Hi Steve,
Hats off to OKi, an amazing woman. The obvious unanswered question is ... how
the heck did you ever trick her into marrying you? Was the wedding Buddhist or
Christian or other?Thanks.DP
In a message dated 3/10/2022 11:34:29 AM Mountain Standard Time,
sfgrob@xxxxxxxxxxx writes:
Actually, Oki is pretty skilled at this. Her tiny country has several regional
dialects. As PD summarized, a result of " fiefdoms", or various kingdoms
throughout the millenniums.
Oki comes from a small, rural farm village in the very south part of the
country, a peninsula actually, off the main Korean peninsula. The dialect
there is very distinct and well recognized, but seldom understood outside the
region.
Oki was a very good student growing up. It is kind of a joke but she was
always 2nd in her grade-level no matter how hard she studied, she never could
make 1st throughout her primary and middle school years. Fortunately, the girl
who always beat her out was a good friend of hers and a distant relative, so
they got along well.
When Oki finished middle school, her oldest brother came from Busan, where he
lived and got Oki to bring her back to Busan to attend high-school there. It
was pretty well established that Oki was not well suited to be a farmer's wife.
Her mother recognized this early as Oki would always run away whenever she saw
any type of worm, or the like, in the fields and rice paddies. She could not
handle it when any of the animals were killed for food. Not good traits for
living on a farm. So when her brother showed up wanting to take her to Busan,
it was a welcome opportunity.
Once Oki got to Busan, she immediately recognized the dialect in Busan was
quite different from hers. She also had to take an entrance exam to enter the
high-school her brother wanted her to attend. It was/is a private commercial
girl's high-school that is somewhat exclusive. As she watched all the
applicants arrive for the entrance test in their father's chauffeur-driven
limousines she thought to herself, how is an education from a rural school ever
going to allow her to score high enough to get in?
So she kept to herself and took the test. When she went back to check the list
for the results, she didn't see her name on the accepted list. She went back
to her brother and reported that she had failed to make the cut. Her brother
did not believe it so he went back over to take his own look at the list. He
found it right away and came back to inform Oki she did indeed make the list.
So what happened? Oki was so sure she was not educated enough to qualify she
started looking at the bottom of the list. There were hundreds of applicants
on this list and Oki finally gave up looking part way up the list and returned
home. Her brother, knowing how smart she really was, started looking at the
top of the list. And where did he find her name? 2nd from the top, where else?
So here she is, a farm girl from "the sticks" as we might say, having to attend
a school filled with wealthy prep-school prepared female students. Fitting in
was a concern. So the first thing she did was learn to use the Busan dialect.
Her brother, who was pretty savvy, knew she needed to be well dressed too, so
he saw to it that she had the best quality school uniform to wear. The
deception was set.
Oki started school and immediately did well, made many friends and fit in very
well. No one suspected where she was from. Some time after her assimilation
into the Busan school culture, she was out with a group of her new friends.
The group came across a girl somewhere speaking the dialect from Oki's area and
the group of girls started making fun of the "country hick". This didn't go on
long and Oki had enough. She finally blurted out a condemnation of these girls
for their snobbery, in her native dialect!
Her friends were so shocked to discover that she spoke the Busan dialect
faultlessly, but was really from a different area, they could hardly speak.
When the shock wore off, the rude girls fell all over themselves apologizing.
Oki taught them a good lesson that day, and no, she did not lose any friends
when they learned where she was from, actually gained a little more respect
from them as Oki could "pass" as a native speaking Busanian.
By the way, when Oki graduated high-school, where do you think she placed in
her class? 2nd place - of course.
It is kind of funny when we travel to various parts of the country. Oki is
still quite adept at picking up and using the dialect of the region we are
visiting. It is not unusual when seeking local information from someone to ask
Oki where she is from originally, because she is using their regional dialect,
but is unfamiliar with the area, confusing them.
Steve
