Dear community,
I'm planing to learn an asian language from scratch, but I can't really make my choice between Korean (Seoul) and Vietnamese (Hanoi). I don't have to be perfect at it, but I definitely have to be able to have a normal daily conversation as I need the skills for a possible internship in one of the two mentioned cities.
Would you please tell me a bit about the differences between the languages, cultures, lifestyle, environment, is there a lot of stress in the capital cities, what about air pollution etc.?
Thank you very much for your support!!
Regards,
Sarah
These are amazing information! Thank you for having shared your thoughts with me - and a special thank to Steve :)
I don't personally speak Vietnamese. I have studied Mandarin, and have to live in Korean.
The first thing is that Korean is a flat language, and Vietnamese is tonal. I can compare a bit of the experience based on my Mandarin experience vs. my Korean experience, but remember, Mandarin, although in the same langauge family, is not the same language as Vietnamese.
My experience with it was the Mandarin pronunciation was harder for an English speaker, but Korean grammar is MUCH more complex that Mandarin grammar. Korean pronunciation, IMO, is not that difficult so long as someone remembers that Korean doesn't sound like English, and the sounds they give you are approximations expressed in the English character set. In either case, you can learn the pronunciation if you remove yourself from your English habits of speech. It's just that a tonal language means you have more to remember about pronunciation ... but the tradeoff is that Korean gives you a lot more you need to remember about forming your sentence.
That's what I have to offer on it.
Whatever your opportunity is, I hope you get it, and you enjoy it. Seoul is a busy city with a lot to do, and if you're there, then you can take weekend trips to Busan (IMO, the most beautiful city in Korea, and the city where I make my home), or other places according to your interest. It should definitely be something exciting for an internship. I'm sure that Hanoi also has a lot to offer, although I haven't visited there personally.
In my opinion, Korean is like japanese and Finnish, Hungarian.
But Vietnam is more like chinese.
So, there are some difference in sentence structure.
Personally, I thin Korean would be easier. Having to learn a new "alphabet" sounds bad but it will help you pronounciation because you won't be thinking in English as you read it. Also, hangul takes about an hour to learn.
Also, Vietnamese is a pitched language. The pitch of your voice can change the meaning COMPLETELY. I find that pretty difficult and stressful. Learning it would be hard without proper audio filesand/ or a native speaker to correct your pronounciation.
