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Word Builder lessons are designed to help you understand how to expand your vocabulary by learning/understanding some common and basic building blocks of Korean words. The words and letters introduced through Word Builder lessons are not necessarily all Chinese characters, or 한자 [han-ja]. Though many of them are based on Chinese characters, the meanings can be different from modern-day Chinese. Your goal, through these lessons, is to understand how words are formed and remember the keywords in Korean to expand your Korean vocabulary from there.  You certainly don’t have to memorize the Hanja characters, but if you want to, feel free!

In this lesson, we are looking at the word 과 [gwa]. When 과 is written in Hanja as “過”, it means “to surpass”, “to go over”,  “to pass” or “too much”.

과 (to surpass, too much) + 식 (eat) = 과식 過食 [gwa-sik] = eating too much, overeating

과 (to surpass, too much) + 음 (drink) = 과음 過飮 [gwa-eum] = drinking too much, excessive drinking

과 (to surpass, too much) + 속 (to be fast) = 과속 過速 [gwa-sok] = speeding

통 (to go through) + 과 (to pass) = 통과 通過 [tong-gwa] = pass, passing through, passing (a test)

간 (to see) + 과 (to pass) = 간과 看過 [gan-gwa] = failure to notice, passing over

과 (too much) + 민 (agile, quick) = 과민 過敏 [gwa-min] = being hypersensitive

과 (too much) + 로 (labor) = 과로 過勞 [gwa-ro] = working too much, too much labor

과 (to pass) + 거 (to go) = 과거 過去 [gwa-geo] = the past

과 (to surpass, too much) + 대 (to be big) = 과대 過大 [gwa-dae] = too big, over-sized

과 (to pass) + 정 (way, limit) = 과정 過程 [gwa-jeong] = process

과 (to surpass, too much) + 소비 (consumption) = 과소비 過消費 [gwa-so-bi] = overspending, excessive consumption

과 (too much) + 신 (to believe) = 과신 過信 [gwa-sin] = overconfidence