Wednesday, May 6, 2009

Konglish Lesson #9

Konglish of the day: 1+1 (pronounced "one pluh-seuh one")

You can often find "1+1" in supermarkets or stores as promotional methods.  It means "2-for-1" as in 2 for the price of 1.  I don't know why Koreans decided to popularize "1 + 1" while "2-for-1" is just as catchy and easy for Koreans to use.

There was a time at work when there was a disagreement between an American supplier and a Korean co-worker on the price of an item.  The price was quoted by the supplier as being "$x plus tax".  In North America, that means x does not include tax and you must add tax to get total price.  This Korean co-worker misunderstood and argued that x is the price that we had to pay.  That's fine.  He's entitled to misunderstanding.  However, he was very adamant in his statement that he was right and the supplier was wrong... and he used the argument that tax is included in "x + tax" because "1 + 1" means you get 2 for the price of 1.

"I decided to buy this milk because of 1+1."

"You want me there on your so-gae-ting?  Oh!  I'll bring another girl to even up the numbers, but then since she's also single, it'll be 1+1 for you!"

"Instead of buying separate snacks, let's get this sandwich and share.  It's on 1+1."

1 comment:

  1. "2 for 1" has a tendency to sound like "2-4-1". less confusing for someone with a tenuous familiarity with such homonyms as "for", "four" and "fore".

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