Let's Learn Korean - 장님의 등불

Total words: 325

한 젊은이가 어두운 밤길을 걷고 있었어요.
그런대 맞은편에서 장님이 등불을 들고 걸어오는 것이 보였어요.
젊은이가 궁금해서 장님 에게 물어 보았어요.
“보아하니 장님인 듯한데, 아째서 등불을 들소 다니십니까?”
그러자 장님이 대답했어요.
“나는 장님이라 앞을 볼 수가 없지요. 그러나 선생과 같이 눈이 밝은 사람들은 이 등불을 볼수 있지 않습니까? 이등불은 내가 보기 위한 것이 아니라, 나를 보여 주기 위한 것입니다.”
장님의 말을 듣고 젊은이는 큰 깨달음을 얻었습니아.

I just read another story from the book I wrote about in an earlier entry. This time the story is incredibly short and I thought I would take a stab at translating it. - translation is in the extended entry.

A young man was taking a walk one night. He noticed a blind man carrying a lamp on the other side of the street.
The young man was curious so he asked the blind man “For what reason, is a seemingly blind man carrying a lamp?”
So he replied “I am blind and can’t see in front of myself. But can’t people like you, sir, with good eyes see this lamp? This lamp is not for me to see with, but rather to show you that I am here.”
The young man listend to the blind mans words and came to a big understanding.

I had some trouble putting the blind mans words into English. That was because I forgot that ...같이 can also mean like/similar to in the same was as ..처. Basically I saw this 선생과 같이 눈이 밝은 사람들은 이 and thought it meant You (sir) and your bright eyed friends i.e. 같이 = together with. Clearly I was initially wrong.

Here are the words I had to look up in dictionary with an English definition and what I consider to be a roughly equivalant Korean word.
맞은편 other side, opposite side 반대쪽
등불 lamp
궁금 curious, wonder 호기심
장님 blind man 봉사님
보아하니 to all appearances - it seems that
어째서 why - for what reason

Posted by 王音癡 on Friday Jan 20, 2006 in Korean Writing | |

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