Favorite Words 3: Korean

우울하다 (uulhada "be glum") seems almost perfect to me. Actually, oo-ool-hada is probably a clearer way of transliterating it. (The verb 하다 [hada "to make or do"] is a common suffix that turns nouns into verbs.) It can't just be me who sees in this word a gloomy owl drooping on a branch, hooting into the lonely night. You see it, too, don't you? I think it might be impossible to forget this word. To my ears, it doesn't have an especially Korean feel, so I guess I have to take off a few points, but it still scores very highly.