개새끼야 !

I hear a man angrily yell "개새끼야!" as I walk home from the office at 7am in the morning. It's a common Korean swear word. It basically means "You son of a bitch!"

It is not uncommon to hear it, but when I look up from the paper I am reading as I am walking, I see that it has come from an angry man on a bicycle who is looking right at me as he rides slowly past.

He is on the other side of the road, and coming from the other direction, so I am not in his way in any way. Nor do I know him, so I have no idea what it could be about.

Korea is one of the safest places I have lived. You never feel threatened or in danger. People are incredibly nice, though not always aware, and I often feel the asshole afterwards for loosing my cool and pushing someones cart out of the way in Costco. So something like this is extremely unusual.

But, perhaps this guy recognises me from Costco.

"너, 모야?" I say back. I'm not sure it is an appropriate response. I'm not good at cursing in Korean. Literally it is "You, what are you?" but I feel it means something like, "What's your problem?" The '너' is certainly not the version of 'you' that you should use with a stranger. I think the phrase should work though, because my wife uses it on me all the time.

It occurs to me briefly that this guy could be my wife, but I dismiss the thought, as her bike doesn't have the fat tires that his does.

"Aa-iishh. 씨발새끼야!" He yells back, slowing down. The "Aa-iish" is just pure fighting sounds, though I think it kind of means, "Well, I wasn't expecting that." So I don't think it really fits the situation. Why would you not expect a response to curses slung at a stranger. I think you can only translate "씨발새끼야!" as "You mother fucker!"

Perhaps some people just don't like foreigners. Or handsome foreigners. Or foreigners that wear plaid. Likely it is the plaid.

I stop walking too, and look at him with a chuckle. "와라." I say simply. It is an invitation to "Come here," and I don't know if it translates this way, but with the chuckle, and the tone and posture, I think I pull it off as a dismissive, "Bring it, then."

The man turns and rides off. Perhaps he has realised I was not who he thought I was– some other foreigner who he had had a previous altercation, or perhaps he realised that being on a bike, he is in no position to start something. But I rather think that it was my chuckling at his aggression that made him re-evaluate the wisdom of continuing.

Either way, I won. And I am happy to have done so without having to resort to cursing back in English.

When I get home, Lisa is up. I tell her about the interaction. She starts telling me other things I could have said to him, and I wonder where she learns all her curses. But she agrees that what I said was pretty good. I think I made her a little proud.