매튜의 한국어 연습 블로그

order up. If you met a friend at a restaurant and wanted to ask if he or she already ordered food yet, what verb would you use? "시켰어?" or "주문했어?" Don't they mean the same thing? Let's take a look:

주문하다 (注文)
order, request

시키다
order, command

명령하다 (命令)
order, command, instruct

As you can see, the first two examples both mean virtually the same thing. However, the social position of the speaker and listener must be considered. 시키다 does sound a bit more harsh and carries a more authoritative tone to it than 주문하다 which is just plain jane "to order" as in food. 시키다 has more meaning outside of simply ordering food; it carries the nuance of "to order someone to do something" (명령). 주문하다 does not. Of course, when talking about food, it makes little difference when speaking about yourself:

감자탕을 주문했어요.
감자탕을 시켰어요.
I ordered pork-on-the-bone soup

Furthermore, it might be more common for a socially higher person to use 시키다 to a socially lower person. In the same vein, a socially lower person would prefer to use 주문하다 to a socially higher person. There is a small exception to that, though. When a customer tells a server that they are ready to order, despite possibly being "higher" than the server/waiter, they will almost certainly say 주문할게요 or 주문하겠습니다 and not 시킬게요. Just one of those things.

More examples:

고객님, 주문하신 상품이 도착했습니다.
Sir, the things you ordered have arrived.

오늘 점심을 배달주문할게요.
I'll order in for lunch today.

제가 주문한 음식이 아닌 것 같습니다.
This doesn't seem like what I ordered.

나 대신 점심 좀 시켜줄래?
Can you order lunch for me?

그 애에게 말을 시켜 보세요.
Try to get this kid to talk.

와이프가 나한테 집안일을 시켰어요.
My wife told me to do some housework.

fresh off the heels of just getting comfortable with ~는 대로 I come to find out that it it isn't all that common. In fact, there's a whole nother grammar point that does the exact same thing, ~자마자. So, what's the difference?

~는 대로 is used mostly for things in the future (미래)

~자마자 can be used for all three tenses (과거, 현재, 미래)

So, although 미사를 끝나는 대로 어머님께 전화했어요 (Right after Mass ended, I called mom) is grammatically correct and will be understood, it might be more natural to say 미사를 끝나자마자 어머님께 전화했어요 since it was in the past.

Saying 수업을 끝나자마 밥 먹으러 가자! (right after class is over, let's go get some food) is also fine, but sticking with 수업을 끝는 대로 밥 먹으러 가자 might be better. Keep in mind that they indeed mean the same thing but like my teacher pointed out, 는 대로 might not be as common. How she drew it is on the bottom of this post.

Examples:

화장실을 사용하자마 손을 씻어요
Right after I use the bathroom, I wash my hands.

집에 도착 하자마자 배달 음식을 주문해요
Right after I come home, I order delivery.

새 책을 사자마자 책 안에 내 이름과 구입한 날짜를 써요
Right after I buy a new book, I write my name and purchase date inside.

월급을 받자마자 거의 모든 돈을 와이프에게 줘요.
Right after I get paid, I give almost all my money to my wife.

버스를 타자마자 멀미가 나요
Right after I ride a bus, I get motion sickness.

밥을 다 먹자마자 달콤한 것이 먹고 싶어요.
Right after I finish a meal, I want to eat something sweet.

나쁜말을 하자마자 죄책감이 들어요.
Right after I say bad words, I feel guilty.

Picking right up after the last grammar point about order comes one that I find helpful. If you want to express a sequence of events that implies a direct progression, as in:

"Right after work, I leave immediately for night class" then one can say:
"퇴근하는 대로 수업에 가요".

If you find yourself trying to say "바로 그다음에" in a vain attempt to express something that happens (or happened) right after something, then you've found your new grammar point.

More examples:

과장의 택배를 받는 대로 저에게 연락 해 주세요
Call me when our boss's package arrives

인터넷 요금이 나오는대로 여기에 놓아 주고 보지마세요
When the Internet bill arrives, put it right here and don't look at it

아침 식사를 하는 대로 이를 닦아요
Right after I eat breakfast I brush my teeth

사람들이 모두 도착하는 대로 시작하겠어요
We'll start when everybody arrives

수업이 끝나는 대로 병원에 들릴려요
After class is finished, I'll drop by the hospital on my way home.

다 만드는 대로 먹으려고요
After it's all made, let's eat.

서울에 도착하는 대로 전화해
After you arrive in Seoul, call me

이 책을 다 읽는 대로 빌려 드릴게요
After I'm done reading this book, I'll let you borrow it.


Seems like I have a grasp on things but maybe this grammar point has more than one use to it.

Update: part two of my thoughts on this one. part one.

I get flustered trying to do the whole sequencing thing in Korean. Like all good students, I learned the "후에" grammar point first. As a means of learning more accurate ways to express order, I am introduced to ~고 나서. When A is finished B will happen (or did happen). Instead of saying "퇴근시간 후에 청국장을 먹었어요" one should say "퇴근하고 나서 청국장을 먹었어요". "~고 나서" does not express tense. Whether A and B already happened or they will happen, either way, the connector stays the same. The tense is reflected in the last verb. It's similar to ~고 but 고 does not imply order.

Examples:

밥을 먹고나서 수업을 다닐거예요
After I eat, I'm going to go to class.

형을 전화하고나서 낮잠을 잤어요
After I called my friend, I took a nap

보통 아침 7시에 일어나고서 식사를 해요.
Normally, after I wake up, I eat breakfast.

친구들랑 식사하고 나서 노래방에 갔어요
After I ate with some friends, we went to a 노래방.

It's not a hard grammar point to learn but it doesn't always sound right. The problem is in translating directly from English to Korean. For example, I want to say "After teaching, I'll check" so I think to myself "가르치고나서 확인할게요". Although it seems it would be fine, this is really not very natural to say at all. Unfortunately, the grammar point brought up in this post does not fully apply here, either. Instead, ~면 is more commonly used. Obviously the direct translation of 수업끝나면 확인할게요 is "If class ends, I'll check" the implication is more like "when" instead if "if". But don't we already have a "when" clause?

Confused? Join the club.

Another short but sweet one. This one is something I've been searching for. I have a tendency to use "전에" and "후에" a lot in spoken Korean. However, it's more of a written expression. Using "후에" to express what will happen later isn't the worst thing one can do but it certainly isn't very native sounding. Therefore, the language nerd student rejoiced when I found this. I hope I can adopt it and similar expressions natively.

~고 나서, as you might have guessed, is used when one event has just finished and another is coming. But, how does this differ from vanilla "고" and "아/어서"? Seems we need a brief summary before going on:

(고)
오늘 친구가 만나고 영화 봤어요.
Today I met my friend and I saw a movie (but the friend didn't come with me).
The two events are not related. Both are in the past, though. Sequential order not implied (maybe I met my friend first or maybe I saw a movie first. Doesn't matter because we didn't see the movie together. It's just a recollection of stuff that happened today)

(아/어서)
오늘 친구가 만나서 영화 봤어요.
Today I met my friend and we saw a movie together.
The two events are related in sequential order. First I met my friend, and then we saw a movie.

The "~고 나서" grammar point is similar but has a vital difference. In this case, the first event (A) is already finished before the second event (B) will take place. The book I'm using gives a great example:

스티브는 저녁을 먹고 나서 도서관에 가서 공부를 해요.
After Steve eats dinner, he goes to the library to study.

Let's take a look at some other examples:
A: 언제 숙제 했어요? when did you do your homework?
B: 점심 먹고 나서 했어요. I did it after lunch, jerky.

A: 샤워 하고 나서 여친한테 전화 할 거야 After I take a shower, I'll call my girlfriend

Actually, I'm not super confident with the last grammar point. someone correct me.