Weather and climate

Level 3 weather talk is the language of the forecast. Many of its words are Sino-Korean compounds that share a syllable: 폭우 (a downpour) and 폭설 (heavy snow) both begin with 폭, “violent”, and 최고 기온 and 최저 기온 are the high and the low. The Korean year also has named stretches of weather that people talk about every time they come round, such as 꽃샘추위, the cold snap that comes back just as the flowers open, and 열대야, the summer night that never cools down. Native verbs do the rest: rain 그치다, stops, and the sky 개다, clears.