回顧星期天LBS - 南韓相關時事趣聞 All about South Korea

通勤學英語 15Mins Today

Topic: Chip shortage hitting Korean carmakers

The continued automotive semiconductor shortage is hitting Korean carmakers, with General Motors Korea announcing plans to halve its vehicle production at its plant here.

隨著「韓國通用汽車」宣布旗下車廠減半其汽車產量的計畫，車用半導體持續短缺，正衝擊南韓車商。

GMK said Thursday it decided to halve production at its Bupyeong 2 plant for February. The plant has a daily production capacity of 480 vehicles ― the cut will lead it to monthly production of around 5,000.

韓國通用汽車週四決定其（仁川）「富平2廠」的產量減半。該廠每日產能480輛─此一減產將致使其每月產量為約5000輛。

Analysts say it is tough to say exactly how long the automotive chip shortage could last, while UBS investment bank said it was expecting the supply-demand mismatch will improve sometime in the third quarter.

分析師說，很難講車用晶片荒究竟可能會延續多久。瑞銀投資銀行則表示，其預計供需失衡的情況將在第三季某個時刻得到改善。

Next Article

Biden’s focus on rebuilding allies to impact Korea-US relations 拜登聚焦重建與盟邦關係 將影響韓美關係

President Joe Biden’s attention to "repairing alliances" has raised hopes that things between South Korea and U.S. will be different under the new U.S. leader.

（美國）總統拜登關注「修補同盟」，已提高韓美間的情況將在這位美國新領袖下有所不同的希望。

"This will involve reaching an agreement on Special Measures Agreement negotiations fairly quickly, taking South Korea’s views on North Korea into consideration even if Seoul’s and Washington’s positions are different, cooperation in multilateral issues such as climate change or trade, and trying to get the Moon Jae-in government on board his administration’s position on China," Ramon Pacheco Pardo, who serves as associate professor of international relations at King’s College London.

倫敦國王學院國際關係副教授拉蒙‧巴奇可‧帕爾多說，「這將包括很快會就（分攤駐韓美軍經費的）『特別措施協定』達成協議。即使首爾與華府的立場不同，仍將南韓對北韓的看法納入考量。在氣候變遷或貿易之類的多邊議題上合作。還有試著使（南韓總統）文在寅政府加入拜登政府對中國的立場」。

"I would also expect Biden to support South Korea becoming part of an expanded G7 or similar forum, and supporting a more vocal Seoul in international relations," added Pardo.

帕爾多還說，「我也預料拜登將支持南韓躋身一個擴大的『七大工業國』或類似論壇的成員，並支持一個在國際關係上更勇於發聲的首爾」。

Source article: https://features.ltn.com.tw/english/article/paper/1430611 ; https://features.ltn.com.tw/english/article/paper/1422097

Next Article

Topic: Internet Explorer gravestone goes viral in South Korea

For Jung Ki-young, a South Korean software engineer, Microsoft Corp’s decision to retire its Internet Explorer web browser marked the end of a quarter-century love-hate relationship with the technology.

對南韓軟體工程師鄭其永（譯音）來說，微軟公司讓它的「網際網路探險家（IE）」網路瀏覽器退休的決定，代表著與這項科技愛恨交織四分之一個世紀的關係的結束。

To commemorate its demise, he spent a month and 430,000 won designing and ordering a headstone with Explorer’s "e" logo and the English epitaph: "He was a good tool to download other browsers."

為了紀念IE的隕落，他花了一個月和43萬韓元設計並訂製一個墓碑，上面有IE的「e」的商標，以及英文的墓誌銘：「他是個用來下載其他瀏覽器的好工具」。

After the memorial went on show at a cafe run by his brother in the southern city of Gyeongju, a photo of the tombstone went viral.

這個紀念碑在南方城市慶州由他的兄弟所經營的一家咖啡館展出後，墓碑的照片在網路上爆紅。

Jung said the memorial showed his mixed feelings for the older software, which had played such a big part in his working life.

鄭其永說，這個紀念碑顯示出他對這款在他的工作生活中發揮了重大作用的古老軟體的複雜感情。

"It was a pain in the ass, but I would call it a love-hate relationship because Explorer itself once dominated an era," he told Reuters.

他告訴路透：「它是個令人厭煩的東西，但我會稱之為愛恨交織的關係，因為探險家一度主導一個時代」。

Source article: https://features.ltn.com.tw/english/article/paper/1528843 ; https://features.ltn.com.tw/english/article/paper/595260

Next Article

Topic: South Korean toilet turns excrement into power and digital currency

Cho Jae-weon, an urban and environmental engineering professor at the Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology（UNIST）, has designed an eco-friendly toilet connected to a laboratory that uses excrement to produce biogas and manure.

南韓國立蔚山科學技術研究院的都市和環境工程教授趙宰元（譯音），設計出一種環境友善的馬桶，可透過與一間實驗室連線，將糞便製造成生物沼氣和肥料。

The BeeVi toilet - a portmanteau of the words bee and vision - uses a vacuum pump to send faeces into an underground tank, reducing water use. There, microorganisms break down the waste to methane, which becomes a source of energy for the building, powering a gas stove, hot-water boiler and solid oxide fuel cell.

這個馬桶名為BeeVi，為蜜蜂和視野的英文字詞的混成詞。它用真空幫浦將排泄物送至地下儲存槽，以減少用水。槽內的微生物將排泄物分解成沼氣，進而為大樓提供電力，點燃瓦斯爐、熱水器，以及做為固態氧化物燃料電池的燃料。

An average person defecates about 500g a day, which can be converted to 50 litres of methane gas. This gas can generate 0.5kWh of electricity or be used to drive a car for about 1.2km.

每人每天平均排便500公克，可轉換成50升沼氣，進而產生0.5千瓦時的電力，使汽車行進約1.2公里。

Next Article

Why Koreans could soon become a year younger 為什麼韓國人可能即將年輕1歲

"How old are you"? It’s a simple question with a clear answer. But for those in South Korea, answering this question is anything but straightforward.

「你幾歲？」這是答案很清楚的簡單問題，但是對南韓人來說，回答這個問題一點也不簡單。

In South Korea, when a baby is born they are considered a year old. Come New Year’s Day, they gain another year. This means a baby born in December would be considered to be two years old in just a few weeks.

在南韓，寶寶一出生就被認為已經1歲。到了新年，他們又多了1歲。這意味著，12月出生的寶寶，僅僅幾週就會被認為已經2歲大。

But this "Korean age" method may soon change as the country’s president-elect Yoon Suk-yeol is pushing for this centuries-old method of counting to be abolished.

不過，這種「韓國年紀」算法或許即將改變，因為該國總統當選人尹錫悅正推動廢除這種已有幾世紀之久的年齡計算法。

Lee Yong-ho, the chief of the president-elect’s transition committee, said the incoming administration was looking to standardise the way age is counted in order to bring South Korea in line with the rest of the world.

總統當選人交接委員會主席李勇浩說，即將上任的新政府正準備將計算年齡方式標準化，讓南韓與世界其他地方一致。Soure article: https://news.ltn.com.tw/news/world/paper/1485239 ; https://features.ltn.com.tw/english/article/paper/1517919