I completely forgot we've got this coming Monday off for Hangeul Day, the day this country celebrates the 1440s invention, by Great King Sejong and his cohort, of the hunminjeongeum, the Proper Sounds for the Edification of the People, which alphabet is known today as hangeul, the writing of the Han (Korean) people. (You've seen pics of the hunminjeongeum from my walks to Yeoju, which is Sejong's city. The king is buried there.)
From Hangeul Day until Christmas, there are no national holidays, and it's during this holiday-free period that I'll be doing this year's walk. This is why I've had to stack up so many hours of comp time. It's been a long process of working extra weekends and slightly longer days, but I have my requisite 160 hours of comp time, plus some extra hours thanks to the work I'm currently doing during this crunch period. I'll be coming into the office tomorrow, in fact, to try to finish up the current textbook that I'm proofreading. Next week, I'll have to proofread a third textbook (all of these are around 120 pages long), then I need to sit with the designer and go over all my corrections while he implements them. The hope is to get all of that done by Friday, then I'll leave straight from work to go to Incheon for what I hope will be a good, month-long adventure along a well-loved path.
But the significance of having Hangeul Day off is that I'm now thinking I want to finish the four-day hike that I started over Chuseok break. I can walk to Hanam City (26K, with my full-size backpack this time) on Sunday, then walk from Hanam to Yangpyeong (35K) on Monday and train back to Seoul the same day. I could also stay overnight in Yangpyeong and train back to Seoul for work on Tuesday morning. I normally come into work around lunchtime, anyway, so that's also a possibility. Either way, I can finish the final two days of my four-day walk (in my regular shoes this time), and Bob's your uncle. I think this sounds like a plan.
The flexibility in your scheduling is really quite a perk at your workplace. At least, it seems that way for a (former) 8-5 bureaucrat like me.
ReplyDeleteBelated comment here, but I thought I would shed some light on the etymology of Hangeul. It's a common misconception, but the "han" does not refer to the 韓 character from 韓國 (also, incidentally, Koreans do not generally refer to themselves as the "Han people"--that's reserved for the Han Chinese (漢)). In fact, 한글 is a pure Korean word devised by 주시경 that relies on the original Korean meaning of 한 as "great."
ReplyDeleteI stand corrected.
DeleteI went to Wikipedia to see whether its article on hangeul would cover the etymology of "han," and it didn't seem to. (Maybe I didn't read carefully enough.) There was a link to an article on 주시경, and that article also failed to discuss where "han" comes from. So do I have to turn to Namu Wiki or something to find the etymology? I'll keep looking.
ReplyDeleteCorrection: upon rereading, I see that the main Wikipedia article on hangeul does mention the 한 = great thing, but without much further explanation. The article says this:
ReplyDeleteThe name hangeul (한글) was coined by Korean linguist Ju Si-gyeong in 1912. The name combines the ancient Korean word han (한), meaning great, and geul (글), meaning script. The word han is used to refer to Korea in general, so the name also means Korean script.
So Wikipedia is saying "han" can refer to Korea in general... is it making the same mistake as those of us who conflate 한 with 韓?