Quick Links Welcome to Kanji Curiosity | The Basics | Glossary Winter is a time of harshness. In spring, as trees explode with fragrant blossoms, we're full of hope. In summer, we can delude ourselves that peaches will always be in season and that sunny, warm days will keep coming for a good six months. In fall, colorful leaves and crisp air fill us with optimism. And then it's winter, and we can't fool ourselves any longer. Haiku About Harsh Realities ... But facing reality isn't all bad. Check out this cool compound: 実験 (jikken: experiment)     reality + to test As the breakdown indicates, an experiment allows one to test reality. That is, an experiment is a reality check! Well, here's one... Show more

Quick Links Welcome to Kanji Curiosity | The Basics | Glossary Kanji-induced dementia (KID) strikes again! Although I believed I'd never seen 追 until the fateful encounters mentioned two weeks ago, I was quite wrong. No surprise there; even when one has stumbled across certain characters thirty-five times before, KID makes them seem fresh and new. One of my Japanese language partners had used 追 twice before in emails, referring both times to my never-ending workload: 締め切りに追われていませんか？ Shimekiri ni owarete imasen ka? Aren’t you chased by deadlines? きっと最後の追い込みをしているのでしょうね。 Kitto saigo no oikomi o shite iru no deshō ne. By now you must surely be in the final stages. Kanji Breakdown #1... The second sentence contains 追い込み... Show more

Quick Links Welcome to Kanji Curiosity | The Basics | Glossary Last week, you may have felt increasingly certain that 追 (TSUI, o(u)) is all about the chase. But the kanji gods tend to read confidence as hubris, and they respond by throwing curve balls. This character has two other main meanings.   Additionally, 追 Means "Additional" The kanji 追 also means "to add" or "additional." That helps us make more sense of 追加, which appeared in the first paragraph of last week's entry: 追加 (tsuika: addition)     addition + addition The kanji 加 can stand for Canada. So if you didn't know the appropriate breakdowns here, you might think 追加 referred to driving someone into Canada ... or chasing away Canadians... Show more

Quick Links Welcome to Kanji Curiosity | The Basics | Glossary The other day, I encountered 追 (TSUI, o(u)) in three different contexts: during a Skype-chat with a Japanese friend, on a random visit to a website, and in a dictionary as I searched for something else. In all cases, this kanji appeared in words I didn't know: 追加 (tsuika: addition), 追う (ou: to chase), and 貝殻追放 (kaigara tsuihō: ostracism). What's Going on with 貝殻追放?! ... I took it as a sign that the kanji gods wanted me to fall in love with 追—or at least investigate it. I have done their bidding and will look at this character in the next three blogs. I'm not sure I'm in love with 追. After all, it breaks down as "moving buttocks"—not the most charming of... Show more

Quick Links Welcome to Kanji Curiosity | The Basics | Glossary Happy 2008! It feels as if we're still straddling the new year's hump. The old year lingers in memory and in effects, while the new one has barely stretched out before us to reveal its form. On the Effects of the Old Year ... The kanji 出 captures this feeling of having a foot in both worlds, because with the kun-yomi of de(ru), 出 has the following meanings: (1) to appear; to come forth (2) to leave, to go away Together, these meanings produce an intolerable schizophrenic feeling in me. But at this moment in time—and perhaps only in this moment—they can coexist without contradiction; we're leaving the old year as the new one appears. With scads of... Show more

Quick Links Welcome to Kanji Curiosity | The Basics | Glossary Welcome to winter, a time of holiday hokeyness, excess consumption, darkness, coldness, and most of all sleep. A bear would put sleep first on that list. But you needn't be a bear to think about hibernation. As the year draws to a close, you might take note of the compound 越年 (etsunen: to go beyond + year), which means both "ringing out the old year" and "hibernating"! Actually, 冬眠 (tōmin: winter + sleep) is a much more common way to say "hibernation." It's a great compound but could introduce some confusion; if you already knew 寝, seeing 眠 would make you realize that there are two characters for "sleep": 寝 (SHIN, ne(ru): to go to sleep) 眠 (MIN, nemu(ru): to... Show more

Quick Links Welcome to Kanji Curiosity | The Basics | Glossary In the holiday shuffle, it's easy to lose a sense of balance and perspective. Kanji to the rescue! Evening BalancePhoto credit: Hickoree   With all that I've said about 意 in past blogs, I've neglected to mention that it's nearly symmetrical. If this kanji resembles an animal with a long tail, just snip off that tail (ouch!), and you have yourself a symmetrical (but aching!) animal! When 意 combines with other symmetrical kanji, they result in compounds that are particularly calming to see. Click the link to find some of those. Soothing Symmetry ...   The Meaning of Life The commercialism of December can fill us with a sense of meaninglessness,... Show more

Quick Links Welcome to Kanji Curiosity | The Basics | Glossary I've long been interested in human consciousness, so I'm excited that Japanese has a host of fascinating words about that concept. The word for "consciousness" is 意識, ishiki (mind + discernment). Strangely, ishiki sounds like dashiki. Since the 1960s in the United States, this West African garment has signified a raised consciousness about black culture and politics. And suddenly we're a world away from Japan! How did we stray so far, so quickly? Consciousness—faster than the speed of light! The word 意識 doesn't necessarily refer to a raised consciousness of social issues. Here are two terms for that: 社会意識 (shakai ishiki: social... Show more

Quick Links Welcome to Kanji Curiosity | The Basics | Glossary When I happened upon the word 意図 (ito: intention), I was tickled. I figured that this instance of 図 might mean "map," as it sometimes does. If so, one could read 意図 as mind + map! An intention might be a map of the mind! Not So Fast ... Thinking that way made me quite happy, because back in college, I took an anthropology course called "Cultures and Consciousness," and one of my favorite textbooks was Charles Hampden-Turner's Maps of the Mind. An Ancient Memory of Maps of the Mind ... "Maps of the mind" is a great phrase, suggestive of many things, including trains of thought. When it comes to representing interconnected thoughts (e.g., about kanji!), the... Show more

Quick Links Welcome to Kanji Curiosity | The Basics | Glossary Some kanji go together like peanut butter and jelly. Where you find one, you also find the other. For instance, 意 (I: will, heart, mind, thought, meaning, sense) frequently pairs off with 気, 地, and 得 inside compounds and expressions. In other words, 意 seems to be quite the trigamist.   意 + 気 In and of itself, 意気 (iki) means "spirit," "disposition," and "morale." With a sample sentence from Jim Breen's online dictionary, we can try to make sense of this abstract word: 鈴木さん、その意気ですよ。 Suzuki-san, sono iki desu yo. That's the spirit, Mr. Suzuki. If Mr. Suzuki is indeed in the right spirit, we might say the following about him: 意気に燃える (iki ni moeru: to be... Show more