March 18, 2010

Korean LOLcats: An Experiment

I take a lot of Korean studies courses at my university because they're easy and I like mid-afternoon classes I can roll into after waking up around the crack of noon after some intense weeknight partying. Undergraduate life, you know how we kick it.

Someone had raised the question in class if Koreans had LOLcats. You know, LOLcats. That thing that used to be funny until your aunt started forwarding them to you. Now, I'll admit I don't really have my finger on the pulse of Korean cyberculture. I only just learned that the Korean word for troll is 악플러 (akpŭllŏ). Outside of my Cyworld page, I don't really know what's up.

At first I thought it was funny and turned around going cheeseburger chom chuseyo in a baby voice... then I realized we had something serious happening. I fired up my MacBook Pro and tuned out the lecture so I could concentrate on this:





I think it loses something in the translation.