Okay, from an over-analytical mind (guilty) with a few minutes on my hands this morning to someone who likes linguistics, wordplay, and off-the wall phrases (And let's not forget twiddling ... although I still don't know what that means
):
Lady Frog, in Korean would be written as:
개구리 아주마
Loosely translated, this would be "Lady frog." It would be tranliterated as "Gaeguli ajuma." Phonetically, it would be GAY-gu-lee ah-joo-ma. Korean doesn't really accent syllables the way English does, but usually when I head it spoken, I can hear a slight accent on the first syllable.
The way that is written is in "hangul" or the Korean alphabet. They have another way of writing called "Hanja" that is based on the Chinese characters. In what I wrote, the letters are grouped into syllables. The vowels change the shape of the syllable somewhat as some vowels are written to the right of the first consonant, and some are written below the first consonant. None of those syllables have an ending consonant, but when that happens, the ending consonant will be on the bottom of the syllable. An example would be: 불 which is "bool" (May also be written as bul or even pul) which is the Korean word for "Fire."
In 개구리 아주마, it breaks down like this:
ㄱ is actually harder than an English 'G', but softer than an English 'K'. You can see it transliterated as both. You can see this character at the beginning of the first and second syllables. On the first syllable, it is on the left,and on the second syllable, it is on top.
ㅐis transliterated as "ae" since it is the Korean letters ㅏ (ah), and ㅣ(between short 'i' and long 'e') combined. However, Korean dipthongs don't make the same sound as they do in English (especially the one transliteraed as 'oi'). This one make a sound that is between a short 'e' and a long 'a', but it closest to a long 'a'. You can see it as the vowel in the fiirst syllable.
ㅜ is always written below the first consonant. It makes an 'oo' or long 'u' sound. You can see this as the vowel in the second syllable of the first word, and the second syllable of the second word.
ㄹ is a problematic character to transliterate because we don't have this syllable in English. It is between a Spanish 'r' and an English 'L'. You will see it transliterated as either. Korean doesn't have a sound like the English 'r.' To make this sound, your tongue should touch the roof of your mouth quickly just about the place where the roof of your mouth indents upward, but you don't hold it - it should touch and release immediately unless it is the last sound of the syllable (in which case it is held and sounds more like the English 'L'). You can hear the sound between the Spanish 'R' and the English 'L.' You can see this letter at the beginning of the third syllable, and also at the end of the Korean word for 'Fire' that I gave above.
ㅣis between a short 'i' and a long 'e', but is closer to the long 'e.' You can see this ending the third syllable.
ㅇ makes an 'ng' sound at the end of the syllable, but is silent if it appears at the beginning of a syllable. Written syllables in Korean cannot begin with a vowel, but spoken syllables do sometimes begin with a vowel. For a syllable that begins with a vowel, the ㅇ character is used at the beginning of the syllable, and it is silent. You can see this character beginning the first syllable of the second word.
ㅏ makes an 'ah' sound. You can see this character at the end of the first and third syllables of the second word.
ㅈ makes a hard 'j' or soft 'ch' sound. You will see it transliterated as both, but these days it is more often transliterated as 'j' to make an easier distinction between it and the ㅊcharacter which makes a hard 'ch' sound. In old days, they used to transliterate those as ch and ch' respectively. You can see the ㅈ at the beginning of the second syllable in the second word.
ㅜ makes a long 'u' sound. You can see this at the end (below the first consonant) of the second syllable of the second word.
ㅁ makes an 'm' sound. You see it at the beginning of the third syllable of the second word.
That's all the characters used in those words.
For the literal translation and context behind them:
개구리 (gaeguli) is the Korean word for a frog. This is a "mimetic word" or word that emulates what it describes. You can imagine a frog making a noise like "gaegul, gaegul, gaegul" and this is what this is supposed to do - imitate the noise of the frog. Literaly "gaeguli" is "something that says gaegul." Likewise, a children's mimetic word for dog is "mong-monggi" because kids are taught that a dog saye "mong mong" (as opposed to "arf"). The real word for dog is "gae." Gaeguli is not just just baby talk, though - that is the word for frog.
아주마 (ajuma) could be translated as "lady," but it is used very commonly in Korean. In Korea, you are never allowed to call an elder person by his/her name. This holds true even if that person is only one day older than you. There are several titles that are used to address someone older than you, and they are also used do show respect when you talk about that person. For this reason, it becomes difficult to find one word that would mean "lady" or "gentleman" in the context that it is used in "lady frog."
Another example of a respectful word is how I would refer to my sisters-in-law. One of them is named "Choon-ja." When I speak to her, I would call her "noona," which is the word a boy or man uses to refer to his older sister (as opposed to 'o-ni' which is how a girl or woman refers to her elder sister). If I need to use her name, whether I am speaking to her, or about her, I must use a respectful word, so I would refer to her as "Choon-ja noona."
Ajuma is a respectful term for a woman - especially one that is old enough that you're sure she is married, but young enough that she is not yet a grandmother. Although it is sometimes translated as "aunt," it doesn't really denote any relationship - it is just a respectful term. If I walk into the store, and a lady is working there, when I speak to her, I call her "ajuma."
So all of that going together, if I was going to translate "Lady Frog" into Korean, and call you a Korean term that would be it's equivalent, I would call you "Gaeguli Ajuma."
Okay, that killed a good 15 minutes of my time. Tell me how much of your time it killed ... I'd hate to think it didn't occupy your mind for at least a moment.
