Does This Say "Love"?

Reader Sonja emails:

"Hi Tian!!! Ok, here is my tattoo that apparently says 'Love'. I think ill cry if you tell me it says horse... ;-( LOL I'm kidding... Sort of.... When I got it they said it was an ancient Japanese Buddhist dialect I think called... Kanji? Or something? Oh I cant remember anymore... I'm very excited to get my new ones now... !!! Ill send you pics of the new ones when I get them In the first week of June. xoxoxo"

After I saw the photo, I did not recognize the character. I then forwarded it to my associates and hoping at least one of them would have more knowledge about the "ancient Japanese Buddhist dialect" than I did. At the same time I emailed Sonja back asking her about where she got the tattoo, and if the design was an original or from a template.

"I had it done in Toronto on queen street west, downtown. At New Tribe... You're worrying me!! I picked it there.. I spent some time in Japan (6 months) and when I came back to Canada I missed it so much so I wanted to get something to remember my time there. Maybe when I go in to get my new ones done I can get them to photocopy the sheet that it came from? Would that help? Someone once told me it says sex......?? Oh gosh... Now I'm worried. Just please be honest.. I know you will... Take care."

The first person responded to my email was John:

"I think she was totally bullshitted. Looks like 青 to me, but I'm certainly no expert at the more 草书-ish characters."

John does have a point there, especially when he pull out his 草书 book:

3500常用字索查字帖（草书） 上海交通大学出版社, 1999.



Ken Nishimura and Aaron Batty from Japan both agree with John:

"I thought it was distorted 'blue' 青. To me, this cannot be 'love' or any kanji I'm familiar with."

Jeremy from Danwei.org thinks "maybe the tattooist was trying to write 麦?"



麦 = wheat, barley, oats;

Chinese translation for McDonald's is 麦当劳 or 麥當勞.

Interview with RTHK Radio 3

Yesterday I did a telephone interview about Hanzi Smatter with Mr. Hugh Chiverton of RTHK Radio 3. Radio Television Hong Kong (RTHK 香港電台) Radio 3 broadcasts in English covers news, information, and general programming. It is similar in genre to BBC Radio 4.

rthk20050512.smi (real audio)
rthk20050512.mp3 (mp3)

Airbrushed Tats at Cornell's Slope Day 2005

http://asia.elliottback.com/archives/2005/05/06/bad-chinese-tattoos/

Reader Elliott Back emails:

"My girlfriend and I were at Cornell University's Slope Day today, and they were offering airbrushed tattoos, some of which were in Chinese. Of course, she told me that half the descriptions didn't match the characters at all. I'm a longtime reader of your blog, so I snapped a photo so I could send it to you. Thanks."

The character labeled 34 appears to be a poorly written 孚, which means "trust", but it also means "brood over eggs; have confidence". The bottom partial should be 子, not 于.

#35 美 means "beauty", not "hope" as the caption says.

I have never seen "peace" written like #40 before. I don't know if it could be 安 because it is written so badly.

#39 真 means "real, actual, true, genuine", not "hope".

My personal favorites are #38 and #41. That is because the person did not even bother to remove the horizontal bars above the characters. The bars used by the template's manufacturer to indicate "this way up" on the package.

#38 is the same as #35 which means "beauty" despite the misleading captions. I have seen #41 妥 before and it was featured here in Hanzi Smatter last October. When will these idiots ever learn...

Fashionable Chinese Characters

http://www.voanews.com/chinese/2005-05-06-voa82.cfm
http://home.donews.com/donews/article/7/77489.html

In recent Voice of America's News Chinese section, there is an article about Hanzi Smatter titled "汉字渐成美国年轻人追求时尚"; or in English, "American Youth Consider Chinese Characters Fashionable". (more at voanews.com and donews.com)

What I personally found interesting was the last sentence of the article:

据统计，目前全球学习中文的人数已达3000万，预计到2007年将有1亿人学习中文。

Translation:

According to statistics, currently there are 30 million [non-Chinese] people studying Chinese globally, this number is expected to reach 100 million by 2007.

"Poison" vs. "Wife"

Reader A. Hanagata emailed this photo with the following description:

"I'm Japanese, and a friend of mine has this tattoo... she told me it meant 'poison' and I told her that it most certainly did not. Perhaps in Chinese it means something. I personally do not recognize it."

I used the similar font that tattoo was done, the closest character I have found is 妻, which means "wife".



Among other similar characters are:

妄 = absurd, foolish, reckless; false
妾 = concubine
委 = appoint, send, commission
姜 = ginger

Update: Reader Joel/Zhwj emails



The top portion is a typical way of writing the top of 毒, 青, and so on (here's a 精神, for comparison); the bottom portion has three main differences from the type version of 母: (1) it's rotated, so the verticals and horizontals are now angular; (2) the the hooked turning stroke is connected to the middle horizontal, and (3) the dots have been made into a line, which unfortunately doesn't extend below the middle horizontal (this is the main source of confusion, and is probably due to the lack of resolution the tattoo artist had to work with). I've sent you an image, Tian, of the two characters written in a font modeled after Qi Gong's handwriting; the 毒 is written in the same style as this photo.

3D Car FX

http://www.3dcarfx.com/KANJI.htm

Listen up, all you import mod fans, you can make fools out of yourselves and cars by placing these incorrect Kanji stickers on your rides.

柬 does not mean "beauty", it means "letter, invitation; choose".

切 does not mean "extreme", it means "cut, mince, slice, carve".

I have no idea what that "follow" character is.

宴 does not mean "love", it means "to entertain, feast; a feast, banquet".

力 is "strength", not the gibberish shown.

I should also point out that usually 鬼 means "ghost; spirit of dead; devil", and 吸 means "inhale, suck in; absorb; attract".

I have emailed corrections to 3dcarfx.com, so far the only response I got from them is an auto-response email.

"Central Ice"

http://www.tattoostation.co.uk/images/gallery/large_kanji.jpg
http://www.tattoostation.co.uk/gal8.html

The top two characters 中部 usually means "central". In geographical term, there is an area just south and south-west of Tokyo that is called the same. In Japanese, 中部 would sometimes also represent the "heart", as the equivalent of "center".

The bottom character 氷, despite it might look like a miswritten 永 (long, perpetual, eternal, forever), it is actually the Japanese version of 冰, which means "ice".

Hence the problem: does the tattoo suppose mean "central ice", "icy center", "Ice of Tokyo's South-West", or "cold hearted"?