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I am studying Kyunghee Listening and there is an advertisement in the book that looks like this:

예쁜 딸아이에게 보고 싶다는 말을 하지 마세요. 따뜻한 밥을 차려 준 아내에게 고맙다는 전화도 하지 마세요 [...]아무것도 하지 마세요. 오직, 운전만 하세요. 세상 그 어떤 아름다운 말도 당신 없인 무의미하기 때문입니다. 사랑한다면 오직 운전만 하세요

This passage is confusing to me for 2 reasons:

First: What does the phrase "오직, 운전만 하세" mean? I know in Korean, "운전" means "driving", but when attached it to this phrase, I found it not very suitable.

Second: In the phrase "세상 그 어떤 이름다운 말도 당신 없인 무의미하기 때문입니다", "없인" is "없이", right? As far as I know, "없이" is an adverb, not verb, so why was the author able to turn it into "없인"? I hope to receive help from you. Thank you!

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  • It is a way of encouraging people to drive safely. 'only drive' = 'concentrate / pay attention / stay focused while driving'
    – Coconut
    Commented Dec 22, 2020 at 19:11

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As for your second question, 없인 is simply the contracted form of 없이는. This kind of contraction can be done any time you use 는 if the preceding syllable ends in a vowel.

운전 does mean drive, so "오직, 운전만 하세요" means "Just drive" or "Only drive." The meaning of this text seems to be: There are important people in your life, and just saying nice things to them without you actually being there is meaningless, so you should drive (presumably to be with them). I'm guessing this is an advertisement encouraging people to focus on driving carefully, or possibly an advertisement for a car.

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  • Thanks for your help. Sorry but can you translate the sentence "세상 그 어떤 이름다운 말도 당신 없인 무의미하기 때문입니다" into English? And let me ask one more problem: That is as far as I know, 당신 is a word used only between couples and is rarely used with strangers, why does it appear in this sentence?
    – Thai Trinh
    Commented Dec 22, 2020 at 15:39
  • My attempt: "It's because those beautiful words are meaningless in the world without you."
    – kaylimekay
    Commented Dec 22, 2020 at 16:07
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    @ThaiTrinh 당신 is used between couples, but also in formal situations to mean "you." It's very common to see in advertisements, for example.
    – kaylimekay
    Commented Dec 22, 2020 at 16:09

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