#竹 radical

[kanjiexplained]

Kanji of the day: 笑

笑 - Laugh

Kun: わら.う、え.む On: ショウ (Pinyin: xiào | xiao4 )

This one is REALLY fun!

Pictophonetic: 夭 indicates the sound (pinyin yāo | yao1), so you'd expect ⺮ / 竹 (bamboo) to somehow indicate the meaning... But it doesn't! 竹 holds no pictophonetic purpose in this kanji. How did this happen?

Originally, the kanji was a pictophonetic kanji composed of 艸 to indicate the sound (cǎo | cao3), and 犭/ 犬 (dog) to indicate the meaning:

(笑 as it was written during early Western Han dynasty (ca. 160 - 170 BC), note the simple 艸 on top and the early dog radical that later turned into 犭. It's unsure why "dog" is meant to indicate the meaning, whether it's because of their smiling appearance, a reaction to their presence, or lost context.)

While 竹 and 艸 are very different in appearance today, in early seal script they were very similar and some writers used them interchangably in shorthand due to similar meanings. So people started writing it with ⺮ / 竹 instead of 艹 / 艸.

(笑 as it was written during Eastern Han dynasty (25 - 220 AD), with little distinction between ⺮ and 艹 at the time )

When this became the standard writing, it became a massive problem - now you had a pictophonetic kanji with NO phonetic information! The phonetic information is the most important one, now the kanji was essentially meaningless!

It was around this time people started using 夭 instead of 犬, most likely because it felt like the more correct writing as while 笑 didn't hold any clear meaning indicator, at least 夭 sounded like 笑.

So here we are, the phonetic components switched places and the current supposed meaning component is an impostor. VERY fun!

Strokes: 10 Radical: 竹 bamboo

[daily-hyosatsu]

A beautiful and interesting name I'd never seen before! 善如寺 is read Zennyōji or Zennyoji. It belongs to only about 480 people, but all the kanji are quite useful!

善 can be read よ.い, い.い, よ.く, よし.とする, or ゼン. It means virtue, goodness, or good. Specifically, it means good as in morally good, or good in an elevated context; for everyday normal things that are pleasant or agreeable, use 良い (also read よ.い or い.い).

如 means in the manner of, like, or the same as. It's read ごと.し, ジョ, or ニョ.

寺 is read てら or ジ. It's the reason that, for a second, I assumed that this house was a very, very boring-looking temple. (More on actual temple and shrine names here.)

Also, 寺 is useful as a radical too!

侍 (+亻person) = Samurai

待 (+ 彳 going-person) = Wait

持 (+ 扌 hand) = Hold, have

詩 (+ 言 word) = Poem, poetry

特 (+ 牛 cow) = Special

時 (+ 日 day) = Time

痔 (+ 疒 sickness) = Hemorrhoids

等 (+ 竹 bamboo) = Etc.

[itaiikawaii]

here's a fun little thing: kanji that I keep mixing up in wanikani! (some of these may seem very different, but because in wk they are studied at the same time they get mixed up...)

他 地 他　on:ほか｜kun:た ＝ other 地　on:ち　＝ world

海 毎 毋 海　on:かい｜kun:うみ ＝ sea 毎　on:まい｜kun:ごと ＝ every 毋　on:ぶ｜kun:はは ＝ don't

夫 未 末 末　on:まつ｜kun:すえ ＝ not yet 未　on:み｜kun:いま ＝ end

礼 札 礼　on:れい　＝ thanks 札　on:さつ ＝ (money) bill

通 辺 通　on:つう　＝ pass through 辺　on:へん　＝ side

竹 村 竹　on:たけ｜kun:ちく ＝ bamboo (radical bamboo) 村　on:そん｜kun:むら ＝ village (radical tree + ceremony)

米 来 米　on:こめ｜kun:べい ＝ rice 来　on:らい｜kun:く ＝ come

半 平 半　on:はん｜kun: ＝ half 平　on:へい｜kun: たい flat

欠 次 欠　on:けつ｜kun:か ＝ lack 次　on:じ・し｜kun:つ ＝ next

孝 考 孝　on:こう＝ teacher 考　on:こう｜kun:かんが・え = thought

also some vocabulary:

上る　上げる　上げる 上る　のぼる = to go up/to climb 上げる　あげる = to raise something up 上がる　あがる = to go up/be raised

大文字　太字 大文字　おおもじ＝Capital Letter 太字　ふとじ＝bold letter

[konjaku]

黄花秋桐[Kibanaakigiri] Salvia nipponica

黄[Ki] : Yellow

花[-bana|Hana] : Flower

秋桐[Akigiri] : S. glabrescens

When I see this flower, it reminds me of the face of Kiyohime chasing Anchin while spitting fire in Dōjōji engi emaki(Illustrated legend of Dōjōji). And, when I see the name of this plant written in kanji, it reminds me of the name of a person.

Since kanjis are pictographs, namely, characters based on pictures, people who use kanjis in their native language recognize those forms and take meaning from them, will be able to understand the meaning of simple ones without properly looking at every detail. For example, 日[Hi] is sun, 月[Tsuki] is moon, 川[Kawa] is river, 竹[Take] is bamboo, 鳥[Tori] is bird, 馬[Uma] is horse, 亀[Kame](old kanji is 龜) is turtle and so on. But, on the other hand, it often also leads to misreadings.

Some may not realize that 薇[Zenmai](Royal fern) is not just a written 艸[Kusakanmuri](Grass radical) on ��[Bi](Minuteness). Some may read taiheiyō(太平洋, Pacific Ocean) even if it is written as 大平洋 or taiseiyō(大西洋, Atlantic Ocean) as 太西洋. This would happen because 大(Large, great) and 太(Fat, grand) are close in shape and meaning. Nevertheless, if they are written as 犬平洋 or 犬西洋, 犬[Inu](Dog) has a very different meaning even though the letters are similar, the number of people misreading them will be greatly decreased.

Now, the person I recall is 桐野 利秋[Kirino Toshiaki] because two of the four kanjis are the same. This is probably also to recognize the form of the kanjis. In additon, 野[No](Field) also plays a part, evoking the image of nature.

He lived from the end of the Edo period to the late Meiji period and became one of the first major generals of the Japanese Army. He was once known as a skilled assassin, but his face in the photographs that remain today does not look like that. In fact, he is said to have had a cheerful disposition. He was killed in the Seinan War on September 24, 1877, by a bullet, at the age of 38. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Hitokiri_of_the_Bakumatsu https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satsuma_Rebellion

[queenlorea]

going insane over the realisation that the Chinese character for dragon ( lóng 龙 in Simplified; 龍 in Traditional) is the “root”/“base” (own words idk what the linguistics terms would be) word for the Chinese character for cage (lóng 笼/籠).* The only difference is the 竹字头 (heading) which is a Chinese radical that translates to “bamboo.”**

thinking about dragons in chinese myth— creatures of the sea and sky, their cries the thunder that shakes rain loose from from the heavens and sends it crashing to the earth below. all the rivers and seas and lakes are their domain.

and Chinese monarchs associated dragons with power and sovereignty and the mandate of heaven,,, the Emperor is the dragon god emperor on earth who would question his will? what is mightier than a dragon

but take a dragon and put a bamboo crown (grown from the ground) on it and now the dragon is locked up confined,, trapped,, the trappings of power,,, dragons are of the sea and sky but what becomes of them when bound to this earth?

*that the two words are pronounced in exactly the same tone and the same pinyin blows my mind. who did this will the og Chinese writer philosopher please stand up

** edited because i got grass and bamboo radicals mixed Up

[gwendolynlerman]

Common radicals

After seeing this post by @don-dake (which was very helpful for me to learn the different forms radicals can take), I decided to write one myself about the following radicals (部首, bùshǒu):

(The ones in the picture are traditional characters, but I use simplified characters in this post.)

哲理类 (zhélǐlèi) - philosophical category

日 (rì) - day, sun

月 (yuè) - moon

金 (jīn) - gold

木 (mù) - wood

水 (shuǐ) - water

火 (huǒ) - fire

土 (tǔ) - earth

笔画类 (bǐhuàlèi) - stroke category

竹 (zhú) - bamboo

戈 (gē) - halberd

十 (shí) - ten

大 (dà) - big

中 (zhōng) - middle

一 (yī) - one

弓 (gōng) - bow

人体类 (réntǐlèi) - human body category

人 (rén) - person

心 (xīn) - heart

手 (shǒu) - hand

口 (kǒu) - mouth

字形类 (zìxínglèi) - typographic category

尸 (shī) - corpse

廿 (niàn) - twenty

山 (shān) - mountain

女 (nǚ) - woman

田 (tián) - field

卜 (bo) - to predict

难子 (nánzi) - difficult words

难 (nán) - disaster

[I haven't been able to find some of the characters (neither in their traditional or simplified forms) in this category, and I'm not sure whether the ones I've found are the right ones, so if anybody could enlighten me, I would be very grateful 🥺]

齐 (qí) - identical

龟 (guī) - turtle, tortoise

臼 (jiù) - mortar

渊 (yuān) - abism

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昍 (xuān) - brilliant

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身 (shē) - body

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[don-dake]

倉頡 Cangjie's rules, explained in pictures.

Great supplement for my earlier post, especially for people who don't do so well with text-heavy posts.

↑ Single component character (first 3 & last radicals)

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↑ Two components character (first & last, first 2 & last)

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↑ Three components character (first & last, first & last, last)

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↑ Fixed exceptions (quote from Wikipedia: “Some forms are always decomposed in the same way, whether the rules say they should be decomposed this way or not. The number of such exceptions is small.”)

e.g.: 門's input is always just 日弓，and not say…中日日弓，despite it looking like it should be that.

n.b. on e.g.: In a character like say…贏，the 吂 part is always inputted as 卜口, even though it looks like it should be 卜女口.

2nd n.b. on e.g.: In a character like 鬼，depending on your Cangjie keyboard version, it could be inputted as 竹戈 or 竹山戈，but I think most keyboards are now improved enough to make up for the differences — mine does at least! Whether I type 竹戈 or 竹山戈，the 鬼 character would turn up within the first two options for me.

↑ 難 (X) key components

[Video Ref] (in Cantonese)

[mykanji-a-day]

算

※   サン

※   そろ

※   calculate, probability, abacus, number, divining

計算 • けいさん • calculation, reckoning, count; forecast

公算 • こうさん • probability, likelihood

算数 • さんすう • arithmetic

[zaobitouguang]

活著 (To Live) Vocabulary: Pages 90-100

惦記 (diànjì): to think of, remember with concern

- The context for this word is pretty illustrative. Youqing has two sheep that he cares for deeply, but they're taken away when the village becomes a people's commune. Youqing often thinks of (惦記) his sheep and is worried that they will be slaughtered for meat.

弓背 (gōngbèi): to hunch over, stoop

- The character 弓 means "bow" (as in bow and arrows), but also refers to anything bent like a bow and can be used as a verb.

抱拳 (bàoquán): to cup one's fist in the other hand

- This is a respectful gesture performed in front of the chest. The non fist hand can be either held straight or bent around the fist.

敗家子 (bàijiāzǐ): wastrel, spendthrift, prodigal son

- You can tell that I've made progress in this book by the fact that this word isn't being used to disparage Fugui. Fugui briefly considers himself a 敗家子 for not wanting to volunteer his home to be demolished in order to construct a furnace there, leading one of his neighbors' homes to be demolished instead.

災禍 (zāihuò): disaster, calamity, catastrophe

- 災 and words containing it are often used to describe natural disasters, but in this case the disaster is man-made (the demolition of the neighbor's house).

餿主意 (sōuzhǔyì): stupid suggestion, lousy idea

- In order to say that someone is coming up with or proposing a 餿主意, you use the verb 出 chū.

竹竿 (zhúgān): bamboo pole

- This word mostly refers to cut, dead bamboo used for things like flagpoles, carrying poles or construction.

硬梆梆 (yìngbāngbāng): very hard, stiff

- This word has two forms: 硬梆梆 and 硬邦邦. The latter seems to be the more common form, at least in simplified characters, but the first is what my stubborn keyboard will type.

咩 (miē): baah, bleat

- The noise that a sheep makes! It's a brilliantly simple character, combining "mouth" and "sheep". Most other animal sounds don't do the same, instead using "mouth" as the meaning radical and another character for sound.

巨響(jùxiǎng): loud sound

- I learned through this word that the measure word for sounds is 聲 shēng, a word that also just means "sound".

[shimyereh]

I was just thinking about how Spanish pluma and Russian перо/pero are both “pen”, but more literally “feather”. I checked the etymology of English “pen”, and — yup, it does come from a Latin root meaning “feather” (penna). Quill pens were a thing for a long time, weren’t they.

Meanwhile, Mandarin has 笔/bǐ, which contains the radicals for “bamboo” (竹) and “hair” (毛) — components of a writing brush.

[daily-hyosatsu]

Some very minimalist (and lovely) restaurant calligraphy today. The surname 竹田 is usually read Takeda, rarely Taketa or Chikuda. It belongs to about 87,400 people. (Which sounded kind of low to me, but then I remembered that there's another name read Takeda that's about twice as common: 武田, covered here, which belongs to about 193,000.)

竹 is read たけor チク, and it means bamboo. Look out for it as a top radical. Some common examples: 笹 bamboo grass, 筍 bamboo shoot, 篠 dwarf bamboo, 箸 chopsticks, 筆 calligraphy brush, 箱 box, 笑 laugh, 等 etc., 筋 muscle/fiber, and 築 build,

田 means rice paddy/field. It’s read た or デン.

[fineillsignup]

some more Chinese OC names and how I chose them

Because some people learn best by example, and because I could literally talk about the worlds inside my head for hours... in fact, huh. By writing them out into stories, that’s more or less what I’ve done, now that I think about it. If you read my completed novel Clouds and Rain, based on its word count of roughly 200k, essentially you’ve consumed the equivalent of me blathering at you for over twenty-four continuous hours. Neat!

I’ll skip the names that I went over either in a story or in my earlier Chinese names posts.

These are all characters for the Three Kingdoms era of Chinese history and therefore you’ll notice pretty quickly that I’ve gone for single character male names and mostly dual character female names. It’s not that the opposite didn’t occur, but the pattern in what survives tends to be like that, and I wanted my OCs to blend in. Also, my choice of what I named them was, mostly, intended to blend in to an ancient setting. But that doesn’t mean they wouldn’t be fine in a modern setting per se, and I’ve added some thoughts to that end sometimes.

female OCs:

周天華 Zhou Tianhua - heaven, sky / splendour, grandeur, China

As a modern name, with apologies to people actually named this (they’re out there!), this could be considered a bit in your face and tacky. Hua is a poetic yet very common term for China and Chinese-ness and it’s hard to think of an equivalent in English that is equally well-known. “Albion” is certainly not well-known or -used enough. Hua is used to stand in for China in loads of common phrases; in particular, it tends to mean “China, the culture” as opposed to “China, the nation-state” in terms like 華僑 huaqiao (Chinese diaspora).

Girls tended to get tacky name in ancient times (lol). Tacky is not necessarily bad! This name is over the top because the parents love their girl so much and are full of hope for the future. I’m soft.

趙閃臨 Zhao Shanlin - lightning / approaches

Can I be stopped from giving girls totally frickin’ rad names? No. I cannot. Don’t try me.

馬應啟 Ma Yingqi - answer, respond / open, beginning

Another hopeful name that looks to the future.

關梅榮 Guan Meirong - plum / flourishes, grows well

The mother’s surname is Li, which is also a word for plum, and the mother and her clan had, uh, some hard times, without spoiling things. In Chinese art symbolism, the plum tree, which blossoms while it is still cold, is a symbol of triumph through adversity.

夏侯蓮 Xiahou Lian - lotus

The lotus, as a flower of the water, which blooms with such beauty from such darkness, which can float on the dirtiest water without being marred by it, is a symbol of perseverance. Plus, y’know, flowers are pretty.

male OCs:

劉達 Liu Da - reaches, attains, understands

Liu Bei’s personal name means “prepare”, so I gave all his sons names with the radical “to walk” meaning that their father had done the preparation, now they have to take it forward. This character “da” is also an extremely important word in various Chinese ancient philosophies such as Confucianism in regards to understanding.

劉通 Liu Tong - connect

Same “walking” radical as the previous, same values as previous, for a younger brother of the previous.

張璞 Zhang Pu - uncut jade

Pu is one of those unfortunate sounds that I feel like mayyyyybe I should avoid??? Should I assume my readers are twelve and can’t hear a character from another culture called Pu without dying of giggling??? I don’t know??? I genuinely like this name!

敘瞻 Xu Zhan - look far, look up

Another hopeful name. (If you were thinking you were going to get pessimistic names, you’ve come to the wrong place.)

關竹 Guan Zhu - bamboo

In Chinese art symbolism, bamboo is modest, honourable, loyal, and elegant.

法奠 Fa Dian - establish, commemorate

His father was feeling very satisfied with how things were going. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

[asiaticfanaticblog-blog]

Kanji Conundrums

The premise of this post would've made the title too squished so here it is: this post will mention a few pairs of words that have different readings/ definitions, but use the same kanji as each other. Duos like 王国/ 国王 are being excluded, as this post is only about words that use the same kanji in the same order, and 美味しい, 美味い, and 美味, seeing as they have okurigana to distinguish the three. With that out of the way, I hope this post is a pleasant read.

辛い (つらい and からい)

This duo's particularly fun, since both words are relatively commonplace, so for new learners who only know one or the other, it might be quite confusing. However, since つらい means "painful/ difficult (for situations)" and からい means spicy, the words aren't likely to be mixed up given context (which fortunately holds true for all of these sets of words).

空く (あく and すく)

These words have similar meanings, but are used in different contexts. あく is usually used to indicate a space is empty or vacant, or if (mostly a time) is free/ available. すく, on the other hand, is to get less crowded or get empty, but most importantly is used to say one’s hungry. The differences between these two verbs make them probably the trickiest to distinguish pair on this list in my opinion.

人気 (にんき, ひとけ, and じんき)

The only trio of words on this list, にんき’s lesser-known siblings are here to make their appearances. While every beginner knows にんき means popular/ popularity, the other two words aren’t quite as helpful. ひとけ means “signs of life, human presence” and じんけ means “the dominant mood of a local, the emotional climate of a district.”

下手 (へた and しもて）

へた is a rather common word, but like several others on this list, it has both an irregular reading and a conventional one, both of which mean different things. へた means “unskillful,” while しもて means “the lower part/ lower direction,” and “stage right.”

上手 (じょうず, うわて, and かみて)

じょうず mirrors its opposite へた, since it means skillful and also has another reading, うわて, which refers to stage directions (in this case, stage right). However, the reading かみて has its own niche, meaning both “the upper part,” and “upper stream.”

心中 (しんちゅう and しんじゅう)

An amusing set of words to share kanji, the two words of this pair have radically different meanings. しんちゅう means one’s true intentions/ motives (or literally in one’s heart), while しんじゅう refers to a lover’s/ double suicide. 

罪人 (つみびと and ざいにん)

While most kanji compunds that can be read with either the kun’yomi of both kanji or the on’yomi of both kanji have exactly the same meaning regardless of readings (like 悪口 and 竹林), 罪人 stands as a bizarre exception. つみびと means a sinner, and ざいにん means a criminal. I remember which is which because the reading ざい for 罪 is used in other crime-related words like 犯罪, while 罪 read as つみ on its own means sin.

木馬 (もくば and きうま/ きんま)

These are two relatively obscure words, which I suppose justifies them both having the same kanji without any okurigana or otherwise to distinguish them. もくば means a wooden/ rocking horse, a vaulting horse (used in gymnastics), or the wooden torture device “the horse.” きうま (or きんま, they’re interchangeable readings), however, means a wooden sledge. 

A  Bonus Entry:

切手 (きって and きれて)

きって is a staple word, but rather unexpectedly has a more obscure relative. きれて means “a man of great ability/ talent,” but can also be written 切れ手, and tends to be to avoid confusion. Because きれて being written as 切手 is irregular, it only gets this honorable mention slot.

This is a topic I’ve wanted to cover for a while, but I left the draft, incomplete and neglected, to sit for a while before finishing it up. Thanks for reading!

[skyflyinginaction]

Assassination classroom: Class E classmates name meanings

In case if you didn’t know if I didn’t add the names its because I didn’t know what kanji with hiragana and katakana to use for there names

Yūma Isogai 磯貝 悠馬 Yuu (悠) means "distant, leisurely,permanence” ma (馬) means “horse” Iso (磯) means “seashore” gai (貝) is an abbreviation of “kai” means “shellfish”

Taiga Okajima 岡島 大河 Tai (大) means large or big and ga (河) is an abbreviation of ka means “river” together means “big river” Oka (岡) means “hill” jima(島) is the abbreviation of shima means “island”

Hinata Okano 岡野 ひなた Oka (岡) means “hill” and no means “an area, field”

Manami Okuda 奥田 愛美 mana (愛) means “love, affection” and mi (美) means "beauty" together means “affectionate love” oku (奥) means “inside,inner depths,one's heart, true feelings, heart, interior” and da (田) means “rice paddy”

Megu Kataoka 片岡 メグ Kata (片) means “one part of a pair” oka (岡) means “hill”.

Yukiko Kanzaki 神崎 有希子 Yu (有) means “possession” ki (希) means “hope” and ko (子) means “child” Kan (神) means “a deity or god” and zaki (崎) the abbreviation of saki means “peninsula; promontory; cape; spit”

Masayoshi Kimura 木村 正義 Masayoshi (正義) means “justice” in kanji his real name Justice so the kanji is used to fit it. Ki (木) means “tree” and mura (村) means “village”

Hinano Kurahashi 倉橋 陽菜乃 Hi (陽) means “the sun”, na (菜) means "vegetables, greens" and no (乃) is “a possessive particle” means “of” Kura (倉) means ”Storehouse”and hashi (橋) means “bridge”

Sōsuke Sugaya 菅谷 創介 So (創) means "genesis, hurt, injury, originate, start, wound" and suke (介) means "concern oneself with, jammed in, mediate, shellfish”. Suge (菅) means “sedge” and ya (谷) means “valley”.

Tomohito Sugino 杉野 友人 Tomo (友) means “friend” and hito (人) means “person” Sugi (杉) means “a Japanese cedar” and no (野) means “an area, field”

Kōtarō Takebayashi 竹林 孝太郎 Ko (孝) means “filial piety,mourning” and taro (太郎) means “eldest son or strong, heroic, masculine” used at the end of boys names Take (竹) means “bamboo” and bayashi (林) is the is the abbreviation of hayashi means “woods”

Ryūnosuke Chiba 千葉 龍之介 Ryu (龍) means "dragon”,no (之) means “a possessive marker” and suke (介) means "forerunner, herald" Chi (千) means “thousand” and ba (葉) the abbreviation of ha means “leaf” all together means "thousand leaves"

Ryōma Terasaka 寺坂 竜馬 Ryo (竜) means “dragon”, ma (馬) means “horse” together means “Dragon and horse” Tera (寺) means “a Buddhist temple”, saka (坂) means “slope, hill”

Rio Nakamura 中村 莉桜 Ri (莉) means "white jasmine" o (桜) means "cherry blossom" Naka (中) means “middle” and mura (村) means “village”

Kirara Hazama 狭間 綺羅々 Ki (綺) means “thin twilled silk fabric”, ra (羅) means “lightweight fabric” and ra (々) is a repeater of ra Kirara means something that is “like twinkle or something shiny” (キララ) Hazu (狭) means “cramped, narrow, contract, tight” and ma (間) means “space and room”

Rinka Hayami 速水 凛香 Rin (凛) means “dignified,severe, cold” and ka (香) means “a pleasant smell; a scent, a fragrance, an aroma” Haya (速) means “fast, speedy” and mi (水) means “water”

Sumire Hara 原 寿美鈴 Su (寿) means “longevity, long life,congratulations”, mi (美) means “beauty” and re (鈴) means “a bell, chime” Hara (原) means “meadow, plain, field”

Yuzuki Fuwa 不破 優月 Yu means “tenderness, excel, surpass, actor, superiority, gentleness” and zuki means “moon” together means “Tender moon”. Fu means “un-; non-; negative prefix” and wa means “break,cut”

Hiroto Maehara 前原 陽斗 Hiro means “the sun” and to means “Big Dipper, ten sho (vol), sake dipper, dots and cross radical (no. 68) ” Mae means “the front” and Hara (原) means “meadow, plain, field”

Kōki Mimura 三村 航輝 Ko (航) means “navigate, sail, cruise, fly” and ki (輝) means “radiance, shine, sparkle, gleam, twinkle” Mi (三) means “three” and mura (村) means “village”

Takuya Muramatsu 村松 拓哉 Taku (拓) means "expand, open, support" and ya (哉) “an exclamation” Mura (村) means “village” and matsu (松) means “a pine tree”

Tōka Yada 矢田 桃花 To means “peach” and ka means “flower” Ya (矢) means “arrow” and da (田) means “rice paddy”

Taisei Yoshida 吉田 大成 Tai (大) means “big or large” and sei (成) means “to become,to do something” Yoshi (吉) means “lucky (or good)” and da (田) means “rice paddy” together means “lucky (or good) rice paddy”

Ritsu 律 Ritsu’s (律) name means “law” her name is taken from Jiritsu (自律) meaning Autonomy

Itona Horibe 堀部 糸成 (イトナ) Ito means “thread” and na (成) means “to become,to do something” Hori means “ditch, canal,moat” and be means “section, bureau, dept, class, copy, part, portion, counter for copies of a newspaper or magazine”

[formgoodaffinities]

Doodle Game 14 with S

貓 māo -- noun. cat. feline would be 貓科動物 māo kē dòng wù but interestingly, 虎 hǔ (tiger), 獅 shī (lion), or even 猞猁 shē lì (lynx) do not share the same radical as cat. 獅 and 猞猁 are 犬 (犭) quǎn radical, meaning animal (獸 shòu)..

舒跑 shū pǎo -- proper noun, a brand of sports drink (運動飲料, yùn dòng yǐn liào, lit. sports beverage). FYI, since we're on the topic of sports drinks, neither Gatorade nor Powerade can be found in stores in Taiwan....

寶可夢 bǎo kě mèng -- proper noun, Pokémon, used to be translated as 神奇寶貝 shén qí bǎo bèi (lit. magical treasure), which was used for over 20 years before they changed it (for the Nintendo game, I believe.)

鵝毛筆 é máo bǐ -- noun. quill. There is a practice to make a Chinese calligraphy pen from baby's hair and it is called 胎毛筆 tāi máo bǐ. 胎 indicates fetal, so this hair is actually the hair baby has when they were born.

計程車 jì chéng chē -- noun. taxi cab. 計算(to calculate)+里程(mileage)+車(car). All the cabs in Taiwan are yellow.

籃球 lán qiú -- noun. basketball. (lit. basket+ ball) of course, chinese baskets are made with bamboo, hence the radical 竹, yet the basket in basketball is...a net. But net= 網 wǎng and 網球 wǎng qiú is tennis...so.

[beneath-the-wisteria-tree]

Día 43

día bastante interesante, vocabulario ya conocido, por cierto por fin me salió el de 薄い y me sirvió mucho lo que me comentaste la otra vez 蛍 (continúa abajo....) 

967.    伎: Performance(歌舞伎: kabuki, arte escénica más conocida en el extranjero, que alcanzó su máxima representación durante el periodo Edo, incluso había calles que eran corredores de teatros donde se representaba y cuentan que ahí es donde surgió el sushi en la forma en que se conoce pues los comerciantes quisieron hacer un bocadillo que pudiera comerse en un solo bocado (a lo sumo dos) dichos corredores de teatros se incendiaron múltiples veces debido a la gran cantidad de personas que se reunían cada noche) 968.    岐: divergir, bifurcación 969.    峠: paso de la montaña 970.    阜: montículo, terraplén, túmulo 971.    急: urgente, prisa, repentinamente 972.    争: “contender, struggle” 973.    情: emoción, sentimiento, condiciones actuales 974.    清: claro, puro（清酒 : sake refinado, hay varios niveles de refinación del sake） 975.    晴: cielo despejado 976.    精: refinado, preciso, meticuloso, esencia, espíritu 977.    請: petición 978.    静: quieto, inmóvil, tranquilo（静かな） 979.    浄: limpio, puro 980.    算: calcular（算盤: ábaco） 981.    答: responder 982.    符:símbolo, marca, palo de conteo（切符: ticket, 音符: nota musical, la música oriental tradicional se basaba en una escala pentatónica, el libro también nos dice que esa palabra se puede referir al grafema fonético de un kanji, eso ya lo investigaré más adelante） 983.    博: extensivo conocimiento, doctorado, PhD. 984.    縛: Atar, restringir 985.    簿: libro de registro 986.    薄: exiguo, escaso 987.    采: reunir, dados (cubitos), forma 988.    菜: vegetal, verdura（野菜） 989.    採: recoger, recolectar

... el componente de "azul" les va a ayudar en la sucesión 973-978 y ya encontré el proverbio que les quería compartir: 青二才: que da a entender que tenemos poca experiencia, que estamos "verdes" porque recuerden que les dije que antes esto de "azul" abarcaba ambas acepciones. otra nota: nótese que en algunas ocasiones el componente 竹 como radical en posición kanmuri está relacionado con cuenta, registro, etc., debido a que en un principio se utilizaba el bambú para registrar, contar y marcar cosas