Korean Age

Korean Age...what is it? It may sound awkward for some of you that there is the name for the "age." Well, in fact, Korean Age refers to the unique age counting system of Korean people. In Korean, we call Korean Age as 한국식 나이 [Hanguksik nai] or 세는 나이 [Seneun nai]. In everyday life, Koreans chiefly use the Korean age - especially when forming a friendship or relationship between people. Of course, for the official and legal age of the people, the Korean government use the same age counting system as many parts of the world. To sum up, Korean age is one of the customs of Korean society. 

 

Meeting many foreigners in and out of the school, I found out that many people have difficulty in understanding Korean Age system (Although they are curious about learning them). Therefore, today, I would like to introduce you all to the Korean Age System. 

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As you know, Korean age counting system is entirely different from the ones in other countries – and it is also complicated in some sense. However, if you remember two relevant rules, it is not impossible to understand KOREAN AGE system. 

First Rule of Korean Age
The first rule of Korean Age is the fact that a newborn baby is one year old right away (There is no 0 years old in Korean Age system).

Second Rule of Korean Age
The second rule of Korean Age is that we count the age by the year the person was born, not the exact birthday of the person. 

Critical Korean Vocabularies / Phrases about Age
나이 [nai] - Age
몇 살이예요? [myeot sari yeyo?] - How old are you?
저는 ___ 살입니다. [jeo Neun ___ sarim Nida.] - I am ___ years old

Unsure about how to speak Korean Phrases? 
Visit Here to listen to the phrases