Your favorite Kanji

[linguaholic]

I think everyone got a favorite Kanji. I would love to hear about your favorite character.

If possible, please share some information about the character and it would come in handy if you could provide an example sentence that comes along with your favorite character!

As you can see below, my favorite kanji is the kanji for dragon. I really like the shape of it.

example: 龍の年  //  year of the dragon

[Czarownica]

I like 足, because it reminds me of a guy sitting on a sled http://www.linguaholic.com/uploads/emoticons/default_tongue.png' alt=':P'>

足が痛いので、今日図書館に行かないつもりです。

I plan not to go to the library today because my leg hurts.

[i hope I haven't messed this sentence up ^^]

[linguaholic]

I like 足, because it reminds me of a guy sitting on a sled http://www.linguaholic.com/uploads/emoticons/default_tongue.png' alt=':P'>

足が痛いので、今日図書館に行かないつもりです。

I plan not to go to the library today because my leg hurts.

[i hope I haven't messed this sentence up ^^]

hehe :=) I like the way you displayed the kanji (making it size 36pt). That's a great way and I will adapt this method from now on.

[linguaholic]

Another Kanji that I really like is 難。It means difficult or difficulty. In Chinese, it is pronounced nan (second tone) and has the same meaning. The simplified version (now used in mainland china) is 难。

[Czarownica]

Really? I hate it >.< I can never remember how to write it, for some bizarre reason. Well, I guess it's fitting that the kanji for "difficult" is difficult...

[gegegeno]

This isn't one that gets used all that often these days, but I quite like the kanji

嬲 nabu(ru),

meaning to tease or mock somebody. It is literally a woman between two men.

There's also a less common variant (it doesn't show up in Microsoft IME at least),

嫐

which is read the exact same way but makes it into a man between two women. I get the impression that it was invented to balance the scales in the "battle of the sexes"...

[linguaholic]

Those two Kanjis are really interesting. I have not seen those in use in Chinese actually. I'm gonna consult a dictionary and find out if those characters are used at all in Chinese.

[gegegeno]

I first saw them in a kanji class when I was studying in Japan. The teacher made a lot of jokes to keep the class moving (otherwise imagine how boring just teaching kanji would be), so when he showed the second one I wondered if it wasn't just another joke until I looked them up afterwards.

I decided to delve a little further into the meaning of the second one (嫐), and it seems that even though it's read as なぶる, it means not so much to tease or mock in a bad way but more like teasing flirtatiously. So much for balancing the gender scales I guess.

[broknkyboard]

Mine is the character 時 for time! Sometimes I just randomly write it on things within my reach, and I occasionally have to explain why my arm has weird inscriptions on it to people who don't even know I'm studying Japanese...

[linguaholic]

Really? I hate it >.< I can never remember how to write it, for some bizarre reason. Well, I guess it's fitting that the kanji for "difficult" is difficult...

Yes, I am serious about this one. It is pretty difficult in terms of stroke count, however I think the shape of it is really beautiful. I am studying Ancient Chinese at the moment and I must say that when studying Ancient Chinese, 難 can still be regarded as one of the easier characters :=))

[pandandesign]

Wow. Very interesting to see all the favorite kanji here. I don't have specific favorite kanji, but I do see some of them are similar to Chinese characters. I would say my favorite kanji is 月, which is moon in translation.