I work with two Korean gentleman,South Korean. There's J.J. he's in his 70s and in great shape and Kim he's in his 60s.They both speak broken English. JJ' can speak a little better than Kim , Kim is hard to under stand. One day awhile back when I first started this job in N.J. I was about to go home and realized that my tire was flat. It was the middle of winter and was bitter cold out side. It was my first winter since I had moved back from F.L.. so I was still getting assimilated to the cold. Kim saw me out side having problems with the tire and came to help out. He had a tire patching kit. He stood out there with me for almost a half an hour in the freezing wind and patched it back up for me, a total stranger. I never forgot that and always respected him for it.
 
I've been picking up some words in Korean since I've known them. I know how to say hello (An young ha se yo). good by (annyeonghi gaseyo), excuse me , crazy, thank you , and a few others . Of course I asked them for some swear words . I don't no why the first thing people want to learn from another language is swear words. Like if I ever get a chance to visit Korea the first thing I'm going to do is start cursing people out" "Hello screw you."  I don't think that would go over well in Korea especially in the North, although I would like to tell that little crazy bastard over there where to stick it, Thats another subject.I think it's has something to do with cursing Americans out in another language anyway.

The one word that has really stuck and has taken a life of it's own is the word( Kat dong)which means Dog Shit. When they first taught me it it was the only word that stuck with me. I would say Kat dong and they would laugh, even though it made no senses in the context I was using it in. Like if there where certain co. workers that where being ass holes I would look at them and say Kat dong and they would laugh. So now J.J. uses it all the time and has sort of morphed it into some kind of English slang term for everything. If he's mad at someone he says "To many Kat dong in this place." If he has complaints about the company he says "This company Kat dong." They recently changed his schedule and he was like "Kat dong changed my schedule." It's gotten to the point now where he addresses me by it, It's become his nick name for me. In the morning when he sees me he says "Good-morning Kat dong" , after the weeks over he says "Kat dong have a good weekend" If he sees that I'm mad hell say "Kat dong what's the matter". Sometimes I'll say it to him to. I'll say "Hey Kat dong", and hell say "Hey Kat dong how you doing." So the word has totally lost it's meaning. This just goes to show you that words are pretty much what we believe them to mean.

I'm glad that where bridging the language gap between are two countries but every now and then after he says it it occurs to me that he just called me Dog shit.