Christmas Cards

I sent my Christmas cards out last week, but I almost didn’t—I almost talked myself out of it at the last minute. 

My first plan for the cards was to make them, but North Korean craziness and a month of night shifts made that plan impractical.  My sweet and hardworking husband, chained to his desk until nine or ten at night most nights, gave his approval for whatever I came up with.  I ended up just picking up some Korean cards with English translations from one of the vendors at the post exchange (PX).  I was in a hurry, and I thought that it would be fun for my friends to get a Korean Christmas card.  It was only later, when I was addressing the envelopes, that I started to worry.

One of the things I always thought was funny in China was the use of English phrases in random, and sometimes wildly inappropriate, places.  I remember a lady I interviewed showing us a photo album from her daughter’s wedding that was inscribed with such meaningful and eloquent phrases as “Hit me baby one more time” and “It’s too late to apologize” (ok, this song wasn’t out in 2005, but it was a similar phrase from one of the popular break-up songs of the year).  The lady pointed the phrases out proudly.  “Look—English!”  “Umm hmm, very nice.”  There’s also the infamous use of random English phrases on t-shirts and other items.  Oh, if only the middle aged ladies who proudly sported curse words on their apparel knew what they meant.  Or if I could figure out what “happy life sunshine” meant, exactly.

 And of course English-speakers aren’t always the ones laughing about inappropriately appropriated language—I’m sure many a Chinese kid chuckled over Brittney Spears’ tattoo that meant “strange”.  There are actually entire websites dedicated to Chinese tats gone wrong.  I used to joke with my Chinese friends in high school that we should make a shirt that said something like “I’m a dummy trying to look cool” in Chinese—if we styled it well, we decided, it would be a great hit among the unsuspecting English-speakers.

So, back to my Christmas cards.  I’m trying to learn Korean, as you know, and have gotten far enough to read the hangul on the front of the card; I also understood some of the message on the inside, including a couple of the old-style Chinese characters.  When I bought the cards I didn’t think too much about it;  reasoning that “‘New day, new morning” probably makes more sense for a Christmas card in Korean.  But does it?  I mean, I assume since the Korean guy selling the cards spoke Korean it’s probably not as strange as say break-up lyrics in a wedding album, but what if the Korean message doesn’t match the English message of “Merry Christmas and Happy New Year” at all?  What if the tone of the card is more suitable for an elderly person getting over a loss or looking wistfully at the past and hoping that somehow the morning will bring the good things written in the Chinese characters?  The realization hit me.  I had become one of those people that I used to mock—people who buy things with foreign words on them because they look cool.

To all of the Korean-speakers who read our Christmas card, please accept our wishes for a blessed and joyful Christmas season, and forgive my not speaking Korean well enough to pick out an appropriate Christmas card if the one I sent is actually more suitable for a grieving grandmother.