Lost in Translation

I have heard before that certain things just don't translate from one language to another. The first example of this I saw was at a church service on Yonsei University's campus. There were three of us foreigners each with UN style earphones getting a translation of the church sermon. Then the translator stopped translating for several minutes. When she stated to speak again she apologized and told us the sermon example from taken from a funny story involving miscommunication due to dialects differences within the peninsula and there simply was no way to accurately translate the story.

The next year I saw a word written in Japanese and asked my Japanese speaking friend what it meant. He said "you know when it is autumn and you are sitting in a pagoda enjoying the scenery? What is the word for that in English?" He was dead serious as that was ONE Single Word in Japanese to describe all of that.

As I am learning Korean I have learned some of the words that just don't translate into English. These are the more enjoyable ones:

내숭 (Nae sung) - False shyness (used to be cute). There is a equivalent to this in Chinese as well.

아저씨 (Ah jo shee) - An old man. Not a negative word, simply stating the truth in a respectful way. Whole lot nicer than saying "Gramps" or "Hey Grandpa!" in English.

아줌마 (Ah ju ma) or 아주머니 (Ah ju mo nee) - An old woman. Koreans will say there are three kinds of people: men, women, and ahgeemas. These ladies are often crass and very blunt sometimes with a cackle for a laugh. Not a negative word if used for women who are actually old.

애교 (Ae kyo) - A girl who acts really cute toward her boyfriend.

오빠 (Oh pa) - A term that girls will use for an older guy. He could be her brother, cousin, boyfriend, or even husband. There are a lot of flirty elements with this word; it's all in how you use it.

꾀병 (Kae byong) - Fake sickness to get out of class.

남남 북녀 (Nam nam bok nyo) - This is a play on words which means "In the South (Korea) it is the men who are handsome and in the North (Korea) it is the women."