🇰🇷 Korean Origins #96
Idiomatic expressions
눈독 들이다
to eye something covetously, keeping a greedy watch on it
From fixing on something a gaze charged with greed — the "venom (毒) of the eye," a stare steeped in desire.
✍️ ONGO · 2026-06-06 · 5 min read
01

Origin Story

Era
A gaze that halts before something it covets

The nundok in nundok deurida means the charged force of a gaze brimming with greed. The dok here is not so much venom like a snake's as the thick, sharp intensity that hangs in a stare fixed hard on something. In Korean, a powerful working of the mind is often expressed as dok. When you want something so badly that your heart leans toward it, the first thing to change is your eyes: you cannot tear them off the object, and you keep glancing at it, watching for a chance. To "set" (deurida) that covetous gaze upon a target is precisely nundok deurida. So the phrase means not merely looking, but watering at the mouth with want and biding your time to seize the thing.

Korean has many phrases that lodge a strong emotion in the eyes — "to light a fire in one's eyes," "to light double wicks in one's eyes." Nundok springs from the same instinct, giving the feeling of greed a shape as the force behind a gaze.

02

Meaning Evolution

1
Original meaning
The intense force of a greed-laden gaze — that is, nundok itself.
2
Derived meaning
Fixing that covetous gaze on a target and watching it intently.
3
Modern usage
Coveting something and keeping a watchful eye on it, waiting for a chance.
03

How It Is Used

My younger sibling has had their eye on (nundok deurida) my new shoes.

There's a rumor that the company has its eye on (nundok deurida) our technology.

The child gazed longingly (nundok deurida) at the cake in the display case.

04

Related Words

군침 흘리다
A related expression (literally "to drool"), since it too means coveting and eyeing something.
눈여겨보다
A related word for watching closely, but with far less of the greed.
호시탐탐
A four-character idiom that aligns with it — lying in wait for a chance.
05

Memory Hook

Picture that intense stare you can't pull off something you want — the "venomous gaze."

"Greed first releases its venom into the gaze."

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