep saying, "he's studied before" Xiaoma: That was less good than the older ladies
Danne: Because you were a little bit nervous I was kind of nervous there, yeah But this is so cool, like... I feel like at least I can have a very simple conversation with people in Korean And honestly... I think this is more than I expected I could learn Really? Yeah, I didn't really think I would be able to do this, but... I'm so excited, and... Thank you so much for helping me, that was really great! A lot of people when they're first learning a language... They're too nervous to go out and speak to somebody Be brave Yeah, I feel like you just have to be brave, and do it, and... I think you can accomplish [a lot] if you just try... Don't be ashamed of your mistakes Right, don't be ashamed of your mistakes You know, like I was... ...really disastrous today, but... No, you were good, you were very good! If you just try to be out there I think this is a great way to practice Like I feel like if I did this for a week or for a month... I would be much better, yeah If you guys like this video Please... Subscribe and leave a comment Letting me know what other types of videos you guys might like to see I'll see you guys all next time, bye bye!
This is super fucking interesting.
Or should I say “이건 정말 재밌어요.”
Learning a new language is a strange thing. It’s like the start of an RPG where you only know like two spells and slowly build up to be like a grand wizard or something. I wonder if we “brute forces” learning our own native languages.