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LEARN + KOREAN / 60 of 125 TOPIK I

Colours and the ㅎ Irregular ㅎ 불규칙

a

On the shelf, you spot white sneakers and a red umbrella: 하얀 운동화, 빨간 우산. Many Korean adjectives ending in ㅎ drop it before a noun and add ㄴ. Before a vowel-starting ending, the stem changes too: 하얗다 becomes 하얘요; 빨갛다 becomes 빨개요.

i haendeupon dijaini eottaeyo?
How is this phone's design?
mina ssi, eolguri ppalgwayo.
Mina, your face is red.
Hint · 힌트
Not every ㅎ is irregular. 좋다 keeps its ㅎ: 좋아요, 좋은 날씨. Verbs such as 놓다 and 넣다 also keep it. Check the dictionary form rather than assuming every word with ㅎ changes.
jeo noran usan juseyo.
Please give me that yellow umbrella.
In Real Life
In real life, colors are often used in the noun-modifying form when identifying a specific item: 빨간색 가방 (“the red bag”), 파란 우산 (“the blue umbrella”). For colors, you will often hear both the adjective form and the color noun ending in 색.

Vocabulary

KoreanEnglish
하얗다
hayata
to be white
까맣다
kkamata
to be black
빨갛다
ppalgata
to be red
노랗다
norata
to be yellow
파랗다
parata
to be blue
우산
usan
umbrella
지갑
jigap
wallet
디자인
dijain
design
색
saek
colour
색깔
saekkkal
colour
그렇다
geureota
to be so
어떻다
eotteota
to be how
밝다
bakda
to be bright
어둡다
eodupda
to be dark
진하다
jinhada
to be deep or strong in colour
연하다
yeonhada
to be pale or light
모양
moyang
shape
크기
keugi
size
길이
giri
length
넓이
neolbi
width or area

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