The misuse of Chinese Characters in the western culture

[linguaholic]

Tattoos with Chinese Characters are widely popular in Europe ( I guess almost everywhere in the World); The problem is just that most people do not have a clue about Chinese at all. Still, they love how the characters look like and that seems to be reason enough to get one :=) Sometimes, however, this can go terribly wrong. Find out more about it, by accessing the following link:

http://hanzismatter.blogspot.ch/

[limon]

Tattoos with Chinese Characters are widely popular in Europe ( I guess almost everywhere in the World); The problem is just that most people do not have a clue about Chinese at all. Still, they love how the characters look like and that seems to be reason enough to get one :=) Sometimes, however, this can go terribly wrong. Find out more about it, by accessing the following link:

http://hanzismatter.blogspot.ch/

Wowwow. Yeah, that's why I will never wear clothing or jewelry with characters I can't translate.

Amazing that there is even a tattoo specific gibberish alphabet. That's going to confuse some future archaeologists someday.

[BWL]

I totally agree! These people clearly think they are getting cool-looking tattoos, but the tattoos could be saying something embarrasing instead!

Luckily all the Europeans with kanji or kana tattooes knew what they meant before getting them. I once struck up a conversation with an Italian guy named Marco in Milan when I read his name correctly written in katakana on his arm.

[Czarownica]

I love this blog so much, I'm glad it became more active recently

I think it's really ridiculous when people who don't even know Chinese/Japanese get Chinese characters tattooed on them. I mean, what's the point of that? It's not deep, it's really stupid. And all those people believing that you can write your initials in kanji/hanzi make my inner linguist cry  :cry:

I knew a girl who had "女" tattooed on her. I just can't imagine a reason for that.

[tulosai]

I once got a henna tattoo that they told me said 'disobey' in Chinese.  Turned out that wasn't it.  I don't remember what it said instead (it wasn't particularly embarrassing or memorable) but I sure was glad it was henna and not real ink!

[limon]

I knew a girl who had "女" tattooed on her. I just can't imagine a reason for that.

What does it mean!? //leans in eagerly//

[Czarownica]

It's nothing too embarassing, I'm afraid It just means "woman". But it puzzles me, because why would a girl need a word "woman" tattooed on her? I mean, she wouldn't tattoo "woman" in English on herself, would she? 

[Alfonso]

This is so true, its one of the most common kinds of tattoo's people get. I want share a story of my good friend, lets call him Paul, got a Chinese character tattoo a few years ago. It was his first tattoo, when he showed it to me be said it meant "Strong Will". A few day's later we were drinking with a Chinese-Filipino friend who had a very strong Chinese culture at home. When he saw the tattoo, he first laughed for about 30 seconds and told us it actual said "Strong Odor". Paul couldn't stand it so a week or two later, he he had another tattoo artist cover the whole thing up with a tribal design.

[SpiralArchitect]

It's nothing too embarassing, I'm afraid It just means "woman". But it puzzles me, because why would a girl need a word "woman" tattooed on her? I mean, she wouldn't tattoo "woman" in English on herself, would she? 

Must be a feminist thing. Something to reaffirm her power as a woman to herself.

Or it just looked cool. Definitely because it looked cool.  :grin:

[mareebaybay]

I agree, I have seen plenty of people who had tattoos that they messed up on because they tried to incorporate something they did not know a lot about.

[thekernel]

Some people assume Asian characters have a sort of mystical or exotic property to them. I can see the reasoning but the flaws lie in poor translation. I have friends with English tattoos on them. I can probably assume that there are lots of Asian people with English tattoos. Just be careful, and for god's sake do your research.

[ollie]

I used to know an exchange student from China, and every now and then we'd go drink downtown. He was so cool to hang out with because whenever we'd see someone with a Chinese character tattoo, he'd tell me either the real meaning or what other implications there were behind the word.

[Firelily99]

If I were getting a tattoo(which I wouldn't) I certainly would make sure that I knew what the words or characters meant.  It would be risky not too and if I'm inking up with characters just because I think that they are cool then I'm not being very smart with my money.