Shark Kanji 01

# 1 2 3

kanji

一 二 三

keyword

koohiiStory1

one

One down, 2041 to go. ;).

two

Two lines.

three four

One + two = three. FOUR year-olds often put their FOOT (human legs) in their MOUTH - but they are too young to realize.

five

三 + two vertical lines = 5.

six

Indicating 6 parts of the human body: head, body, 2 arms, 2 legs.

seven

ten

This kanji is our good old seven, turned upside down. Hachi (eight) begins with the sound of the katakana "ha", and it´s approximately the same character. Kinda of looks like the kanji of 1　一 with the kanji of 8 八added. So think of it as 　一＋八＝九. Two needles crossing marks the spot, or you can use the Roman character for ten (rotated 45 degrees).

mouth

Looks like a huge open mouth.

day

Open the window, new day.

month

A month is longer than a day.

rice field eye

A rice field divided into four parts. There are 3 sections. Imagine the outer two being the whites of your eye. The middle is the pupil. Fill it in with imaginary color.

old

Tombstone and cross on an old man´s grave.

I

I have 5 senses.

risk

Don´t look at the sun directly with your eyes, it´s risky!

companion

My companion and I are like two moons side by side.

bright

The sun makes the moon bright.

chant

Someone chanting with their mouth open for two consecutive days.

sparkle

A diamond sparkles as brightly as three suns.

goods

Three boxes of goods are devoured by the hungry mouths of waiting consumers.

spine

Spine connects head and body.

prosperous

If you work from Sun UP to Sun DOWN you will be prosperous.

early

The sun up is early, well before ten.

rising sun

9am carries with it the rising sun.

generation

3 tens = generation.

stomach

The rice field is harvested once a month to get food for our stomach.

nightbreak

A nightbreak happens when the sun rises over the horizon (floor).

gall bladder

The moon has a lot of gall sticking around after sunrise.

span

The sun spans from horizon to horizon in a day.

concave

The letter "U" is concavely written.

7

四 五 六 七

8

八

eight

9

九

nine

4 5 6

10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33

十 口 日 月 田 目 古 吾 冒 朋 明 唱 晶 品 呂 昌 早 旭 世 胃 旦 胆 亘 凹

# 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42

43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50

kanji

凸 旧 自 白 百 中 千 舌 升 昇 丸 寸 専 博 占 上 下

55

卓 朝 只 貝 貞

56

員

51 52 53 54

57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64

見 児 元 頁 頑 凡 負 万

keyword

koohiiStory1

convex

When I get vexed, I give people the middle finger.

olden times oneself

Age 18 = olden times. Faced with his clone, our hero valiantly cut a mark on his forehead right above his eye so that his comrades could tell his true oneself from the enemy.

white

A white ray is a drop of sun.

hundred

100 turned sideways. {sort of the same as what ashoksaraf said}.

in

Pocky goes in the mouth.

thousand

It takes many drops of ten to get to a thousand.

tongue

What is in a mouth that permits it to speak a thousand things? Yes, a tongue.

measuring box

rise up

It is a thousand or ten? I need my measuring box. This kanji does not mean "get up" or "awake." It means rising, like the rising of a salary, or a promotion. STORY: You know that your salary has RISEN UP when your MEASURING BOX has enough dollar bills in it to reach the SUN.

round

Nine plus a drop rounds it off to ten!

measurement specialty

The decimal system uses drops of ten as a measurement. After you have chosen your 10 fields of study, measure how good you are at each to find out your specialty.

Dr.

Ten specialties grants you the title of Dr. with a dot.

fortune-telling

Fortune-telling: using a mouth as a divining rod.

above

A magic wand standing on above the floor.

below

Roots are below the ground.

eminent

The most eminent magician is he who learned to use his magic wand early in life.

morning

There is mist as the moon fades away in the morning.

only

Imagine an animal with only a mouth and legs.

shellfish

Eye thought I saw a shellfish legging it down the beach!

upright

see

A magic wand is needed to make a clam stand upright. An employee (member of the company) has to clam up his mouth if he wants keep the job! As a primitive, this is Mike Wazowski from Monsters Inc. (the giant eyeball with legs...) Makes for easy stories later on.

newborn babe

In the olden times, a newborn babe came out legs first.

beginning

In the beginning were just two who walked on human legs.

page stubborn

A shellfish carrying a page balanced on its head. A stubborn person in the beginning gets something into their head and can´t change their mind.

mediocre

A drop of breeze is naught but a mediocre wind.

defeat

Tied up, the shellfish had to accept defeat!

ten thousand

I bound ten thousand dollars together and hid it under the floor.

employee

# 65 66 67 68 69

kanji

句 肌 旬 勺 的

71

首 乙

72

乱

70

keyword

koohiiStory1

phrase

Some Japanese phrases are difficult to wrap your mouth around.

texture decameron

When you expose your flesh to the wind it gets textured: goosebumps! Hesig should be BOUND for a DAY (or maybe 10 days - a decameron) for calling this Kanji DECAMERON. See martyrdom (#809).

ladle

A ladle binds drops together.

bull´s eye

I managed to hit the bull´s eye by throwing my white ladle. The V shape is your neck on top of your collar bone, or the straight line. Yourself, or the rest of your body is below that!

neck

riot

This is a fish hook, that pulls out the fishguts. The riot police broke up the riot by dragging the rioters away by their tongues with fishooks.

straightaway

If you get a needle in your eye that is hooked in there, get to a hospital straightaway.

tool

Keep an eye on your tools while you work at the table.

fish guts

75

直 具 真

76

工

craft

77

左

left

I consider craft to be one of the harder primitives to use in stories so I´ve personified it as Bender the crafty robot from Futurama who was designed to bend I-beams. The LEFT side of my brain posesses the faculties needed for logical crafts, like engineering.

right

The right hand is for putting food in your mouth. (The other hand is for ass-wiping!).

possess

Possessed by the Earth´s gravity, the moon stays by its side.

bribe tribute

To bribe someone, money is a necessary possession. This next song is a TRIBUTE to a little SHELLFISH friend of mine who was tragically crushed by an I-shaped table..

paragraph

To write a paragraph is the craft of grouping sentences on a page.

sword

This SWORD is so sharp, it can cut the top part of カ off in カタナ.

blade

The part of a sword where a drop of blood can usually be found is the blade.

cut

The seven samurai used their swords to cut their opponents.

seduce

A man is easily seduced by a mouth to his "sword.".

shining

Shining is the sun´s seduction. When you have both money and the power of the sword, you can make the rules. The wealthy guy with the sword standing next to the king, that´s the vice-roy who does all the dirty work. I don´t know about you but to me this seems like someone´s head is about to be separated from his body. You can see he´s kneeling and his mouth is wide open gasping for the last breath he will ever take.

73 74

78 79 80

右 有 賄

TRUE

87

貢 項 刀 刃 切 召 昭

88

則

rule

89

副

vice-

81 82 83 84 85 86

91

別 丁

92

町

90

separate street village

A compass is a tool with a needle on top that points to true north.

Today, the program "Sesame Street" is brought to you by the letter "T". Actually this means town, like one that has lots of streets and is surrounded by all the rice fields.

#

kanji

can

koohiiStory1 A mouth on the street asking for things: "Can I get some help?! Can I get directions, Can I have some money? Can you please speak English?!".

place on the head

If I put a street sign on my head what do I get ? A place on the head !

child

A child who is ten will still ask for his ma (top looks a bit like katakana ma). The child´s arms flailed around at the sight of the hooked tool the dentist was going to use to fill his cavity.

keyword

95

可 頂 子

96

孔

cavity

97

了

complete

93 94

98 99

女 好

woman

The experiment was a complete failure! The child was made without any arms! To remember the order of strokes, remember a female ninja is called a "kunoichi". That is, く(hiragana) ノ(katakana) 一(kanji, ichi=one).

likeness

A woman is fond of her child. Women share a common likeness. Their mouths are always open, whining about this and that.

mama

The two breasts of a momma who breastfeeds.

pierce

Ariel the Little Mermaid´s clamshell bra was held to her breasts by piercings.

elder brother

My elder brother was basically a mouth on legs when he was a teenager.

overcome

Ten elder brothers can overcome anything.

little

A little penguin with its wings at its side.

few

Only a few people can make an ugly face like that.

large

A person stretching their arms and legs to look large and scare a bear away.

many

Two evenings too many!

evening

fond

109

如 母 貫 兄 克 小 少 大 多 夕

110

汐

eventide

111

外

outside

112

名

name

113

石

stone

114

肖

resemblance

The evening is young, the moon is not full. Eventide is just another word for evening, and it has the word tide in it which we associate with water. A young magician likes to practice outside in the evening with his magic wand (as opposed to the old magician who wakes early to practice with his wand in eminent (#51)). In the evening, when it becomes dark, open your mouth to say your name so that people can recognise you. Indiana Jones jumps up and grabs the lip of cliff just in time to evade the huge STONE rolling out of the mouth of the cave! Using DNA matching, a very little bit of flesh can be used to show the resemblence between family members.

nitrate

That stone has sparks coming out of it! Someone must have poured nitrate acid on it.

smash sand

To SMASH a STONE you need to hit it NINE or TEN times. Here´s how I remember that stone is on the left. This is because sand starts as stones, and only later they become few.

plane

Sparks will fly if you attempt to PLANE your sabre.

ray

A ray of light is not a wave but made of little photons with human legs.

plump

A large person with a big drop of sweat dripping off of him because he is so plump.

100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108

115 116

硝 砕

119

砂 削 光

120

太

117 118

stinking

koohiiStory1 Imagine four hungry mouths all sitting around the table. They are all banging their utensils on the table waiting for a big meal to be placed in the centre. The ST. BERNARD DOG lifted his large NOSE high in the air to find out where the stinking smell comes from.

exquisite

Exquisite women are few and far between.

focus thick

You focus by concentrating your eye on fewer objects. In Sparta we throw our Children over a Cliff. Under the Sun, they fight other Children. In the end, if they survive, they sure have thick skin.

strange

I find it strange that so many people commit suicide in Tokyo by throwing themselves in front of the train. To me when I look at this kanji, I see a train just about to come out of a tunnel, and above the man waiting for his oppourtunity where he can end it all.

#

kanji

keyword

121

器

utensil

124

臭 妙 省

125

厚

122 123

127

奇 川

128

州

state

129

順

obey

126

130 131 132 133 134 135 136

水 氷 永 泉 原 願 泳

141

沼 沖 江 汁 潮

142

源

137 138 139 140

143 144 145 146 147

活 消 況 河 泊

water

So as not to confuse this with river (#146) think of streamers falling down. There were 3 little islands in the stream who all decided to set themselves up as independent states. Obey, Obey! says the brain-washing scientist as he sends a stream of orders to fill your head. The kanji for water is an abstract primitive itself, so unless one is willing to break down its etymological development, it should just simply be memorized by strokes; constructing a story is not necessarily useful unless it strongly denotes its shape (I find that Heisig´s story doesn´t do this).

icicle

Icicles start with 1 frozen drop of water.

eternity

It would take an eternity to count all the drops of water. White is a symbol of purety, so white water is pure water, the precise definition of spring water.

stream

spring meadow petition

Follow the springs down the cliff and you will find a nice meadow. Let´s petition to save that beautiful MEADOW from overdevelopment by signing on this PAGE.

marsh

With that much WATER (2 actually) you would need to swim for an ETERNITY. The marshlands near Mordor seduce Frodo into gazing upon them, and he falls into the water--splash!

open sea

Open sea is a lot of water in the middle of nowhere.

creek

A CREEK is a small trail of water easily crafted with a stick.

soup

To make soup you just take water and add (+) the rest of your ingredients.

tide

The morning tide is basically, well, WATER in the MORNING.

source

The water that flows from the meadow is the source of life for the wild antelope. Conversations can become more lively after everyone has had a few drinks. It´s because "watery tongues" loosen lips!

swim

lively

but of course

To extinguish a SPARK, you need WATER. If you ask your teenager if what he´s drinking is water (and not Vodka), he will answer "but of course".

river

A river CAN exist only if there is WATER.

overnight

Please supply a guest who stays overnight with WATER and WHITE sheets.

extinguish

#

kanji

149

湖 測

150

土

148

151 152 153 154 155 156

157 158 159 160 161 162 163

164 165 166 167 168 169 170

吐 圧 埼 垣 圭 封 涯 寺 時 均 火 炎 煩 淡 灯 畑 災 灰 点 照

172

魚 漁

173

里

171

keyword

koohiiStory1

lake

This is my favorite story. Simply associate the sad moment of an OLD person, standing near the WATER of the lake and looking at the MOON reflected in the lake. The created primitives themselves are put so beautifully, that you will not forget this kanji.

spit

A fathom is the unit you use when making rules about water´s depth. Remembering soil is easy. If soil is soft, you can take a walking stick and plunge it two* feet into the ground. The only things that come out of my MOUTH and onto the GROUND are spit and vomit. Everything else (words, song) floats on the air.

pressure

The GROUND at the base of a CLIFF must suffer from enormous pressure.

cape

This refers to LAND, not the STRANGE gear superheroes wear.

hedge

Before the Great Wall of China, there was a dirt hedge that spanned across.

squared jewel

Piling SOIL upon SOIL for aeons is how SQUARE JEWELS are formed deep in the earth.

seal

The king used a special seal of ivy leaves glued onto his document.

horizon Buddhist temple

Try to reverse Heisig´s story in this Kanji: imagine being trapped in one of those prison towers on an ivy cladcliff like in the movies. From your prison ontop the ivy clad cliff all you can see in the distant horizon is nothing but water. At the Buddhist temple the monks are seated on the ground, glued there in meditation.

time

When the SUN starts to shine on the TEMPLE, it´s time to get up.

level fire

Soil is scooped up into a ladel. The extra drop is brushed off to make it level. For some reason, this kanji reminds me of a person running, her arms (the two drops) raised up, because she caught on fire!

inflammation

To fight fire with fire would just inflame a situation.

anxiety

An anxiety feels like FIRE in the HEAD. Drink water and burn twice as many calories as you eat... you´ll definitely get thin. Imagine inside your body, all those calories literally being burned from above and below... THAT´s what it takes to become thin.

fathom soil

thin

farm

Imagine old gas lamps which had a flame to light up the street signs. Many farms are created by first setting FIRE over the land to clear the land for the FIELDS.

disaster

What a disaster! First a FIRE, then on top of it came FLOODs.

ashes spot

The fire underneath the cliff will eventually turn everything above to ashes. The FORTUNE TELLER was burned by FLAMES on the spot because she was accused of being a witch.

illuminate

SHINING FLAMES illuminate!

fish

The elements of this kanji are bound up, rice field and cooking fire. When I think of bound up cooked rice, it makes me think of sushi, which in turn brings to mind fish.

lamp

fishing ri

You need WATER and FISH for fishing. The ri is a Japanese way of measuring the area of the GROUND underneath a RICE FIELD.

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

black

If you burn the GROUND of a RICE FIELD with FIRE, eventually it will turn black.

black ink

Theres BLACK on the GROUND...most likely someone spilt some black ink.

carp

Japanese carp are massive fish - they are measured in ri! I did such a quantity of work that when NIGHT BREAK came, I was asleep on the COMPUTER. I threw my Rindows computer off a cliff because it kept crashing. Now, after its last crash, it´s worth less than a rin.

176

黒 墨 鯉

177

量

quantity

178

厘

rin

174 175

179 180 181

埋 同 洞

186

胴 向 尚 字 守

187

完

182 183 184 185

188 189

宣 宵

191

安 宴

192

寄

190

same

You can´t bury computers underground, because of the dangerous heavy metals, so you hide them behind an equally large mound of soil and hope no-one notices. Muslim women wearing veils (HOOD) all look the same, you can just see ONE MOUTH and very little else.

den

All the animals in the den share the same water.

trunk

A trunk, a trunk // The body of a monk // The body of a monk in a trunk, a trunk.

yonder

Look over yonder ! That tiny dot is robin hood at the mouth of his secret cave !

esteem

An especially esteemed alien has three antennae on his helmet.

character

CHILDren learn Kanji characters underneath a HOUSE.

guard

A GUARD is usually "glued" to the house he watches. Make the perfect impression in the beginning by removing your shoes upon entering a Japanese home. You can proclaim your opinions from the comfort of your HOUSE and have it SPAN the entire globe these days via The Internet.

bury

perfect proclaim wee hours

relax

wealth

The WOMAN spent all DAY preparing a banquet in the HOUSE. The strange house has a sign saying "DRAW NEAR" in its window, instead of a ´Beware´ sign. It must be a trick! Remember Ducktales? That rich duck had that room in his house where he kept all the wealth! He had so much in that house you could even swim in it!

savings

It takes a lot more than one clam of savings to buy a house on a street.

tree

If you need a story for a tree, then you need to be hit by one.

grove

A grove has at least two TREEs. The higher you go up a mountain the less trees there are, that´s so u dont mess up with their possition like i do. Simple mnemonic : "The Japanese Judas-tree is the tree on which Judas hang himself to the ivy" (Judas the traitor of the Christian bible). Just picture Judas hanging himself, using ivy as a if it was a rope.

banquet draw near

196

富 貯 木 林

197

森

forest

198

桂

Japanese Judas-tree

193 194 195

I burn the CANDLE in my HOUSE until the WEE HOURS reviewing the kanji!!! It´s funny, Hesig gives no Kanji in his book that means cheap/inexpensive... well... if you were wondering what Kanji would carry that meaning, look no further. Sometimes I wonder if Hesig just thinks our little brains would be too easily confused by multiple meanings. Regardless, think of that woman relaxing. Cheapest place to do that is in one´s own home rather than at some fancy resort, eh? 家で休暇を取るは安いですね。.

# 199 200 201 202 203

kanji

柏 枠 梢 棚 杏

keyword oak

koohiiStory1 The wood from oak trees can be used to make barrels in which white wine is aged. What´s more, I love white wine with an oaky flavour...

treetops

wood at 90 (9 * 10) degrees. At Christmas time, on the treetops, people used to place great big candles (Now we usually place a star instead).

shelf

A shelf is a wooden companion to books.

apricot

paulownia

From the tree straight into the mouth is the best way to eat an APRICOT! In Japan, a paulownia (きり）is known as the "princess tree". It was once a traditional TREE planted at the SAME time as the birth of a daughter. It would grow fast enough that, at the time of her wedding, it could be used to make a dresser as a wedding present for her.

plant

Plants don´t become trees straightaway.

wither

frame

206

桐 植 枯

207

朴

crude

208

村

town

209

相

inter-

A tree withers away as it gets old. Wooden wands are the crudest. They are nothng compared to their carbon fibre equivilents. If you´ve ever played an old 8 bit or 16 bit RPG, like Dragon Warrior or Final Fantasy or Inindou, you´ll remember that every town was all bordered off by a line of trees with no space in between to get out through. Imagine that the trees were glued together so you could only exit town through the main or side gates, (so you couldn´t escape the important scripted scenes.). The prime minister is having inter-course behind that tree! All you can see are his eyes poking out from the righthand-side of the tree.

210

机

desk

My wooden desk is so messy, it looks like a strong wind blew my things all over it.

book

The origin of a book is paper made out of TREEs. ONE tree can make many books.

tag

calendar

Botanists like to identify TREEs by HOOKing tags on them. Years-Months-Days: It takes many years for a cliff to form or erode. A tree takes many months to grow. But days pass by regularly - so in this way, we see the movement of time such as with a CALENDAR.

plan

I plan to RELAX on top of that TREE.

204 205

211 212

213 214

本 札 暦 案

215

燥

parch

Tip: goods + wood/tree : This combination of primitives appears four times in Heisig, so it´s worthwhile giving it a name. I suggest "furniture" (a common type of wooden goods). REF: parch (FRAME 215) , maneuver (#671), winding (#1369), seaweed (#2035). Story: It´s been so parched recently that your furniture suddenly catches fire.

216

未

not yet

I believe a better version of that by mameha1977: [Cheat] Remember these as a set: The tree (木) does not yet (未) have exremities (末) of vermilion (朱).

extremity

The tree has reached the extremity of its growth and no longer produces small, new branches at the top. Instead the existing top branch just grows longer and longer.

217 218 219 220

末 沫 味 妹

flavor

The extremity of a wave of water is the splash. My mouth has not yet swallowed the food because the flavor is so delicious that I keep chewing it.

younger sister

My younger sister is NOT YET a fully grown WOMAN.

splash

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kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

221

朱

vermilion stocks

It´s autumn: only one vermilion leaf on the tree has not yet fallen. Which tree would you buy stocks in - the healthy one on the left, or the one with only one vermilion leaf left on the right?

young

The young little girl held a cute flower in her right hand.

grass

Grass grows in earlier than flowers.

suffering

Flowers for the old man suffering in the hospital.

tolerant

A tolerant person will ignore SEEing GRASS (marijuana) in the HOUSE of a friend.

dilute

imitation

A Dr. missing his needle can only use dilute flower water for medicine. On top of the leaves a flower appears, promising new generations for the old tree below. If I find out this furniture you´re selling me is made of imitation wood, I´ll put you in the graveyard.

vague

The precise locations of sailors who meet a WATERY GRAVE are vague.

grave

The soil under a graveyard is full of graves.

livelihood

He made a livelihood out of robbing GRAVEYARDS in broad DAYlight.

membrane

In the moonlight of the graveyard I hear a zombie say, MMMMM..EMM...BRANEsssss.

seedling

If you plant seedlings in a FIELD eventually they will FLOWER. When your wife´s LEGs get huge hairs on them it is surely a bad portent for things to come.

222 223 224 225

株 若 草 苦

227

寛 薄

228

葉

226

229 230 231 232 233 234 235 236

模 漠 墓 暮 膜 苗 兆 桃

leaf

portent

stare

The pits of a peach tree look like turtles. Sauron´s One fiery eye stare at Frodo and it is a sign of portent. Evil will become whomever the eye is staring upon.

dog

A large dog, dripping drool. It was left to the turtle to make right with the dog and thus maintain the status quo.. The computer won´t stop beeping, which is making the chihauhua bark, and it´s driving this guy insane. The only solution he can come up with is to throw them both on the fire and finally enjoy the silence. Flesh of a dog over a cooking fire = "hotdog". There are all sorts of things in hot dogs. Believe me, you don´t want to know what sort of things . Visualize the hotdog curling as it cooks, to remember the unusual way the flesh primitive curves in this kanji. (tweaked version of ziggr´s. Thanks!). REEDS are the only FLOWERS that WILD DOGS like to FIRE up and smoke while they are playing poker. Actually when hunting it may be a good idea to use a pack of dogs as your personal guard.

peach tree

238

眺 犬

239

状

status quo

240

黙

silence

241

然

sort of thing

242

荻

reed

237

244

狩 猫

245

牛

243

246

特

hunt

cow

The cat hid in the FLOWERS of the FIELD from the WILD DOGs. A cow tried to climb up a vermilion tree, but in doing so, it broke its two bottom branches off.

special

Think of not special people, but special animals. The sacred Hindu cows are special they can wander around the temple without fear of becoming roast beef.

cat

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

revelation

The revelation makes the cow´s mouth drop down, "Hamburgers are made of what?!".

before

I´ve never seen a cow with human legs before!

248

告 先

249

洗

wash

In Japan, you always wash with water from the shower before you enter the bathtub.

250

介

jammed in

251

界

world

The two strokes at the bottom look like a J and I, which stands for "jammed in.". One Japanese farmer I know is so small minded that he thinks the entire world is JAMMED IN the borders of his little RICE FIELD. Some people think drinking tea is boring and quaint. That´s why I spice mine up by adding a cocktail umbrella, which of course is made from a wood-en toothpick supporting a paper umbrella with flowers printed on top.

247

252 253 254 255 256 257 258 259 260

茶 合 塔 王 玉 宝 珠 現 狂

262

皇 呈

263

全

261

tea

pagoda

I wouldn´t mind a meeting of mouths with her, she´s really fit ! In order to build a pagoda in this small Japanese garden everything has to fit: the soil to the left and the flowers in the upper right corner.

king

To be king you have to be a real crafty one !

jewel

The king is said to have only one family jewel below the belt...

treasure

On treasure island is a single house - where all the jewels are stored.

pearl

The king of the Oysters produces special Vermillion pearls! The KING ... can SEE clearly the PRESENT state of affairs in the land. (maybe he hees them in the crystal ball on the left?).

fit

present lunatic

emperor

plug

The mouth of the king is displaying his bling. The fat king hogs the whole space under his umbrella. (tweaked version of radical tyro´s story. "fat" makes a more vivid image for me.). The fat king under his umbrella offers useless advice to the workers. "You´ll need the whole tree to plug that gap". Imagine a grossly fat, incompetent king under a parasol giving annoying advice to sweating workers who know what they´re doing. (I always have trouble bringing up the "whole" primitive. This story reminds me how to build that part. ).

logic

The king of LOGIC is the computer.

lord

A lord is a little drop down from King in hierarchy. Visualize an idiot trying to figure out how to extinguish a candle. He sees a glass of WATER and decides to pour it onto the CANDLESTICK to put it out. Water spills everywhere. The main pillar in a house should be made of the biggest and strongest tree - the lord of the trees. The fat king taking up the whole space under the umbrella actually isn´t fat - he just has two big gold bars hidden under his clothes.

display whole

266

栓 理 主

267

注

pour

268

柱

pillar

264 265

270

金 銑

271

鉢

269

Oh no ! A pack of dogs has bitten the king. He has turned into a rabid lunatic ! Ancient Rome had Emperors instead of Kings, and they wore white robes. Thus an emperor is a king in white. (make sure you picture a roman emperor not a japanese one and you´ll be ok).

gold pig iron bowl

Pig iron is basic/crude metal, that is, before it has been processed. This is the BOWL of an alchemist: see how he mixes metals in his bowl, as he follows the instructions from his book?

koohiiStory1 I can´t believe no one has used this one yet: Copper is metal which looks almost the same as gold. Really, look it up on Wikipedia, it´s yellow and it´s shiny (atleast in some compounds)!

#

kanji

keyword

272

銅

copper

273

釣

angling

274

針

needle

All the people that go to the Japanese festivals to catch fish part time are suckers. Me? I´m a pro. I bring a big-ass golden ladle. I´m a true ANGLING professional. Remember the story of the needle in the haystack. Why would someone even look for a needle if it wasn´t a GOLD NEEDLE?

inscription

A piece of metal with a name on it. Well, this is basically the definition of inscription.

tranquillize road-way

Tranquilize - using a metal syringe to get the truth. When we go out on the ROAD-WAY, we often risk our own necks (that´s why I take the train! ).

guidance

For guidance on the road-way, glue a GPS unit to your car.

crossing

Cross-road.

swift

The car went too swiftly through the crossing and was hooked by the cops.

create

A cow creates a road by eating all the grass on its path.

275 276

銘 鎮

281

道 導 辻 迅 造

282

迫

urge

283

逃

escape

When you have the URGE to go to White Castle, you know it´s time to hit the road. I used my pants to make a rope, which I then used to escape from prison; hence the naked, hairy legs running along the road!

environs

Caution: this kanji doesn´t mean environment; it means "environs; boundary; border; vicinity". To separate the environs, create the border by placing daggers on the road.

patrol

The cops don´t PATROL anymore - they just flood the road.

car

My car is so fast it can go through ten rice fields in ten minutes. When you put your car on the road you should always take along a few friends. Don´t confuse with carry (#303).

277 278 279 280

284 285 286 287 288

辺 巡 車 連 軌

take along rut

290

輸 前

291

各

each

292

格

status

289

293 294 295 296

略 客 額 夏

transport in front

abbreviation

My car got so stuck in a rut it required nine people pushing to get it out again. The car is a cattle-car, used to transport animals for the butcher´s meeting - a convention on new butchering techniques. Hear the screams of the animals as it pulls up in front of the convention hall, where the butchers are waiting with their knives out front. When I get horny my flesh sword sticks out in front of me. Son, I´ve never told you this but each woman has a second mouth between their fiiiiiine walking legs. Ranger! I want you to go check the status of each tree. "Errr, Each tree sir?" replies the ranger looking out over the vast forest. "That´s Right, I want the status of each tree! Move out!". There are so many abbreviations and acronyms nowadays that no brain can remember each of them. Mnemonic: ab-brain-each-ation.

forehead

Each person under my roof is treated as a guest. Sign the guestbook page with your forehead. (Picture a guestbook full of forehead prints like thumbprints).

summer

In SUMMER you are hot from the top of your head down to your walking legs.

guest

#

kanji

keyword

297

処

dispose

298 299

条 落

twig fall

301

冗 軍

302

輝

radiance

303

運

carry

300

superfluous army

receive

In basketball however, tall children receive all the attention.

cram school

Welcome to our cram school: you will receive a rounded education on our grounds.

mellow

Imagine tall children sitting round the fire toasting marsh-mellows.

pavilion

The Pavillion on crown street is the tallest I have ever seen.

capital refreshing

Tokyo, capital of Japan: tall buildings, small people (compared to the buildings). When you´re a tourist in the capital during the heat of summer, finding a water fountain is oh, so refreshing.

scenery

Imaging the sun rising over the capital--classic postcard scenery.

whale

gentleman

If fish were cities, the whale would surely be the capital. The cottage is so small - it has an umbrella for the roof; soil for the floor and room for only one mouth. If my LIDDED CROCK has the same CIRCUMFERENCE as my head, I like to use it as a HELMET. Imagine a road built so well that it takes only a week to travel the circumference of the earth. What a handsome gentleman. Standing up so straight, and broad shoulders too!! He´s like a modern samurai!

good luck

The samurai´s wife gives him a (uhum) before battle for good luck.

robust

Half of a turtle shell as a shield makes a samurai more robust.

villa

A villa is fancier (decorated with flowers) and more robust than the average.

crown

305

夢

dream

306

坑

pit

308

311

塾 熟 亭

312

京

309 310

315

涼 景 鯨

316

舎

cottage

317

周

circumference

318

週

week

313 314

319 320 321 322

士 吉 壮 荘

British army cars are at the service of the crown. Rays of light emitted from Apollo´s chariot = radiance. Don´t put the sun into this kanji. The rays are coming from the chariot directly! Don’t confuse it with “take along” (287). In that one, there was a car so you could take along your friends once you found them on the road. In this one, there is an army chariot just to carry military supplies (sorry no room for you).

tall

冠

高 享

Water each flower or the petals will wither and fall. The king´s crown was blown off by the wind. "Oh well," he said, "it´s just a superfluous symbol.".

Remember the SUPERFLUOUS CROWN that flew away in the WIND? Well now the king is saying "i should have had the thing GLUED to my head from the BEGINNING". Last night´s date with Miss Sweden was like a dream. She even laid flowers over my eyes to crown the perfect evening. A whirlwind digs a hole in the ground throwing out lots of dirt until it ends up with a giant pit. Two little aliens in a trenchcoat and top hat, trying to look TALL. The bottom one, in the glass helmet, is under the coat. The top one has his top hat pulled down in disguise, so all you can see is his mouth.

304

307

koohiiStory1 The best way to dispose of a nasty bit of wind is to let it go and use those walking legs to dissapear. Nobody will ever know it was you. They all say they have a TREE between their WALKING LEGS but most only have a TWIG.

koohiiStory1 The samurai happened to find an extra large crown that he wore as a belt on his waist, just above his legs. I wonder if he will sell it to me?

#

kanji

keyword

323

売

sell

324

学

study

325

覚

memorize

326

栄

flourish

In the school house there are kids always studying. (BTW, atomiton, this is NOT 字). In a schoolhouse in class: 1) you see something on the blackboard, then 2) you memorize it. The TREES FLOURISH in the CLASSROOM, a little too much perhaps, there´s no room for the students any more.

write

Make sure you practice writing kanji with a brush every day before the sun goes down.

haven

A brush laying in dirty water is a haven for bacteria.

breed

Imagine a taskmaster giving a cow the command to "start breeding, and start doing it now!", except that the cow takes his advice a bit too literally and starts chasing the taskmaster to carry out this command! instead of finding another cow to breed with. Hence, you see the taskmaster running to the right, trying to stay ahead of the cow.

aggression

Aggression is the craft of a good dominatrix.

failure

If you end up in failure, you give money to the taskmaster to train you. The taskmaster is a strict bathroom monitor who hands out only one sheet of really rough, splintery toilet paper per person. You can see the wood fibers. An OLD TASKMASTER is no happenstance (coincidence). The older you get the more rigid in your ways.

327 328

書 津

331

牧 攻 敗

332

枚

329 330

333 334 335 336 337

故 敬 言 警 計

339

獄 訂

340

討

338

341

訓

a sheet of happenstance

say

The flowery phrases of the schoolmaster held the students in awe. A pictogram of someone saying a four letter word from their mouth after the censors have gotten a hold of it.

admonish

To admonish is to enforce awe by means of words.

plot

A plot is a summary of a book that can be given in ten words. The wild dog family visits their cousin in prison. They exchange words over the interphone at the visiting booth.

awe

prison revise chastise

instruction

343

詔 詰

344

話

tale

345

詠

recitation

342

imperial edict packed

Revise, revise and revise until you have all the words nailed down. I said some bad words, and my mother chastised me by washing my mouth out with glue instead of soap! The best type of Japanese INSTRUCTION is full immersion, which consists of going to Japan and swimming in the stream of words that surrounds you every day. The mnemonic "words to seduce the masses" was just too vague and I kept forgetting it. So now instead I picture a seductive female reading aloud the imperial edict to the masses, thus "seducing" the masses. WORDS of GOOD LUCK are PACKED into fortune cookies. Tales are always spoken, not written, and because of this, words fly out of your tongue, rather than your pen. Listening to the words in a recitation of Vogon poetry is worse than spending an eternity in hell. [Note: I assume those 2 reports are to warn against possible confusion with poem (#346) but how can you confuse Vogon poetry with an actual poem? Anyway, it´s the next frame, so it should be easy to keep them straight... Or maybe there´s a kanji for Vogon in RTK3?].

#

kanji

348

詩 語 読

349

調

346 347

keyword

koohiiStory1

poem

A poem is a temple of words.

word

The simplest word to say is I.

read

discuss

Read the WORDS used to SELL things. To tune an old-fashioned radio, you turn the dial the full range of the circumference, until you can clearly hear what´s being said. Think of an online discussion group where misunderstanding someone´s words leads to flaming. An angry discussion = inflamed words.

consent

The words of the very young are useless without CONSENT from their elders.

rebuke

A PETA activist speaks at a meeting of butchers to rebuke them.

style

Each Indian tribe crafts their arrows in a certain style..

load

In an essay test, you are judged on both your choice of words and your writing style. II (older form of writing 2). After shooting one arrow (the dash top left), I have 2 arrows left in my quiver (bottom left). An astronaut lands back at the launch range, kisses the earth beneath him with his mouth, then heads off to a fiesta to celebrate a safe flight. Burglars... those guys!!! Burglars only want money (clams) so that they can get needles (drugs) and party (fiesta)! The plantation is where we get our Christmas trees. We pick them out at Thanksgiving to be sure we get a good one. After eating a big Thanksgiving dinner, you have to be careful in the car ride home not to drop a load in your pants.

overgrown

The gay parade looks astonishing, as if overgrown with flowers.

turn into

It only takes a single stroke of a dagger for a parade to TURN INTO a bloodbath.

castle

The sand castle is just the soil (#150) that turns into a castle.

sincerity

Sincerity happens when what you say actually turns into something. The march of women - against intimidation in the workplace - is pretty intimidating in itself!

tune

353

談 諾 諭 式

354

試

test

355

弐

II (two)

356

域

range

357

賊

burglar

358

栽

plantation

350 351 352

359 360 361 362 363

載 茂 成 城 誠

365

威 滅

366

減

dwindle

367

桟

scaffold

364

369

銭 浅

370

止

368

371 372

歩 渉

intimidate destroy

coin

Water flows down to destroy the march of fire. When WATER was tossed on the PROTESTORS (a march of mouths), the numbers began to DWINDLE. Japanese festival floats are often so tall they need wood scaffolds to be completed. (http://www.japan-guide.com/e/e5909.html). Political hopefuls in Rome threw gold COINS from floats when they were campaigning for office.

stop

The water can´t be too SHALLOW if you expect to float. If you find in the ground a walking stick with a magic wand, STOP! Maybe it´s some kind of macumba/black magic/voodoo bad thing.

walk

When walking your pet, you must stop a few times along the way when nature calls.

ford

The new Ford Jesus. It can do everything except WALK on WATER.

shallow

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

373

頻

repeatedly

374

肯

agreement

375

企

undertake

I repeatedly walk around hoping this kanji will come into my head. I repeatedly walk around hoping this kanji will come into my head. I repeatedly walk around hoping this kanji will come into my head. I repeatedly walk around hoping this kanji will come into my head. I repeatedly walk around hoping this kanji will come into my head. A secret agreement between a covert gov´t agency and aliens states that we will not step foot on the moon again in return for alien technology. Mary Poppins floated down with her umbrella to undertake the job of stopping the children´s misbehaving.

curriculum

A CURRICULUM is a calendar that replaces days with reasons to stop having fun.

warrior

ONE-ARROW can STOP a warrior.

levy

A warrior stands guard at a bridge collecting shells as a levy for any who want to pass.

correct

If you do it correct on the first attempt you can stop.

evidence

Your words must be absolutely correct if you plan to use them as evidence.

politics

Those involved in politics are always trying to elect the correct taskmaster. In The Karate Kid, the boy must prove his determination by MENDING his teacher´s HOUSE in various ways.

376 377 378 379 380 381

歴 武 賦 正 証 政

383

定 錠

384

走

run

385

超

transcend

386

赴

proceed

382

387 388 389 390

391 392

393 394

越 是 題 堤

建 延 誕 礎

determine lock

surpass

Even if you lock up your GOLD, a DETERMINED thief will get it in the end. Hint: This kanji is NOT soil on top of mend, as Heisig claims - that would duplicate one of the strokes. Instead, it is 10 on top of mend. So my story is: If you run 10 miles, you will need to mend your socks! A successful marathon runner needs to be able to transcend seductions, such as the possibility of rest, shelter from the rain, or a cold beer. Don´t run into trouble, Dumbledore tells Harry. "Proceed with caution with your wand out.". The person in charge of running the parade surpassed all our expectations (by just a extra drop...).

topic

´Sun´ ´Mend´ - It just so happens that sunshine can mend your gloomy spirits. The "TOPIC" of the day´s newspaper must be placed JUST SO at the top of the PAGE to attract attention.

dike

Making a dike is all about arranging the soil just so....

build

Build is easy to remember if you can remember that archtiechts have two steps in building. 1. Take a brush and brush out the blueprints. 2. Get a visual image of the blueprints all rolled up like they usually are. The second step is easy, it´s just the architecht stretching out the blueprints and showing it to his clients.

just so

nativity

Stretching correctly prolongs life. Even the top part of 正 is stretching... Nativity = born, being born. Think of birth as a painful and prolonged event. And of course, all the words and curses being yelled at the soon-to-be father for doing this to her!

cornerstone

Features like stones and groves of trees are the cornerstones of a happy zoo.

prolong

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

bridegroom

The virgin bridegroom tries to understand the new, mysterious part of his woman´s body - but with little success. It´s a zoo down there! (primitives placement: the part of the body is ´down there´ - the woman is ´left´ unsatisfied).

396

婿 衣

397

裁

tailor

398

装

attire

395

garment

399

裏

back

400

壊

demolition

401

哀

pathetic

402

遠

distant

403

猿

monkey

405

初 布

406

帆

sail

407

幅

hanging scroll

408

帽

cap

404

first time

Keep distant from a lidded crock on the road wrapped in a scarf. It might be a bomb. The MONKEY likes to play hide and seek with the PACK of WILD DOGS by hiding in the LIDDED CROCK. But he is easy to see because the SCARF he always wears is at the base of the LIDDED CROCK. This is the first time we´ve been out of the Shire, Mr. Frodo! Says Sam, covering himself with his cloak and clutching his dagger.

curtain canopy

A canopy is a towel to block the suns rays.

brocade

Brocade is the art of sewing gold on a white towel. My recurring nightmare: Walking through the market, and suddenly realizing that I´m wearing only a top hat...and a towel. Unlike the younger sister (妹), who is not yet old enough to date... the elder sister is on the market! LUNGS are a PART of the BODY that can be found at any meat MARKET or black MARKET.

411 412

市

market

413

姉

elder sister

414

肺

lungs

410

The computer had carefully dressed up in clothes to look human. It was n´t until I looked at the back and saw the cables and stuff that I realized what it was. If you stand too close to a DEMOLITION site, the dust might sting you like NEEDLES in your EYE and get your GARMENTs all dirty. One of my friends with a crazy sense of fashion loves to wear a tophat and a scarf so that you can´t see his whole face but only his mouth. He thinks it´s cool. I think it´s pathetic.

A matador holding his red linen by his side. When stranded at sea, we needed a Sail. The best we had was a TOWEL, which was MEDICORE, only catching a DROP of WIND. In the west, the rich use $100 bills to light their cigars... In Japan, after showering, when the wealthy don´t have any clean towels, they simply grab a hanging scroll off the wall and use it to dry off! If you wear a towel as a cap, you are at risk of being seized and searched in U.S. airports. There is a graveyard outside my house that scares me, so I put a huge towel over the window to serve as a curtain so I can get a good nights sleep.

linen

幕 幌 錦

409

The only garments allowed in this club are top hat and scarf. The tailor was hard at work making sure all the pilgrims were dressed in their best garments for thanksgiving. The TURTLE SAMURAI needs special GARMENTs for his ATTIRE since his body is much more ROBUST than others.

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

415

帯

sash

416

滞

stagnate

First, note that the top half of the kanji consists of one and mountain. Of course, the "number 1" mountain in Japan is Mt. Fuji. The bottom half, under Mt. Fuji, consists of crown and towel. Now for the story. Archaeologists digging under Mt. Fuji (Japan´s #1 mountain) in an ancient royal tomb (they know it´s royal because of the crown) discover what looks like a towel, but after they clean it up, they see it is actually a splendid royal sash for the king´s kimono. History of the first karate blackbelts: In those days, it was often difficult to find fresh, clean water, so samurai usually had to wash their sashes in stagnant puddles. The longer one had been studying martial arts, the older the sash on one´s karate uniform and, therefore, the darker the color. So why weren´t their karate uniforms black too? Never seen a ninja????

thorn

A TREE with a BELT wrapped around the middle. If you tighten the BELT, hundreds of tiny SABERS pop out of the tree in all directions, looking like THORNS.

system

The system for making leather belts involves slicing up a cow with a sword.

made in...

technique

Made in china - a system of exploitation . making garments for nothing. The REVOLVING wheels of the car (with REVOLVER blaring on the stereo) kicked up RISING CLOUDS of dust. Imagine an old Kung-fu movie: "Try my rising cloud flower technique!!!" smash pow crack!! .

rain

From the ceiling hangs a towel dripping four drops like RAIN.

cloud

Every rising cloud is a potential rain cloud. (Thanks astridtops).

cloudy weather

frost

Cloudy weather is when a cloud blocks the sun (up above). If it´s raining and you´re standing in the middle of a rice field, you´re sure to soon become acquainted with the thunder up close and personal. FROST is kind of an inter-weather, phenomenon, something between rain, snow and freezing temp’s.

winter

Don´t slip off your legs in winter, strap two skis to your feet.

heavens

If you think of the sky as a ceiling above our heads, here you have the heavens as the largest ceiling you could ever imagine. As Heisig pointed out, nothing comes above the ceiling primitive thus the order of primitives is taken care of.

bridge

The nicest bridge is not in Hollywood or Los Angeles, but in San Francisco.

attractive

The most attractive woman in the world is obviously Angelina Jolie.

stand up

419

刺 制 製

420

転

417 418

424

芸 雨 雲 曇

425

雷

421 422 423

426 427

霜 冬

revolve

thunder

431

天 橋 嬌 立

432

泣

cry

433

章

badge

434

競

vie

A vase that can´t stand up won´t be a vase for long. Guys have two ways of watering when they are standing, the less common one is crying. In the military, badges are given out early in the day, with everyone standing at attention. TWO twin BROTHERS are competing (VYING) for the title of who is the older BROTHER. The game is that they must balance a VASE on their head and the one who drops his looses and becomes the younger BROTHER!

sovereign

The crazy sovereign stands up from his throne, wearing nothing but a crown and a towel. That´s why they try to keep him locked up in the castle away from the public.

428 429 430

435

帝

# 436 437 438

kanji

童 瞳 鐘

keyword

koohiiStory1

juvenile

The juvenile stood on top of his computer and broke it. Noob.

pupil

In Japanese comics, the eye´s of juvenilles all have enormouse pupils.

bell

The METAL bell rings to call the JUVENILES to class.

439

商

make a deal

440

嫡

legitimate wife

441

適

suitable

442

滴

drip

443

敵

enemy

444

匕

spoon

445 446 447 448 449 450

北 背 比 昆 皆 混

452

渇 謁

453

褐

451

454 455 456 457 458 459

喝 旨 脂 壱 毎 敏

I use what I think is the real etymology for this kanji which is so shocking it sticks. The STANDING member at the top is a certain part of the body that all men have and it is approaching the HOLE between TWO LEGS (the HOOD) with extra marks to show they are FLESHY - ie a womans legs. So this shows the oldest DEAL of all time - prostitution. Legitmate wifes tend to be women who are antiques in contrast to the young bit of illigitmate fluff on the side. Think of the term from televison "suitable for all audiences" to get the sense of the word. What program could be more suitable for the whole family than the "antiques road(show)". DRIPS of WATER were collected in ANTIQUE VASES since the museum had a leaky roof. The taskmaster became my enemy for life when he smashed the antique vase holding my wife´s ashes. To remember the primitive meaning, picture someone sitting on the ground performing Seppuku...with a spoon. http://tinyurl.com/co48k.

stature

Warning: The left part is NOT the primitive turtle! The stroke order is different. Sometimes it will look exactly the same but not always depending on the font / style used to draw this character. Be sure to study the difference! While japanese people are generally small, people in the northern contryes have taller stature because of all the flesh they eat!

compare

A gay couple about to turn around to compare which role is better...

descendants

Grandparent spends all DAY COMPARING photos of their DESCENDANTS. If you compare colors, you will find that white is produced from the mix of all the others.

north

all mix thirst

People have to mix their fluids (have sex), in order to create descendants. You awaken from your siesta because you feel extremely thirsty so you go looking for some water.

brown

The talk was so boring the audience took a siesta. Why is my package late? Imagine a UPS driver dressed in BROWN garments taking a siesta. What can BROWN do for you?

hoarse

If you have a siesta with your mouthopen, you will wake up with a hoarse voice.

delicious

Use a spoon to eat a DELICIOUS hot fudge sundae. Duh..

fat I (one)

Every chef will tell you, fat is what make the meat taste delicious. I am ´the one´ , says the samurai with the crown around his waist and a spoon up his a***.

every

Freud believed every man wants to lie down with his mother.

cleverness

Every master(or taskmaster) must have some degree of cleverness.

audience

#

kanji

plum

koohiiStory1 Plums actually grow on every single tree. What, you didn´t know that? They do. Orange trees, apple trees, cantaloupe trees. Plums are simply mutant fruits that have been installed in the root software of every single tree. I hear that some plum-loving scientists are working on a way to hack every tree´s genetic code so that every tree will bear nothing _but_ plums.

sea

Every drop of water will eventually return to the sea.

beg

Lying down, Captain Hook is begging to be spared from the ticking crocodile.

drought

During a drought, everything begs for even a mist for relief.

abdomen

The only body part that doubles over. My girlfiend saw someone wearing the exact same (duplicate) outfit at a party, so she doubled back to change!

keyword

464

梅 海 乞 乾 腹

465

複

duplicate

466

欠

lack

460 461 462 463

467 468 469 470 471

吹 炊 歌 軟 次

blow

To me, this kanji looks like a person with two arms and two legs, but who lacks a head. This is clearly a BLOWJOB, we can see the MOUTH and the LACK OF condom. (I am sorry for the image, but it sticks forever in your mind).

cook

Japanese cooking sometimes lacks fire, e.g., sashimi.

song

Can-Can-ers lack the ability to sing a song, so they just dance.

soft

Cars are rough steel things, lacking softness.

next

Is this store lacking ice? Let´s try the next one, then. To prevent animals from eating the beautiful flowers in your garden, the best thing to do is to plant briar bushes immediately next to them.

473

茨 資

474

姿

figure

475

諮

consult with

476

賠

compensation

477

培

cultivate

472

briar assets

Assets are the next best thing to money. The next woman always has a better figure! Thinking like that, you´ll end up alone in an old folks home longing for the good old days! Having a word with the next mouth over, like a neighbor, is usually a good way to consult with somebody for cheap. Because, you know, actual consultants charge huge sums. Compensation is money you give to someone to shut them up (i.e. muzzle their mouth). To cultivate the land is to tame it, control it. In short, you muzzle it´s unruly, chaotic nature. When you DIVIDE someone, there is sure to be a lot of screaming. That´s why you should use a MUZZLE before using the SABER.

479

剖 音

480

暗

darkness

If you were standing on the sun, believe me, you´d be making sound. Picture the sun exploding - there would be a gigantic noise and then...nothing. Everything would plunge into darkness.

481

韻

rhyme

What is a RHYME but some SOUND that EMPLOYEES say to get them through work.

482

識

discriminating

483

鏡

mirror

484

境

boundary

Words are difficult to discriminate/discern from sounds in the middle of a fiesta. Mirror should suggest vanity. Imagine a spoiled girl who gets her parents to buy her a Golden mirror so she can stand in front of it all day vainly admiring her lovely human legs. In the dense cities of Japan even a small garden is a luxury. In this house, the owner has put mirrors on the boundary of his land so it feels much bigger.

478

divide sound

#

kanji

486

亡 盲

487

妄

485

489

荒 望

490

方

488

491 492 493 494 495 496 497 498 499 500

妨 坊 芳 肪 訪 放 激 脱 説 鋭

504

曽 増 贈 東

505

棟

501 502 503

506 507

凍 妊

510

廷 染 燃

511

賓

508 509

keyword

koohiiStory1

deceased

The top hat hanging on a hook belonged to the now deceased Charlie Chaplin.

blind

Deceased eyes! Easy ;). I had a problem with remembering that "deceased" went over the "woman". So, here´s my story: The delusional woman was carrying her deceased husband on her back. After Godzilla laid waste to the city, the survivors put some flowers on the bodies of the deceased and floated their bodies down the stream.

delusion laid waste ambition

direction

disturb

You´re dead meat, buddy, my ambition is to be king. Note: The primitives are top hat and bound up. Compare ten thousand (#64). Story: A rich man wearing a top hat and bound up from head to toe hobbles up to you and asks for directions to the nearest police station because he just escaped from his kidnappers. Capt. Jack Sparrow´s compass gets disturbed every time a beautiful woman walks by him (just picture Keira Knightley in her sexy asian outfit as Elizabeth and the image will be fixed forever).

perfumed

Little boys always head in the direction of mud and dirt. She used a perfume so strong, that you can track her by following the direction of the smell of flowers.

obese

Flesh in all directions = obese.

call on

When you call on someone, you point your words in their direction.

set free

Go in any direction away from your taskmaster when you are set free. When the taskmaster found his favorite white compas damaged by water, he became the most violent taskmaster there ever was.

boy

violent undress explanation

HORNY TEENAGERS love to UNDRESS FLESH. The words of a horny teenager typically fall into one of two categories: either rumors or explanations.

formerly

Pointed is the metal devil´s pitchfork. The Artist formerly Known as Prince has the horniest brain around, and I think you can imagine what his wagging tongue is doing...

increase

Prices always INCREASE for LAND that was FORMERLY cheaper.

presents

Presents represent money that was formerly yours.

east

Traditionally seen as a pictograph of the sun rising behind a tree.

ridgepole

Feng Shui states that the ridgepole of a house should be made of wood and face east. Eastern Siberia is often frozen by ice. According to wikipedia, Yakutia (in Eastern Siberia) holds the record as the coldest town on Earth. Check it out yourself...it made it stick for me!

pointed

frozen

courts

A pregnant woman is a porter of her child. A porter has run away from his master. His punishment is to be stretched out on the rack. So say the courts in this barbaric time.

dye

To make this dye, I used water and the barks of nine different trees.

burn

Any sort of thing can burn in the fire. This house is reserved to V.I.P. only. If you are not one of the few with enough money to call you that way, keep out!

pregnancy

V.I.P.

#

kanji

keyword

512

歳

year-end

koohiiStory1 Santa had to put his foot down to stop a march of little guys, namely elves. They were protesting the harsh treatment they get every year-end when Santa asks them to step up toy production for the holiday season.

513

県

prefecture

514

栃

horse chestnut

515

地

ground

516

池

pond

517

虫

insect

518

蛍

lightning bug

519

蛇

snake

<span style=" font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; ">In Japanese this is KEN, as in Barbie´s boyfriend. He has lovely blue <span style="font-style: normal; ">eyes<span style="font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; ">, a girlfriend who is as thin as a straightened out <span style="font-style: normal; ">fish hook<span style="font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; ">. But, down where it counts, he has very <span style="fontstyle: normal; ">little<span style="font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; "> to show... There are a bunch of HORSE CHESTNUT TREES on top of this CLIFF above the beach. Chestnuts keep rolling off the cliff and falling on people´s heads. So far TEN THOUSAND people have been killed by falling chestnuts, and the Japanese government still ain´t did shit about it. Picture the ground as an extent of soil where scorpions are buried like land mines. Imagine a sign post saying ´no trespassing, scorpion mines´ if that helps, and how it is dangerous to walk there. Remember the story of the scorpion that begged the turtle for a ride across the pond? Halfway across the water, the scorpion stung the turtle on the neck and they both sank to the bottom. I see the bottom of this kanji as an arm, and the top is an insect biting into the arm, sucking some blood. Bugs have to go to school to learn how to become lightning bugs. Only the brightest bugs graduate to become lightning bugs. A snake eats insects and he does that outside, while we eat another snake in the house and preferably with a spoon. Little is it known that a rainbow is actually created by insects of different colours flying in formation, a craft they have perfected to create the rainbows we see today.

520

虹

rainbow

521

蝶

butterfly

522

独

single

523

蚕

silkworm

A butterfly is an insect that appears after spending a generation on a tree as a cocoon. The bachelor´s apartment looked like it had been attacked by a pack of wild dogs. There were even insects in the kitchen. No wonder he´s single! There are no insects in heaven - well, that is, except for silkworms. What, do you expect Jesus to import his fancy robes from China?

524

風

wind

525

己

self

They say that when an INSECT flaps its wings even the single DROP of WIND that it creates is sometimes enough to create a hurricane on the other side of the Earth. This kanji looks like the "s" of "self", looking at its own reflection in a mirror (reversed sideways), as if pondering about his "self".

rouse

Be careful when you´re RUNNING through the jungle, because you might step on and ROUSE a sleeping SNAKE. Then you´ll have to RUN like hell before it bites you!

527

起 妃

528

改

526

queen

reformation

Cleopatra. The taskmaster of Slytherin ( wizardry house symbolized by a snake ) plans a reformation of Hogwarts, disallowing the study of magic to all muggle-born. こわいですね！.

# 529 530

kanji

記 包

keyword

koohiiStory1

scribe

A scribe writes down the words spoken by a snake (i.e. a lawyer).

wrap placenta

The snake bound up its prey by wrapping his body around it. Imagine a newborn baby, fresh out of the womb, being entirely wrapped by the long piece of flesh, called a placenta, that once fed him.

cannon

Primitive cannons fired stones wrapped with poisonous snakes.

bubble

dragon

When water forms a bubble, it wraps a pocket of air. It seems bizarre, but tortoises are a genetic cross with the head of a fish and the tail of an eel. Where the shell comes from, no one knows. Think of a two natural sources of electricity: electrical storms (a form of weather) and electrical eels. 電話 でんわ phone, call. Have you ever seen an asian DRAGON? it looks like an eel, but can stand up because it has legs.

waterfall

The Water Dragon dwells in the waterfall.

pork

Pork comes from the flesh of a sow. In association with consummate (#540), our sow is on the road pursuing a mate. This is still Miss Piggy only she´s gotten horny (as she often does) and now she´s pursuing Kermit to help her consummate her desires. Think of "The Three Little Pigs". There was a house made of straw, another made of sticks, and a third made of bricks, each occupied by a pig. So, naturally, housetop over pig means house, the central element of that story. Since the Nihonjin man is hardly ever home, the woman feels more like she´s married into the house than into a relationship. In Orwell´s ´Animal Farm´ the pigs overpowered every other animals. They crownded themselves as ruler of the farm and walked tall on their rear legs, a crime strictly forbidden in the animal republic. Intestines are the part of the body that is taken out of piglets to make piggy banks. Just imagine factory workers scraping out the intestines of real piglets and packaging them up for little children.

533

胞 砲 泡

534

亀

tortoise

535

電

electricity

531 532

538

竜 滝 豚

539

逐

pursue

540

遂

consummate

541

家

house

542

嫁

marry into

543

豪

overpowering

544

腸

intestines

545

場

location

546

湯

hot water

You´re looking for a good location to bury your piggy bank savings. It has to be in some soft soil that´s easy to dig up, well hidden, and easy to remember like this kanji. Imagine a hot water kettle for your tea, except this one is a pink piggy bank that pours the water from its snout (and squeals when the water is piping hot). Make sure to use a potholder!

547

羊

sheep

Picture of a sheep run over by a steam roller. Must have been a ram, note the horns.

beauty

I guess this kanji proves it´s not just the Welsh whose idea of beauty is a large sheep.

ocean

This kanji refers to the waters of the Pasheephic ocean.

536 537

548 549

美 洋

550

詳

detailed

Trembling from head to hoof from such a traumatic experience, the sheep gives a very detailed worded account to the detective about his wolf attack. "We need more details Mr. Sheep. Tell us exactly where the baaad man touched you".

551

鮮

fresh

The freshest fish is caught in the middle of the night while most people are "counting sheep." (If you´ve ever been to Tsukiji fish market, you know what I mean).

#

552

553

kanji

達 羨

keyword

koohiiStory1

accomplished

Dolly (the first cloned sheep ever) grow tired of being a celebrity and escaped from the labs by digging a tunnel. She turned out to be an ACCOMPLISHED escapist, as she managed to dig a road under the soil. /Imagine Dolly performing a escape, like those movies where the main character has to escape from jail.

envious

555

差 着

556

唯

solely

557

焦

char

558

礁

reef

559

集

gather

554

560 561

准 進

distinction

A very thirsty sheep, who always lacked water, spends his days watching his fellow sheep (in the farm next door or in another pen) and being very envious of their water. This New-Zealand pro-gamer has won many distinctions playing WoolCraft (a massively multi-user game in which the goal is to shear sheep).

quasi-

A pullover is donned by pulling wool over your eyes. The mouth of a turkey is used solely for saying, "Gobble." Likewise, your mouth, full of turkey, is solely used to gobble it up. When I put the turkey over the oven fire, it always ends up being charred beyond recognition. I´m not a very good cook. Coral reefs are now dying off due to our abuse of the environment and now look like charred stone. For a picture illustrating this, see http://www.nacri.org/images/Hofdredgingfig8.jpg. Hunter-gathers, searching all along the ground for food. They never look up and see the Turkeys that have gathered on top of the trees to hide. Those were some smart turkeys! Quasi-modo, the famous hunchback of Notre-Dame wasn´t actually a hunchback at all!! He used a frozen turkey to make a hunch!

advance

Why did the turkey cross the road? To advance to the other side, of course.

miscellaneous

Newscast: "Among today´s miscellaneous stories, we have a report on a baseball team that was chased up a tree by a turkey. Stay tuned for this and more!".

don

563

雑 雌

564

準

semi-

565

奮

stirred up

566

奪

rob

Stop | spooning | turkeys. Spoon females. The anhinga, or water turkey, has a needle-like nose, so really it´s only a semi-turkey http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anhinga. The St. Bernard dog pounces on a turkey in a rice field and stirs up all the other birds around. See them all gobble gobbling in fear? Remember the scene in A Christmas Story where the big dogs robbed the family of their Christmas turkey? Well, the following year Ralphie´s mom glued the holiday bird to the kitchen table, just as a precaution.

assurance

To assure that no one will get into the Turkey coop, put a huge rock in the entrance!

noon

Noon is a good time for a ten minute nap (using lie down as nap).

permit

If horses could speak, you might have to ask their permission before mounting them.

delight

Imagine a spoiled little girl. Her delight when she gets a Pegasus for her birthday... and then like all spoilt little girls she gets bored of it quickly... hence the yawn.

562

568

確 午

569

許

567

570

歓

female

571

権

authority

572

観

outlook

I have Eric Cartman of the “South Park” animated series, wearing a cop uniform, riding a wooden Pegasus (such as on a funfair), and yelling “RESPECT MY AUTHORITAH!!!”. Microsoft Outlook works about as well as a pegasus that can´t see: they both crash all the time.

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

573

羽

feathers

574

習

learn

575

翌

the following

576

曜

weekday

Pictograph. Easy enough. Imagine a white bird loosing a couple feathers as it is learning to fly. You learn a lesson as you watch it doing so, maybe you learn that “nothing comes for free” or that “one has to be prepared to loose in order to gain”... The following segment is sponsored by...Swiffer - who make excellent feather dusters for cleaning your vases. Tip: feathers + turkey : This combination of primitives appears six times in Heisig, so it´s worthwhile giving it a name. I suggest "futon" (your futon is made from turkey feathers). REF: weekday (FRAME 576) , laundry (#577), leap (#1285), outstanding (#2272), twinkle (#2534), shimmering (#2880). Story: On weekdays you hang your futon out in the sun.

577

濯

laundry

578

曰

sayeth

580

困 固

581

国

country

582

団

group

579

quandary

At the laundry you stuff your large futon (made from turkey feathers) in the machine, thereby causing it to break -- as shown by the water spurting out the side. Sayeth?! Who the hell says "sayeth"? Doesn´t seem quite right...just like this kanji, which is just like "day" but doesn´t seem "quite right.". I´m supposed to make an enclosure for my tree, but if I use its wood for the enclosure, there won´t be anything left to be pent-in. What a quandary! Fossils are old things pent in that have hardened. In my country (England) the crown jewels are kept pent-in in the Tower of London. Which happens to be where enemies of the state were once also pent-in (probably for trying to steal those jewels). When you are admitted into a group like the Yakuza, you´re well and truly done (だん) for. You must stick to the group like glue, and you will be pent-in for life, never being able to leave.

harden

583

因

cause

584

姻

matrimony

We once had a dog with big paws // and oh what great trouble he´d cause // we built a huge pen // to keep him pent in // and stop him from breaking more laws //. Matrimony is the state in which the woman has got you pent in like a dog so that you cannot go after other bitches.

park

A nice picnic pent up in the park, with your crock pot and scarf (picnic blanket).

586

園 回

587

壇

podium

588

店

store

585

#NAME?

590

庫 庭

591

庁

government office

592

床

bed

589

593 594

麻 磨

warehouse

Write mouth two -times. A man on the podium announce the rules for the contest: You must fill a top hat with dirt as many times as you can by nightbreak. Try to remember all those stores from Zelda that were inside caves and had fortuneteller like vendors. I think of the Batcave. It´s a big cave that Batman uses as a warehouse to store his car, the Batmobile, and all his cool big-boy toys.

hemp

When the courthouse caved in, trials had to be held in the courtyard. Some bureaucrats at a government office decided that the tunnels of caves need to get street signs, which are then nailed to the walls of the cave. The two safe places to sleep in the wilderness are in a tree and in a cave. So these can be considered as beds. (Image: while Batman is out, Robin is smokin´ a huge doob in a secret corner of the Batcave where he nurtures his hemp grove).

grind

If you grind the hemp you are bound to get stoned quicker.

courtyard

#

595 596

kanji

心 忘

keyword

koohiiStory1

heart

The four chambers in the heart. In the West, we point to our head when asked about the mind. In the East, they point to the heart. So then, the radical for "state of mind"…　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　RTK2:　シン　安心　あん しん(peace of mind).

forget

You only truly forget her when she has perished in your heart.

597

忍

endure

598

認

acknowledge

599 600 601 602 603

忌 志 誌 忠 串

mourning

document

A samurai´s intentions always come from the heart. A will is an important document that contains your final word on how you intend to distribute your assets.

loyalty

Their true loyalty exists in the middle of their hearts.

shish kebab

Naka naka , "who´s there?" shish kebab .... "shish kebab who?". A person who is afflicted with the vampire disease can only be killed with a sheeshkebab through the heart.

intention

605

患 思

606

恩

grace

607

応

apply

604

afflicted think

609

意 想

610

息

breath

611

憩

recess

612

恵

favor

613

恐

fear

608

614 615

惑 感

A ninja must be able to endure the pain of clinging to a ceiling, motionless, for hours at a time, waiting for just the right moment to drop down and thrust the blade of his sword into the hearts of his enemies. By the way, this character is used in the compound 忍者 (ninja) which is why I choose to use ninja as its primitive meaning. You are given a speech about some serious mistakes of yours, and you have to endure the whole thing, because all you can do is acknowledge. Remember the tale of Cleopatra? She was MOURNING the loss of her Marc Antony, so she placed the asp SNAKE to her HEART.

idea

Think with your brain NOT your heart. Grace here is a favor freely bestowed, like a good deed. So to remember this kanji, go to the local shelter, find a big dog pent up in a small cage and adopt him. That will cause a warm feeling in your heart! In the videogame Zelda, Link enters a CAVE to visit a fairy that will APPLY magic to fill his HEART containers. When you get a good IDEA you get excited and you can hear the SOUND of your HEART, it´s pounding so hard.

beguile

The concept of love is basically two hearts inter-acting as one. Your breath brings oxygen in through your nose which is then pumped around your body by your heart. Recess to me is a school break. At recess some kiddies are comparing their latest body piercings. Tongues and noses are nothing special. The new cool is to have your heart done! Too easy. Imagine the Wizard of OZ. There, the three heroes asked the Wizard for three FAVORS: the lion wanted courage of TEN men, the scarecrow wanted a BRAIN, and the tin man wanted a HEART. Ok, the lion bit is stretching but you have it memorized now, so who cares? If your heart surgeon is mediocre in his craft, you have plenty of reason to fear. ("Oops, I think I left my scissors in there"). She was beguiled/mislead by his charm: at the party he kissed her on the mouth, they did it on the floor and thus he stole her heart. Poor girl!

emotion

Emotion is a march of mouths inside your heart telling you what to feel.

concept

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

616

憂

melancholy

617

寡

widow

Melancholy makes me think of Hamlet cause he was so ´emo´. In order to play up his feelings he bares his head and holds his crown over his heart then walks (on walking legs) around the palace making everyone see how melancholy he is. What a wuss. The new widow sits in the house, her head in her lap (the extended stroke), her dagger in her husband.

busy

Busy (as in "occupied") means a state of mind where all other thoughts are perished.

ecstasy constancy

ECSTASY alters our STATE OF MIND and makes us DEVILS. Constancy is holding the same state of mind over a long span of time. (tweaking PepeSeco and mspertus).

lament

When the world´s most eminent magician died, everyone´s state of mind became that of lamentation. He was buried with his famous sun-flower wand in his hand.

619

忙 悦

620

恒

618

622

悼 悟

623

怖

621

dreadful

Enlightenment is a state of mind that goes beyond the five senses. Someone in a dreadful state of mind has crawled into his bed and is hiding under the sheets (linens).

disconcerted

(re: wazzab) The state of mind of the people of New Orleans as they examined their city´s concert hall laid waste can best described as disconcerted.

enlightenment

625

慌 悔

626

憎

hate

627

慣

accustomed

For all have sinned... so everyone´s state of mind should be to repent. Like the saying goes, Hate just begets Hate. A state of mind that just increases and increases until it explodes. It took him awhile, but Data finally got ACCUSTOMED to his nipple/breast piercings. They were constantly rubbing up against his shirt and his heart-shaped locket. Picture Data, shirtless, squeezing his nipples in front of Picard and saying "Yes, at first they were a bit shelly, but I´ve grown quite ACCUSTOMED to them". That last bit should do it for you.

628

愉

pleasure

At the meeting of butchers, in their narrow state of mind, they throw lame jokes around like, ´Oh hello, it´s a pleasure to meat you´, and find this rather pleasing.

629

惰

lazy

630

慎

humility

624

repent

remorse

When I am in a LAZY state of mind I use my left hand to play with my meat...it feels like someone else is doing it, which is good cause I´m to lazy to get a date. Humility is the state of mind of accepting the truth about yourself - both favorable and unfavorable. (tweaked version of Raichu´s). Remorse is the state of mind where I feel bad for what I did while I was tired and emotional!

recollection

Recollection is about bringing ideas back to your mind.

632

憾 憶

633

慕

pining

634

添

annexed

635

必

invariably

631

Pining, yearn for... etc. Presumably for lost love. An easy one here, someone standing in the graveyard, placing an old valentine card amonst all the existing tributes. Hawaii is a little drop of heaven nestled in the waters of the Pacific, most often visited by honeymooners and valentines. It was annexed to the U.S.A. in 1959, and more recently to Japan as well-- albeit only unofficially, and through private commercial holdings. You swear you´ll be in love forever, but invariably there comes a time when your heart is divided.

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

636

泌

ooze

637

手

hand

Anything full of water will invariably begin to ooze. This pictograph actually really works if you look at it as a hand with fingers spread and middle finger pointing down. see the very top stroke as the edge of a shirt cuff, and it will all come together. It´s a hot day of summer with a clear sky, you´re sitting outside a cafe (or maybe on a reclining chair in the garden), and you watch over the kids with a hand covering your eyes from the sunlight (next time, don´t forget the sunglasses).

638

看

watch over

639

摩

chafe

640

我

ego righteousness

If you grind the hemp without a stone but use your hand instead it will chafe. (Image: "Robin, why are your hands all chafed?" ´Uh... (I´ve been grinding hemp all day)´). Someone with a huge EGO is too good for any romantic partner and as such has nothing but personal "hand fiestas" with himself every night. Righteous Christians are sheep with egos (reworked from raulir, fixes word order to match radical order).

deliberation

Careful deliberation produces words of righteousness.

sacrifice

643

義 議 犠

644

抹

rub

645

抱

embrace

A cow that is righteous sacrifices her milk for the human race. I like to RUB my FINGERS over my EXTREMITIES ....like my extremity-ly long, umm, hair.... This has been edited in response to being reported ...you can change "hair" to whatever extremity-ly long body part you like. When embracing someone, wrap your fingers around her butt for added effect. You may think of "bound with snakes" as a description of the fingers slithering around the buttocks, if you want a particularly graphic image.

board

Ok, this is a little wierd, but i took this back to the kanji for pagoda (#254). I think it helps simplify the image, and also helps anchor the pagoda kanji in memory better as an added bonus. say this aloud once, and i think it will bring out a vivid image very quickly: "Now boarding the pagoda ride. Please keep your fingers inside at all times...".

641 642

647

搭 抄

648

抗

confront

You can extract her juices by inserting a few fingers. Gandalf confronts the evil beast, shouting "you shall not pass!". He holds up a single finger and sends forth a whirlwind.

649

批

criticism

Think of the two most famous critics, Ebert and Roeper. On their show, they compare thumbs (which are technically fingers) with each other before dispensing criticism.

650

招

beckon

A Geisha beckons you with her index finger, and as you approach she runs her fingers all over her body in an attempt to seduce you. Keyword meaning : “invite”.

651

拓

clear the land

652

拍

clap

646

extract

653

打

strike

654

拘

arrest

A huge index finger coming down from the sky is kicking boulders of rock, clearing the land. Maybe it´s the finger of God preparing a place for his little people to live. (Image: the most snooty prim and proper English Lord with white gloves clapping only with his fingers. "Oh bravo old chap. Bravo..."). You´re using a hammer to drive a nail into a plank, but you miss and strike your fingers, ouch ! PS: the character does not mean "to go on strike", it will be very helpful in the long run to create images that convey the proper sense of the character! You approach the thief from behind, stick your finger at his back to fake a gun, and say the phrase "You´re under arrest".

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

655

捨

discard

656

拐

kidnap

657

摘

pinch

Someone stuck their fingers in my cottage cheese! I´m going to have to discard the lot! Wrap your FINGERS around someone´s MOUTH to keep them quiet, then put the KNIFE to their throat to ensure their cooperation. This is the best way to KIDNAP someone. My grandma always pinched me with her fingers when i was playing with her antiques. Imagine her fingers, also quite antique, thin, bony and hard, pinching at your hand. "Keep your fingers away from my antiques!!".

challenge

Here comes a new challenge, try to kill Bowser, the giant Turtle using jut on finger.

finger

Finger lickin´ delicious. At the BUDDHIST TEMPLE you´ll see wonderous things, such as the priest that can HOLD himself upside down with just a FINGER. Teacher was always telling us to fasten our lips by pulling a zipper shut with our fingers. It always frightened me because I imagined getting my tongue stuck in the zipper. A military leader in his chariot is brandishing his finger at the enemy, crying "chaaaaaaaaarrrgggeeee!". In mathematics, a conjecture is a mathematical statement which has been proposed as a true statement, but which no one has yet been able to prove or disprove. Have you heard of the Finger-Turkey conjecture ? It states that if turkeys had fingers, they would be able to count. Be sure to imagine a turkey with fingers at the tip of its wings, counting from one to ten.

659

挑 指

660

持

hold

661

括

fasten

662

揮

brandish

658

664

推 揚

665

提

663

conjecture hoist propose

My piggy bank is so heavy that I cannot HOIST it using just my fingers. When a man PROPOSES to a lady, he takes her FINGER and places the ring on it JUST SO, and the moment sweeps her away. Boss yells, "Who damaged the Xerox machine?!" fingers of employees point at one another.

667

損 拾

668

担

shouldering

669

拠

foothold

670

描

sketch

671

操

maneuver

672

接

touch

I tried to PICK UP the bowling ball...but my FINGERS didn´t FIT in the holes. One of Hercules´ labors was to hold the world in his fingers for Atlas and not move until nightbreak, shouldering the considerable burden. When rockclimbing, when your weight disposes of the valuble foothold, all that´s left is your fingers keeping you from death. Meanwhile, your walking legs are left dangling in the wind. A sketch is a seedling (#234) of things to come. Before the assault, the sergeant draws a sketch of the attack with his fingers in the sand. Tip: goods + wood/tree : This combination of primitives appears four times in Heisig, so it´s worthwhile giving it a name. I suggest "furniture" (a common type of wooden goods). REF: parch (#215) , maneuver (FRAME 671), winding (#1369), seaweed (#2035). Story: Using just a finger you are trying to maneuver your furniture round your room. A pervert meets a woman. The pervert tries to touch the women with his lustful fingers. The woman takes a vase, lifts it over her head and smashes it on the pervert´s head...

put up a notice

A muchacho puts up a notice that says “NO FINGER SNAPPING ALLOWED. MUCHACHOS ON SIESTA”. The muchachos are sleeping soundly, completely oblivious to the sound of dogs barking, guitar playing and even gun shots. Now imagine one tourist passing by and snapping his fingers and waking up all the muchachos at once.

666

673

掲

damage pick up

#

kanji

keyword

675

掛 研

676

戒

commandment

677

械

contraption

678

鼻

nose

679

刑

punish

680

型

mould

674

hang

genius

My stones are so huge that it takes two hands to polish them! Two hands, fiesta.....when moses received the ten commandments with two hands, he went back down the mountain and threw a fiesta with the jews, celebrating the arrival of the commandments. The ten commandments were heavy. So to help carry them, Moses made a wooden contraption; the ark of the covenant. An Egyptian embalmer reaching both hands into the dead pharaoh´s nose and yanking out handfuls of brain. This kanji is for severe punishment. A man has his shackled hands placed on a wood block and they´re chopped off with a saber. No more stealing bread in the Middle East... A famous ninja once pressed his two hands and saber into the soil of his temple, before going onto a mission from which he never came back. Think of some sort of signature that he left behind him. The mould of his two hands and saber has since become a popular attraction in the area. Spinal tap: "Every other band´s amps go to ten. But you see my extra stroke of genius these go to eleven.".

property

If you´re a money genius, you can afford a lot of property.

lumber

A TREE GENIUS is a LUMBER jack. Duh. How do you suppose they manage to cram a genie inside a bottle? Well, I suppose they put him in there while he´s still a little child...

polish

683

才 財 材

684

存

suppose

685

在

exist

686

乃

from

681 682

koohiiStory1 Think RPG. The wizard points his finger to the guard and the ivy he has just animated with his magic wand climbs down the wall to hang the poor guy, opening the way for the adventurers into the dungeon.

Genie in the bottle does exist but you need to dig deep into the soil to find one. FROM a pictograph of a thumbs up. That´s how it also gets the primitive meaning of fist.

suck

This character is the "kei" in "keitai" (cell phone), a word you will no doubt hear often in Japan, since everyone has one. Imagine you´ve just arrived in Japan, but don´t have a cell phone yet, so instead you´re carrying around a portable turkey you can hold in your fist. To dial a number, just poke it with your fingers. I like to think of this as a fist with with brass knuckles because of the extra line. An old school thug reaches out to help you up but then with his other hand ( with the brass knuckles) punches you. Imagine a baby reaching out and holding mom´s breast as if it were bottle, and sucking on it to get some milk.

handle

See suck (#689): if it´s too big to handle, just use your fingers instead...

length

Both a meter and a yard are about one arm-length.

history

I sleep in history class with my mouth tucked under my arm.

officer

687

携

portable

688

及

reach out

693

吸 扱 丈 史 吏

694

更

grow late

One officer can change the course of history. At nightbreak (#30) the sun rises above the floor, so it is logical that when it is growing late, the sun would rise to the ceiling. Time to pack up your things and take your belongings under your arm.

695

硬

stiff

A stiff drink on the ROCKs after it GROWS LATE is a way to unwind after a long day...

689 690 691 692

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

or again

After her boyfriend´s crotch has been satisfied, a woman might suggest they cuddle. The boyfriend, on the other hand, might say, "Or again, we could fool around . . . ".

697

又 双

698

桑

mulberry

699

隻

vessels

Crotch to crotch is how many pairs spend their private time together. . . Children going around the mulberry tree singing "This is the way we wash our crotch, wash our crotch, wash our crotch...". On Vessels that travel long distances, sailors often get quite lonely. They keep TURKEYS on the VESSELS, but not for use as food. The lonely sailors take turns enjoying the turkey´s CROTCH. Think of the flower-vessels as a the Greenpeace vessel “Arctic Sunrise”, only instead of a rainbow there is a big flower painted on the hull (this will come back in seize (#701) and harvest (#908)). Think of “flower-power” and of the “peace” in “Greenpeace” and it will make some sense hopefully. -- In this kanji, we see an inauguration speech being given before the Greenpeace vessel is set afloat and sent to safeguard our planet.

696

pair

700

護

safeguard

701

獲

seize

702

奴

guy

703

怒

angry

704 705

友 抜

friend

A pack of genetically-modified wild dogs is seized by a group of Greenpeace activists and taken onboard the Greenpeace vessel (the flower vessel, see safeguard (#700)). That GUY stole my WOMAN so I kicked him in the CROTCH. (This story helps keep the word "GUY" as someone you hold in contempt). This woman is angry because of the guys in the previous frame who pay more attention to her crotch than her heart. I prefer to decompose the kanji in three elements here because it is easier to read like a mnemonic. A good friend is always at your side. ---- I teach at a Japanese High School, and I often see chummy male students grabbing each other´s crotches in a joking manner. It´s still weird to me, but apparently reaching to your side and grabbing you neighbor´s crotch is a great way to express friendship.

slip out

Don´t let good friends slip out between your fingers.

establishment

Well, you usually use your fingers to throw objects used as missile weapons. Easy. By the way, for those of you looking for a less anachronistic image for the missile primitive as a modern rocket, try a slingshot. it´s a crotch (originally a tree branch) that sends missile projectiles flying into/like the wind. And for this present kanji, it is something you naturally use with your fingers... (Note: this kanji is more collapse/cave-in/sink (#1888) than humans drowning) A water missile? A torpedo! And when it hits it´s target? The ship collapses then sinks and everyone drowns! Establishment can be attacked by words or by missiles. Writers will use words, whereas militars will use missiles.

beat

Your car has missles?! That beats mine, hands down.

706

投

throw

707

没

drown

709

設 撃

710

殻

husk

711

支

branch

Samurai´s husk/shell/armour is superflous to missile attacks 甲殻　卵殻　貝殻. Picture sliding down the branch of a tree (in this case a pine tree or any tree with needles) and getting a bunch of needles stuck in your crotch--ouch!!

skill

(Adapted from darg_sama´s) Balancing a branch on your finger is the prototypical example of a skill that is nothing more than a skill (i.e., it is completely useless).

bough

The tree´s primary branch is known as the bough.

708

712 713

技 枝

#

kanji

keyword

714

肢

limb

715

茎

stalk

716

怪

suspicious

koohiiStory1 The limbs that this kanji represents are parts of the body that are connected to the trunk, like the main branches to a tree (“arms and legs” is the second meaning of this kanji). In other words, limbs are "flesh branches". Suggestion: Replace "spool" with "toilet paper/roll". Reasons: (1) Toilet paper/roll usually comes on a spool. (2) Toilet paper is used to clean the soil off your crotch. Story: Just get a flower and carefully wrap some toilet paper around its stalk. Spool also appears in suspicious (#716), lightly (#717), diameter (#882), sutra (#1360). When you´re suspicious, your state of mind twists round and round like a spool of thread.

717

軽

lightly

718

叔

uncle

Fact: this kanji is used to denote a certain class of vehicles in Japan whose engines are under a certain size (less than 750cc I think) and are called light vehicles here. Imagine a so-called light vehicle or a light-truck with a load of spools driving down a road ever so lightly, careful not to let any of the spools roll out onto the street. Oh come on people - say what we´ve all been thinking: the uncle is that creepy guy towering above a little one´s crotch.

coach

Creepy uncle volunteers as gymnastics coach so he can eye the team from below.

loneliness

The unmarried uncle´s house is the picture of lonlieness.

719 720

督 寂

721

淑

graceful

722

反

anti-

Uncle (the one who is lonely and coaches kids in his spare time) is actually a graceful guy once he hits the water, as he used to be part of the swimming team in his youth. I think of an anti-hero (Dirty Harry etc.) for this primitive, whose trademark for disposing of villians is not an honorable fight, but a kick in the crotch and then a shove off a cliff (perhaps whilst the villain´s back is turned).

slope

As the villain (pushed off by the anti-hero) is tumbling down the slope, he activates gadget skis to escape, spraying soil everywhere as he flies down the slope.

724

坂 板

725

返

723

727

販 爪

728

妥

726

plank return marketing

gentle

A pictograph of Wolverine´s adamantium claws. Overly gentle women are vultures who want to marry you and steal your money - not true but an easy mnemonic!

milk

A fledgling is being nursed at a zoo, it is fed milk through a small tube that is bent in the shape of a hook (so that it fits inside its beak). The fledgling soon becomes addicted to milk, giving us this very catchy mnemonic: “fledgling hooked on milk”.

claw

730

乳 浮

731

将

leader

732

奨

exhort

733

採

pick

729

Of course, trees are anti-plank. Wouldn´t you be if you were a tree? Pretty obvious: to return is to turn back on the road you´re on and go the opposite way. The goal of marketing is to get people who are naturally anti-buying to spend their shells (money).

floating

Floating rubber ducky!!! The leader in this race is the turtle! It appears he has covered the vulture’s feet in glue, so that the vulture cannot get off the starting block. It´s easy to picture a LEADER that uses a BIG dog to EXHORT his people to do more. You pick cheries with your fingers, then along comes a giant vulture and picks up the whole tree with its claws.

#

kanji

keyword

734

菜

vegetable

koohiiStory1 A vegetarian vulture is munching on a flower, perched on a tree, patiently waiting for a patch of vegetables to grow. The bird house is the brothel (someone else said so) and of course everyone is welcome - thay accept any crotch.

736

受 授

737

愛

love

738

払

pay

739

広

wide

740

拡

broaden

The Batcave is very wide and has a lot of elbow room for Batman to do his yoga. Japanese girls are tight and may require fingers inserted to broaden them and make them wide enough before you can...

mineral

Elbonium: a new mineral found in wide caves shaped like elbows and made of metal.

valve

neglect

Opening a stuck valve requires 2 hands and a lot of elbow grease. Men walk with their elbows out from their sides in a weird turkey trot when they try to appear very MASCULINE. Think of a 70´s pimp walk. When someone´s elbow is above your mouth he/she is probably standing on a pedestal. While standing on the pedestal at the award ceremony, the recipient heartlessly neglected to mention the people that got him there.

reign

Build a moat around your pedestal to protect your reign of power.

735

accept impart

742

鉱 弁

743

雄

male

744

台

pedestal

741

745 746

怠 治

climax

Many men, before they commence their relationship with the woman of their desires, place her on something of a pedestal, which often leads to disappointment later on. The body part feminists like to put on a pedestal is the womb, especially when they hear a man complain about some responsibility. "We give birth, so it´s your duty to do so-and-so". The top primitive is similar to hole (#1316). A window is a hole (#1316) in your house that you occassionally sit next to while leaning on your ELBOW and gazing out, a picture of a lonely HEARTedness. Going, going, GONE!, said the gravedigger as he shoveled soil onto the body´s protruding elbow (the last bit left to cover). This kanji shows up in a lot of words related to the legal process. Try this image: using a very outdated judicial method, the people of Salem dunked accused witches in the water until they were all gone. At the local company they have a very gory way of getting rid of incompetent personnel : they arrange a business meeting in a very special room where the walls are ... meeting. Not surprisingly the boss is never present at these meetings, he´s the one who pushes the button that sets the walls in motion. Sexual climaxes don´t always happen on the bed; they sometimes happen against a wall or on the ground!

room

You book a room in a love hotel called "Climax House".

arrival

Http://img168.imageshack.us/img168/7731/karatesd3.jpg Just look at this image...

747

始

commence

748

胎

womb

749

窓

window

750

去

gone

751

法

method

752

会

meeting

754

至 室

755

到

753

Please accept this finger, you say, imparting it to your yakuza boss. If you really love someone, you won´t keep them in a cage-like bird house relationship, but rather open the door and let their heart walk around freely. Think less about "I" (あい) and more about "we". You´re at a restaurant and raise your finger to indicate to the waiter that you want to pay. Your friend elbows you in the ribs -- it´s his shout, and he insists on taking care of the bill.

# 756 757

758

kanji

致 互 棄

keyword

koohiiStory1

doth

To reach climax I doth the bidding of my dominatrix taskmaster.

mutually

The 69 position allows both parties to mutually give themselves pleasure.

abandon

Think of a really loud and annoying baby, you want to abandon it but it keeps coming back...so you take of your belt by the buckle, and buckle the baby to a tree!

allot

Bringing up your offspring means raising them from infant until they are meat ready to be harvested. What, cannibalism is in poor taste? Forget I ever brought it up. But bring up will forver be infant meat to me. I want my baby back baby back baby back ribs! Don´t lay a finger on him, a concerned mother says as the state REMOVES her child away for upbringing by a taskmaster foster home. Scene at the baby factory: Manager: "Good news! Your infant has been allotted human legs". Parent to be: "Thanks a lot!".

gun

Everyone is allotted a metal gun (US constitution according to the NRA).

sulfur

Sulphur is like a rock, but it can stink like a stream of infant doodie.

759

育

bring up

760

撤

remove

763

充 銃 硫

764

流

current

765

允

license

INFANT Moses placed in the WATER and sent down the current of the STREAM. In some Asian kung-fu version of James Bond, the main protagonist has a “License To Kill” with his deadly elbows and human legs. His suit is always stained of red blood at the elbows and lower legs (this to help create an image that distinguish the two elements). I named the right part legal prostitute has it represents a walker [walking legs] with the license. It´s easy to imagine a legal prostitute tempting a man with her mouth.

761 762

766

唆

tempt

767

出

exit

768

山

mountain

Suddenly, a cactus comes out of the ground with a sign that reads: exit. Now you can leave the desert! (Note: giving this primitive the meaning ´cactus´ can be useful later). Pictograph, see book. * As a primitive this element appears equally as well at the top or bottom of the kanjis (besides appearing to the left). Since a mountain often brings to mind towering peaks, I will consider it implied that the element is placed at the top of the kanji. When this primitive appears at the bottom, I will arrange my story in a way that other elements are said to be at the very top of the mountain (see FRAME 775 for an example).

bungling

With fingers fumbling around trying to get the key in the door so he could exit, the bungling husband woke his wife as he tried to leave for a rendezvous with his mistress.

boulder

A mountain-sized stone is known as a boulder.

charcoal

Burn enough charcoal and you´ll have a mountain of ash. On the left, there are three mountains. The road branches off to each of them. (Note: This kanji is mostly used for branches in the road).

771

拙 岩 炭

772

岐

769 770

branch off

773

峠

mountain pass

774

崩

crumble

775

密

secrecy

Heisig mentions at kanjiclinic.com that he wishes he´d chosen mountain pass for this keyword as it´s closer to what the word means. If we do this, the kanji makes complete sense because a mountain pass is just below the mountain top. Sam and Frodo were steadfast companions even as Mount Doom crumbled above them. To maintain secrecy, secret societies invariably have to house themselves in the moutains.

crowded

koohiiStory1 When I think of honey, I think of a bee hive, which is a HOUSE that INVARIABLY has INSECTS. Storm is a full-blown wind that rips the mountains off the ground (you see one flying here). This is “Cape Strange” from FRAME 153, only with mountain in place of soil. Interestingly, there is also 碕 which is made of the primitives stone and strange. The three kanjis 碕, 埼 and 崎 all have the same meanings and pronunciations. They have very little uses other than names, for which promontory is the clear winner with over 2300 uses in place and people names, while the other two kanjis account for less than 200 names. Pictograph, see book. * As a primitive, using the image of going through a door, even one that stands alone with the frame and no wall around, helps flesh out the primitive “enter”. During a traffic jam it is impossible to get your car to enter the roadway as it is crowded with cars. Think of a grid lock so bad cars are litterally scraping up against each other like people on a Japanese train during rush hour.

part

When something is entered by a dagger, it ends up being cut in several parts.

poverty

In the case of true poverty, not having money is only part of the problem. There are other components as well, like lack of education, class structuring, etc., but that doesn´t really matter. Just remember that the money is only part of it, not the whole.

#

kanji

keyword

776

蜜

honey

777

嵐

storm

778

崎

promontory

779

入

enter

780 781

込 分

783

貧 頒

784

公

public

785

松

pine tree

782

partition

The PART of my HEAD where I remember the KANJI is in the kanji PARTITION. I always open the doors to the public restrooms with my elbows because I don´t want to touch the door with my hands. Following up with the "entering public restrooms" story for the right-hand primitive: public restrooms always reek of pine tree scented disinfectant. The venerable old man is the public figure head of the Native American Village, answering all questions and solving all problems. The higher in rank you get in this tribe, the more feathers decorate you. Imagine this old man covered in beautiful feathers.

787

翁 訟

788

谷

valley

789

浴

bathe

790

容

contain

Take care what words you say in public lest you be sued. This could be seen as a very accurate pictograph of another type of valley: a valley mouth open under the umbrella of inner labia, with the outer labia parted above. There are even more connections to be made among the primitive keywords and the visuals, but i will enter no further... This story is quite lascivious, sorry... Now, imagine you are at a 混浴　（こんよく） [two kanjis we now know] Onsen (温泉), and you are watching a woman bathe. Just picture the water dripping down her cleavage (that valley in between her breasts). Note: cleavage in Japanese is 谷間. Imagine a house big enough to contain an entire valley. might want to live there. And now imagine cleaning it. . . . Maybe not . . .

melt

Think of what happens when the snow on top of the mountains melts: it turns into water and flows down onto the rooftops of all the houses in the valley below.

longing

Guess what? Japanese has dirty words too! (In fact, a lot of them) A sexual story is NOT inappropriate here, as this kanji is very sexual, such as in 性欲; lust. As for a story: the lack of contact with a woman´s valley will leave a man LONGING for love.

786

791

792

溶 欲

venerable old man sue

#

kanji

keyword

793

裕

abundant

795

鉛 沿

796

賞

794

lead (metal) run alongside

prize

koohiiStory1 Again using the fact that cleavage in Japanese is called "valley of the chest": a woman with abundant cleavage tightly wraps up her bosom in a form-fitting cloak, but leaving her valley exposed. Another unforgettable image (thank you, thank you, I´ll be here all week). Picture the molten lead (the heavy metal) being discreetly drained out of the factory into a gully behind. Water in a gully runs alongside the path. This is a bit silly.. or maybe not only a bit, but.. You know some foodstuffs (cereals come to mind) sometimes have prizes mixed in them? Well, in this case, the prize was a shell (money, remember) and you only notice in the outhouse... (see also secret (#904)). Every major political party, if personified, would look like a giant outhouse walking around with human legs spewing out a constant stream of bullshit.

798

党 堂

799

常

usual

800

裳

skirt

801

掌

manipulate

There is a secret hall buried in the soil underneath the outhouse. It´s usual to take your towel with you when you go to the outhouse at the onsen (hot springs bath in Japan) so everybody doesn´t see your stuff. Compared to pants, a SKIRT is the GARMENT to be wearing when you want to use one of those Japanese toilets. It makes it so much easier: you just walk in the OUTHOUSE hike it up, and do your business. If you´re going to manipulate your body with your hand, then go do it in an outhouse, at least!

pelt

A pelt is hooked on a branch. A small tent is made with a pelt and a branch planted in the ground. The mnemonic hints at the first stroke (the hanging pelt) and the hook at the end of the second stroke. This is chinese radical #107 meaning “skin”.

waves

Waves are the ocean´s pelt (skin).

old woman

An old woman is seen here as a woman with waves (i.e. wrinkles, creases). You expose holes in a pelt by passing your fingers through them and wiggling them on the other side. The sense of the kanji here is to reveal something that was hidden, to make known, to open your heart (thus revealing it, exposing it to others), express your opinion, etc.

797

party hall

804

皮 波 婆

805

披

expose

806

破

rend

807

被

incur

808

残

remainder

802 803

809 810

811 812

殉 殊 殖 列

martyrdom

Before the invention of scissors or knives, sharp STONES were used to REND PELTs, so that caveman designers could complete new styles for the upcoming year. If you wear a coat of fur (pelt) you are sure to incur the wrath of animal rights extremists. The remainder of the bones have been thrown from the float (for the dogs maybe, at the end of the parade). Think of the early Christian martyrs who suffered martyrdom because of their faith. See them held in cells for 10 days (a decameron) before being fed to the lions. They appear before the chanting Roman crowds as bones to be devoured. Think of what was leftover after the lions finished them off....nothing, not even a pile of bones to bury.

particularly

A t-bone steak is vermilion - particularly if served rare.

augment

Advertisement for Breast Implants -- Tired of nights all alone? Want to get boned straightaway? AUGMENT your breasts and all your troubles will be solved!

file

A line of skeletal warriors, all armed with sabers.

#

kanji

keyword

813

裂

split

814

烈

ardent

815

死

death

816

葬

interment

817

瞬

wink

818

耳

ear

820

取 趣

821

最

819

823

撮 恥

824

職

822

take gist utmost snapshot shame post

koohiiStory1 They tried issuing the skeleton warriors with proper garments to wear, but they kept getting split by the sharp bones or by their sabres. In the end, it was decided they look scarier naked anyway. The nazis were ardent believers in the master arian race, see them marching everyone else into the oven fires, single file. Ok, this is where knowing some Eastern culture comes in handy! In Japanese society, when someone dies they creamate the body and pick out the remaining bones with special chopsticks. In this case, they´re out of chopsticks so they decide to use (gasp!) a spoon instead. I imagine an interment as a funeral. At this funeral it´s an open casket, and the dead body (death) is holding flowers with both of its hands. Imagine Snoopy winking with his big eyes (and a happy smile) standing next to Woodstocks Birdhouse, woodstock being so cool that he wears little sunglasses. Your ear is like the eye on the side of your head for seeing things, but there is hair around it that creates jagged lines. You put your ear next to a womans crotch...and somehow, from it, you hear the words "Take me....". The gist of it is this: We take the money and run! TAKE the UTMOST care when you SUN bath all DAY, or you´ll get burned from your EARS to your CROTCH. Take the utmost care that you don´t have your finger in the way when you take a snapshot. Amelia Ear-Heart (sic) brought shame to those who said women couldn´t fly. Worst post in history: quality checker at the kazoo factory. Imagine the toll on your ears!

825

聖

holy

826

敢

daring

827

聴

listen

828

懐

pocket

829

慢

ridicule

The trick for me is to remember that the 耳 is to the left of the 口. However, this is easy because a true holy man uses his ear to listen (i.e., to God or his supplicant) before he opens his mouth to speak, unlike a charlatan who just makes something up. Of course, kings are often true holy men and prophets (e.g., King David in the bible). Only a truly daring Japanese student would wear a spike in his ear under the gaze of the Japanese teacher taskmasters! I promise to use my ear to do nothing but listen ... stick a needle in my eye, cross my heart and hope to die! (Intentionally said backwards to get the order of the primitives correct). (re: taijuando) When you are in New York City you have to be alert, i.e. in the "New York State of Mind": you need ten eyes to make sure no one will go through your garments and pick your pockets. I´ll focus on the mandala primitive here. I guess Heisig chose this keyword for phonetic reasons and as a character it´s the "man" in mandara/mandala (曼荼羅). A mandala is a graphic representation of the universe, here split in 3 planes of existance, the sun representing the cosmos, the eye represents the human observer, the crotch represents the animal instincts.

loose

One obscure Tibetan sect-- the Otaku cult-- has an unusually loose interpretation of mandala drawing practice. Instead of traditional mandalas they draw mangas (漫画). They then pour water on the image to wash it away, and begin anew.

830

漫

#

kanji

keyword

831

買

buy

832

置

placement

koohiiStory1 When something catches my eye, I take out a few clams and buy before anybody else does. On the JET Programme, many people have their eye on a placement in Tokyo, Osaka or another big city, and write it on their application form. They are usually sent to the countryside straightaway.

penalty

For Japanese, when the mind´s eye (the sideways eye) feels guilty for something bad that the body has done, there are two penaltys to choose from. One, you can say I´m sorry. Two, you can commit suicide by sabre. Why, oh why, do so many Japanese executives commit suicide at the first sign of scandal when all the have to do is say I´m sorry to get off the hook. (on yomi: バチ, バツ).

833

罰

834

寧

rather

835

濁

voiced

836

環

ring

837

還

send back

839

夫 扶

840

渓

mountain stream

841

規

standard

842

替

exchange

843

賛

approve

844

潜

submerge

838

845 846 847 848 849

失 鉄 迭 臣 姫

husband

A pretty tough kanji. Think of elegant old housewives with English accents dining together at a HOUSE party. The hostess brings out a dish of hors d´oeuvres: a SPIKE of metal with an EYEBALL and a HEART skewered on it. Upon being offered this treat, one of the housewives says in her English accent, "I´d RATHER not.". The fly is wrapped in a spiderweb voicing "Help me, Help Me" under the watchful eye of the spider who´s venom is dripping like water from her fangs. Together with the next kanji, the keywords spell “send back the ring”. First we have a jewel. Next we have the great eye of Sauron searching for the fellowship hiding under the many ceilings during their journey. The fourth and fifth primitives are the mouth of Gollum always mumbling “My preciousss”; and Pippin´s scarf! Placement: the eye appears at the top similarly to how the Great Eye of Sauron is perched atop the Dark Tower. You´ve probably guessed it by now, this is the road that Sam and Frodo take to send back the ring to Mount Doom! (see previous frame, the jewel is replaced by the road). Even though it is argued size is not important, I´m sure most women would like their husband to have a big one.

lose

Using his finger the husband sometimes is an erotic aid to his partner. The Simpsons are on vacation. Homer stops to take a leak in a mountain stream but gets snatched by an eagle. Hear his scream? In the male-dominated world of yesterday, the husband´s way of seeing things was considered the standard point of view. Women who dared to disagree were frowned upon. A show like "Trading Spouses" called "exchanging husbands" where 2 husbands are exchanged for a day (thanks dingomick). Out of two potential husbands, which would you approve of? Well, the one with shells (money) of course!!! When a submarine or similar vessel SUBMERGES an EXCHANGE of air for WATER takes place in special compartments. The drop falling here is the husband´s toupee... he´s already lost his hair once, now he´s losing it again. Such is life, I suppose.

iron

Iron is a metal that gradually becomes lost due to oxidation and rust.

alternate

When you get lost, you just take an alternate road to get back on track.

retainer

Its a pictograph of a teeth with a retainer in the middle.

princess

Princess Leia becomes Jabba´s slave (“princess Leia is a woman slave”).

aid

#

kanji

keyword

850

蔵

storehouse

851

臓

entrails

852

賢

intelligent

853

堅

strict

854

臨

look to

855

覧

perusal

856

巨

gigantic

858

拒 力

859

男

857

repel power

man

860

労

labor

861

募

recruit

862

劣

inferiority

863

功

achievement

864

勧

persuade

865

努

toil

866 867 868 869

励 加 賀 架

encourage

koohiiStory1 The storehouse is overgrown with slaves. The slaves are to be sold in the store, to differentiate from a warehouse, which doesn´t have the word "store" in it. You signed your organ donor card, right? So, when you die, your entrails and other body parts will be placed in a storehouse. An intelligent man is neither slave to his crotch nor to money. But an intelligent slave will know how to use his/her crotch to make money. The strict parent thinks adolescent kids are "slaves to their crotch" (= can´t control their hormones), so he grounds them. Permanently! The slave is look to the future, "One day" he thinks "I will be able to recline with all my goods, a tv, stereo and washing machine, and when that day comes I shall be truly happy" he sighs. The slave reclines on the floor at night to watch the stars. Since that´s the only thing the slave is allowed to “read”, he does so very thoroughly and diligently, hence perusal. This is actually the top view of a porn star with a gigantic erect penis. The top and bottom are his arms and the middle is his penis. Imagine him making the pumping motion while he´s banging some chick. The arms move in, the penis moves out and vice versa. A woman might be REPELLED by a porn star´s GIGANTIC penis, so he kindly offers to use his FINGERS instead. I always refer to the power of the KATAKANA "KA". Male is seen here as muscles working in the field, in other words working in the rice fields is the work of the male who are usually stronger. This is more or less the meaning of the original Chinese character. Those jocks who always tried to show their muscles in the schoolhouse are now the ones out there doing manual labor jobs while we sit here and learn Japanese. Ha! The necromancer hangs out at the local graveyard and uses his dark powers to recruit an army of undead. Emphasize the verb form to keep distinct from the noun cadet (#1173). I have an inferiority complex because I have fewer muscles than everyone else at the gym. They all look like Macho Man Randy Savage (power) to me. The great achievements of humankind, were crafts completed by muscle power: the pyramids, the Eiffel tower, etc. Mnemonic "pegasus persuasion power". I think of the hippogriff from Harry Potter as being like a pegasus. To befriend a hippogriff, you have to persuade it you mean no harm, you can do this if you have "pegasus persuasion power". GUY POWER!!! Body builders toiling in the gym all day....　　　　　RTK2:　ド　努力　どりょく (effort)...　Pure Group: 　奴702 　怒703. 10,000 Persians are at the base of the cliff, but the leader of the 300 Spartans just flexes his huge muscles and encourages his men by shouting that they have the power to fight them all.

congratulations

If you eat anymore, you will be adding more カロries. (katakana karo). When someone at work gets married, you pass around an envelope to which you add some money and a card which you sign with your congratulations.

erect

Instant wood. Just add Viagra.

add

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

870

脇

armpit

What part of the body has a very, very, very powerful smell? The armpit, of course! Compare the primitive positions of armpit (#870) and threaten (#871). When your triceps rest alongside your body, they fit snugly against your armpit. When you hold them above your body, however, your posture becomes quite threatening. The nurse says : “If you co-operate, that needle (syringe) in your triceps won´t hurt”. Note: both co- and cooperate are meanings for this kanji.

871

脅

threaten

872

協

co-

873

行

going

874

律

rhythm

875

復

restore

876

得

gain

I use The Flash for for this primitive; a superhero who is always going very fast. The calligrapher´s brush is moving down a column of a script, in rhythm with his meditation. Before going all the way to the Boss in a Final Fantasy game, you should probably double back to save at a restore point. To gain more knowledge of what´s goin on in the world I´m reading column after column of articles in the newspapers, and it takes so much time I´m glued to it till nightbreak.

accompany

The line of viking soldiers is always accompanied by a horn mending specialist.

junior

Junior is GOING to RUN the family business one day... A line queued up outside the Buddhist temple, waiting to see the shrine on New Year´s Day.

877 878

従 徒

880

待 往

881

征

subjugate

882

径

diameter

883

彼

he

884

役

duty

885

徳

benevolence

886

徹

penetrate

887

徴

indications

888

懲

penal

889

微

delicate

890

街

boulevard

879

wait journey

In Medieval Japan, going to see your lord was often a long journey. America seeks to GO and CORRECT other nations. But really what they do is subjugate them... Scientists recently measured the diameter of Earth by drilling a deep hole and dropping a line of thread off a humongous spool until it got to the other side. What´s the main difference between a he and a she? The he has a column covered in a pelt... a penis. Badum-ching. Japanese kamikaze pilots (and the American from Dr. Strangelove) are so devoted to their duty that they go with their missiles. Hearkening back to the kanji for LISTEN... Benevolence is a good listener who is willing to go the distance to help. The taskmistress in a moment of weakness allowed the man´s column to penetrate her. As punishment he was made to bring up their infant. If you see a column of kings being marched up the mountain under a taskmaster´s whip... indications are, there has been a coup. Penal servitude is served until indications show that one has had a change of heart (learned one´s lesson). Easily confused with punish (#679) and penalty (#833). Concentrate on the reasons behind the penal system ("changing people´s hearts" here), instead of the penalty itself or the punishment (revenge) aspect. It may help to note that there´s no sword, but a heart :-) (Note: 懲りる = learn from one´s bad experiences). The Column of 300 spartans were in a delicate situation. They had travelled in one line (using only their legs) to the mountain pass to face the fierce Persian task master. The boulevard of boulevards, the Champs Elysées, with the Arc de Triomphe covered in ivy to give the champions a heroes´ welcome.

koohiiStory1 To maintain the social equilibrium in a future dystopian society, the brains of citizens are bound up (hypnotized). The government is using mental wave emitting statues shaped like St. Bernard´s dogs put alongside the boulevards. The first DRAFT of catcher in the rye was actually called "catcher in the TALL WHEAT"...good thing they changed it. I read it in 高校.

#

kanji

keyword

891

衡

equilibrium

892

稿

draft

893

稼

earnings

894

程

extent

895

税

tax

896

稚

immature

897

和

harmony

Your earnings allow you to bring home your daily bread (made of wheat, naturally). The extent to which some people will go to create ´wheat displays´, or as some call them ´crop circles´, is truly amazing. Nobody likes the tax man, so here it is only fitting that the person who comes over to take some of your wheat is depicted here as a devil. Keep in mind that in feudal societies there was no kind of money to speak of, so taxes were paid by serfs in wheat to the devils who came over to keep them poor. I can´t believe I brought you to the fanciest restaurant in town and you asked for turkey on wheat...how immature is that?! The first step to harmony is having enough wheat to feed every mouth in the world. Once we are all fed it is easier to get a long in harmony.

898

移

shift

Picture the WHEAT field, filled with MANY, MANY stalks of WHEAT. Notice how they SHIFT like waves in the slightest breeze. When you hear SHIFT, just picture that scene.

899

秒

second

An hourglass filled with wheat counts time. A few wheat seeds drop every second.

900

秋

autumn

In AUTUMN, the WHEAT looks the color of FIRE, meaning it´s time to harvest it. In AUTUMN, the farmer´s HEART is in DISTRESS as to if he has enough crops. Even better, the farmer will experience great DISTRESS in his HEART if his WHEAT catches FIRE!

901 902

愁 私

distress private

Warning sign: "Private wheat, trespassers will be elbowed". Think of REGULARITY in terms of bowel movements. Enough WHEAT in your diet will help your DROPS with improved REGULARITY.

904

秩 秘

905

称

appellation

906

利

profit

907

梨

pear tree

908

穫

harvest

909

穂

ear of a plant

910

稲

rice plant

The prize at the bottom of a cereal box is invariably a secret decoder ring. Taking appellation to mean the act of naming, we have the little baby superman reclining in the space craft that landed in a wheat field. Mr. and Mrs. Kent look down and decide to call him Clark. (I also thought of Jesus but he was born in a barn full of hay not wheat). In the middle ages there where only 2 ways for peasantry to make a profit. one by being a farmer, 2 to be a mercenary and live by the way of the sword. The Japanese pear tree is the most profitable in the world, because it produces its fruit in pairs [sorry for the awful pun]. The harvest of genetically modified crops is taken onboard the Greenpeace vessel (see the flower vessel in safeguard (#700)). The pilgrims only had wheat, so they asked the Indians to do them a favor and trade them for some ears of corn. The rice plant is common in Japan because all the wheat was eaten by vultures in the olden times.

incense

If you focus the suns though a magnifying glass on to the bottom of a stalk of wheat it will start to smoulder and burn like a stick of incense. The weird thing is that it burns from the bottom upwards, hanging in the air as if my magic. Try it and see!

903

911

香

regularity secret

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

912

季

seasons

913

委

committee

There´s a season for planting wheat and there´s mating season for having children. Female WHEAT farmers decide to create a COMMITTEE, which they fittingly name “The WHEAT WOMEN COMMITTEE.”. You spend three hours putting all of your wheat sale transaction records into Microsoft Excel, when suddenly it crashes, so you put your fist through the monitor. If you excel in the Mario Kart road, your movements are saved and you can race against yourself as a transparent racer. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xe8CkcrLk4. Think of the smooth talker who EXCELS at using WORDS to entice women (including married women if it makes it easier to remember).

914

秀

excel

915

透

transparent

916

誘

entice

917

穀

cereals

918

菌

germ

919

米

rice

920

粉

flour

921

粘

sticky

922

粒

grains

923

粧

cosmetics

Stroke order: I like to think of the first two strokes as “chop sticks” with which one eats the rice. The rest then is the “tree” meaning “plant” in this contexct. also: USA. Parts of parts of parts of parts of rice... is flour. (Image: geishas patting their face with RICE flour to make it white. Not wheat flour...). This is another way of fortune telling -- throw sticky rice against the wall, and look for the message in whatever sticks. A sage is using rice to fill up a vase, but as an exercise in patience, he´s doing it grain by grain. Condy Rice is actually white, but she uses special cosmetics made from dirt she found in a cave to appear black - it´s better for the political situation.

astray

The road that the USA is heading down is, well... let´s just say that they´re astray...

chic

In extremely chic restaurants, you have to pay 90 bucks for a bowl of rice. Imagine Japanese army provisions like obentou boxes, always containing the same quantity of rice. (thanks darg_sama, emphasizing quantity and the nuance of food "rations", "food supply": the kanji also appears in "military provisions" and "army rice"). Chrysanthemum flower consists of many tiny petals, just like many rice grains bound up together.

925

迷 粋

926

糧

provisions

927

菊

chrysanthemum

924

There are different cereals in different parts of the world. Japan has samurai cereal. Great Britain has Crowned Wheat ... the United States and Russia have Missile cereals. Can also mean bacteria.....imagine the wheat pent in your fridge growing to the point where they resemble flowers.......I actually had something similar happen to onions...they grew footlong legs after about 2 or 3 years......OR just think of that Cowboy Bebop episode with the lobster in the fridge... :-).

928

奥

core

929

数

number

In the core of a nuclear reactor, scientists have discovered a way to get power from rice, by penting it in under high pressure. It´s very dangerous, so they´ve trained a st. bernard dog to run things, he´s adding more drops of rice as necessary. Young taskmaster is learning numbers by watching women haul sacks of rice past him. "One... two... four! No, wrong! Go back, go back!".

930

楼

watchtower

The young taskmaster (see number (#929)) uses a tree as a watchtower to get a better view of his rice-carrying women. "I can seeeee you! One! Two! Three!".

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1 Note this character means sort in the sense of what kind, I believe a better keyword would be "variety" and this character does appear in some dictionaries with the primary meaning as variety, my story: I´m in a Chinese restaurant and the waiter says "What sort of rice would you like with your dog head?". LACQUER is a type of WATERY type of liquid used to protect items made from TREES, sort of an UMBRELLA of protection. So protective, you can carry around RICE in the LACQUERED, WOODEN product.

931

類

sort

932

漆

lacquer

933

様

Esq.

934

求

request

935

球

ball

936

救

salvation

937

竹

bamboo

938

笑

laugh

Here we have the requirements to be counted among the ranks of the noble Esq. You must posses a forested estate, herds of sheep, and granary full of grains of rice. Enemy: "Any final requests?" // MacGyver: "Just an arrowhead and some grains of rice." (MacGyver then throws the grains of rice at the enemy and uses the arrowhead to cut his hands free from the rope.). Someone files a request to see the family jewels and, to their surprise, you show them your balls! Like in the biblical sense, someone looks skyward and makes a request for salvation from this horrible taskmaster... Pandas like to eat bamboo. I´m using panda as the primitive name when it fits the story. ^__^. When the people tried to build a tower of bamboo to reach the heavens, the gods just laughed and laughed. The bamboo vase was beautifully crafted, but the tourist didn´t know what it was and wore it as a little bamboo hat.

940

笠 笹

941

筋

muscle

942

箱

box

943

筆

writing brush

944

筒

cylinder

945

等

etc.

946

算

calculate

947

答

solution

948

策

scheme

The bamboo generation smokes bamboo grass. Muscle is part of the body that gives strength, and can be both supple and tense like the bamboo. The best kind of BOX is made from BAMBOO sticks that are INTER-laced to make it air tight. Just picture such a box and you´ve mastered this kanji. Bamboo is the best material from which to make a brush if you want it to be a writing brush. Seriously, all BAMBOO sticks look the SAME, just long CYLINDERS. Should the story be more complicated? The Bamboo Buddhist Temple has bamboo buddhas, bamboo buildings, bamboo benches, bamboo beds, bamboo bowls, etc. etc. etc. Before the time of digital calculators, people used old school calculators made of bamboo (abacus). It´s not as easy as a calculator, but you don´t need any batteries either. All you need are your eyes and your two hands. The solution to this puzzle is, like the match stick game, to make the bamboo pieces fit together. (Elaboration of jameserb´s story:) A clever scheme from Wile E Coyote -- he ties one of those rubber belts to some trees and uses it to launch a bamboo spear at the roadrunner...

register

Note : the keyword is not a verb, think of a record book. This acupuncturist who uses bamboo in place of flowers to dilute water into his patients (see frame 227), managed somehow to appear on the register of acupuncturists. Chances are, he won´t stay on the register for long. My image is close to that of gorgon´s story.

939

949

簿

bamboo hat bamboo grass

#

kanji

keyword

950

築

fabricate

koohiiStory1 Bamboo crafting is a mediocre substitute for wood when you are building or fabricating a house. While it may look good and might attract a chick (ちく) or two, the kids´ll (きず) just tear it to pieces as its not sturdy enough.

person

Behold Mister T (of "A-Team" fame)! I chose Mr.T because he´s sure to make amusing stories. He is a very versatile character since he´s both the big, tough guy and the “moralistic” person, telling kids not “to do drugs or alcohol”. He is easy to imagine, the heavy gold chains are probably the most prominent feature of the character. And last but not least you can always pepper your story with the famous line “I pity da foo!” * Fittingly, on the left side of the kanji, it looks like a “T”.

951

人

952

佐

assistant

953

但

however

954

住

dwell

955

位

rank

956

仲

go-between

957

体

body

958

悠

remote

959

件

affair

960

仕

attend

961

他

other

962

伏

prostrated

963

伝

transmit

965

仏 休

966

仮

provisional

967

伯

chief

964

Buddha rest

Mr T´s assistant is on his left. Why? Because Mr T has this bad habit of suddenly extending his right arm (what with all the boxing that he did), and his assistant got inadvertently punched in the face more than once (ouch). So now his assistant is always to his left side, much safer - "Stay on my left, foo!". However drunk Mr T is when he comes back to his place, he always get up at nightbreak. “I pity da foo who gets up after nightbreak !”, says Mr. T. When Mr T shows people round his dwelling he takes a big candlestick (with a candle in it!) so that the light shows off his collection of bling bling jewellery. Mr T ranks first position in the stand-up competition (doing knee flexions). Just picture him doing hundreds of these while the rest of the participants are already completely exhausted after a mere hundred. When negotiating a hostage situation, Mr. T acted as the go-between, or person in the middle, for law enforcement and the terrorist. Mister T works out his body (body-building), using two piles of books (i.e. an exercise that can be done at home with two chairs, similar to push-ups but working mostly the shoulders, trapezius and triceps). Mr. T ventured out into a remote area to visit with his wise, old taskmaster who must use a walking stick to get around and originally gave Mr. T the heart to fight crime for the good of the community. Note: this kanji refers to event or case. Current Affair headline: Mr. T has affair with cow. "It´s only animal ´man´ enough for me". Back in the day, a person who stands beside a samurai is usually attending to them or working for them. Old latin saying: homo hominis scorpio (people are scorpions to other people). Don´t need a silly story for this one: prostration is when a person puts themselves in a low position like a dog, as an extreme gesture of humility. Mister T transmits a message with rising clouds (smoke) signals, to a nearby American Indian tribe. The smoke signals spell : "I p-i-t-y y-o-u f-o-o !". Mr. T says, "I ain´t afraid o´ no foo! I´ll give anyone an elbow to the face, I don´t care if it´s Buddha himself!". Mr T resting by a tree. Mr. T was offered a job in the Iraq Provisional Authority, but he turned it down, because he´s anti-war. "I pity da fool thinks this sand pit worth invadin´ when our schools be in such sad shape!". If Mr T was white I am sure he would have been commander in chief of the USA, he just the sort of clown Americans love to vote for. (NB: I tried with the indian chief motif but kept adding feathers by mistake).

#

kanji

keyword

968

俗

vulgar

969

信

faith

koohiiStory1 Mr. T says, "Don´t be like them valley girls, always speaking vulgar language and acting all vulgar! They ain´t nothing but foos!". Mr. T has faith in the Word of God. (Image: Mr. T kneeling and prayering in front of a bible. "Pity me, fool.").

excellent

Mr T wants to go to an excellent school, so he enrolls in Harvard, an ivy-league school.

reliant

Mr T is reliant (depends on) on his garment (the gold chains). Mr T shows the example to the kids, and stays in the file (at supermarket, ...). “I pity da foo who does not follow my example !”.

971

佳 依

972

例

970

973 974 975

個 健 側

example

individual healthy side

977

侍 停

978

値

price

979

倣

emulate

980

倒

overthrow

981

偵

spy

982

僧

Buddhist priest

976

983 984 985 986

億 儀 償 仙

waiter

hundred million ceremony

Mr. T is the master of ceremonies because he is a righteous dude.

reparation

Mr. T says, "This ain´t no prize, foo! This is reparations for slavery!".

hermit

A HERMIT is a PERSON who lives in the MOUNTAINS.

sponsor

And now a word from our sponsor. We see Mr. T, doing a sort of George Foreman thing, grilling Mountain Turkeys. "I pity da foo who don´t have a Mr. T grill!".

humanity

The beginning of humanity required at least TWO people. Mr. T and Mrs. T!

scorn

Mr. T has scorn for every fool. Of course Mr. T will tell a police officer if he catches someone using drugs, foo! Mr. T loves the convenience of the new konbini. Not only does it stay open even if it grows late, they have brand new toilets, and a Post Office!

989 990

使

use

991

便

convenience

988

Mr. T rulezzz! I am on his side! Mr. T infiltrates the secret samurai Buddhist temple as a waiter with a tray of green tea. (Careful: attend (#960)). Halt fool - Mr T acting as a bouncer at the pavillion. Mr. T (person) tells the used car salesman to tell him the real price straight away, and when he doesn´t he throws him through the windshield. Mr T downloads an emulator so that he can play his favorite game, Pokemon. He plays for a different reason, though - he hates to see them poor little foos in the ball so he spends his entire time setting them free. The A-Team are planning to overthrow the government. However, they can´t do a damn thing until Mr T arrives. Mr. T is a terrible spy. He walks around upright. "Why should I hide?! I´ve got nothing to be ashamed of!". While a waiter at the Buddhist temple (see FRAME 976), Mr T increases in wisdom and becomes a Buddhist priest. Mr. T has an clear idea of what he would do if he ever got hundred million dollar. (I guess it would be a enormous gold chain !).

halt

催 仁 侮

987

This keyword gave me trouble, I could write the kanji from memory but could not remember the keyword the other way around. In such case the dictionary definition can be helpful : "Middle English, single, indivisible". Here we have Mr. T. who is so hardened (all the body workout he´s had) that he became in-dividual, that is, indivisible. "I pity da foo who can be divided into smaller units.". Mr. T in a public service announcement yells, "I´m healthy because every day I build a food pyramid, foo!".

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

992

倍

double

993

優

tenderness

Mr. T keeps his double muzzled ... he wants all the glory. The A-Team is on a mission to help Hamlet. With uncharacteristic tenderness, Mr. T consoles the melancholy Hamlet. "No, I really DO pity the poor foo. There, there little guy...take my hanky". (Careful: benevolence (#885).

fell

At a fiesta, Mr. T tries to knock down a large pinata, but in his overly enthusiastic swings to get "the sucka," he actually FELLS the tree the piñata is hanging from, crushing some party goers. “I pity da fools who got crushed by my FELLED tree!”.

995

伐 宿

996

傷

wound

997

保

protect

998

褒

praise

999

傑

greatness

1000

付

adhere

1001

符

token

1002

府

municipality

1003

任

responsibility

1004

賃

fare

994

1006

代 袋

1007

貸

1005

1008 1009 1010 1011 1012 1013

化 花 貨 傾 何 荷

inn

substitute sack lend

change

The Toyoko Inn can house 100 people or 1 Mr. T. If someone doesn't have a fat piggy bank to cover their medical costs and happen to get wounded somewhere, they'll be reclining there forever. Mr. T opens his mouth from the top of the tree saying "I pitty da foo who don´t protect the trees!". Mr. T is praised for his protecting of the trees by being given a top hat and scarf which he wears over his mohawk and chains, respectively. My wise person says greatness does not come from wearing shades (sunglasses) but from planting trees to shade everyone. 賀 TO EVERYONE WHO MADE IT TO 千 kanji!! Remember, after this, you´ll be 読ing japanese novels, the news, and the internet like a native. 吉 to ALL of you in your amazing japanese 往. :). I dropped my token down the drain, so I used a piece of bamboo with chewing gum on the end to retrieve it. A municipality, like any type of government, adheres to having caves for offices (see government office (#591)). It is always Mr. T´s responsibility to be the porter and carry around everyone´s luggage because he´s so strong. It´s your own responsibility to pay the bus fare with the correct number of shells/money. Mister T substitutes an arrow for a toothpick -- The keyword meaning is to replace something with something else, to act for another, to represent. It´s best to stick to the first meaning, because the last two are very close to "mediator" which will come in frame 1761. The idea here is that the arrow is not a toothpick, neither it is changed into one, but it can substitute for one. A sack is an easy substitute for a garment. In order for the bank to lend you money, you need to put up some sort of collateral as a substitute for the money. Referring to a scene in the movie "The Matrix" where a girl bends a spoon with the power of her mind alone, I imagine Mister T who changes a spoon into something else (maybe the waiter forgot to bring knives or forks). Note: as a primitive, it can help to use the image of "spare change", this can help you keep it distinct from other similar kanji such as "shape" or "turn into".

freight

The flowers change with the seasons. Freight is the shells (money) paid to change the location of something big. Don´t confuse with the similar 賃 fare (#1004).

lean

Mr. T gave a girl some change to lean over and give him head.

what

What can Mr T do? ´You mean: what can´t MR T do, you fool´.

baggage

TSA guard: What´s in the baggage?! It´s just flowers, I swear!

flower

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

1014

俊

sagacious

1015

傍

bystander

The entire town wants to get rid of legal prostitutes, but the sagacious Mr T realizes that they are a benefit to the economy and society. So he lets the sa-geishas stay. In Japan, the emperor is a bystander - he stands on his crown but can´t really affect the direction of the country. (thx shimouma).

long time

Note: this is the ひさ in ひさしぶり . Long time no see mummy! (A bound up person).

furrow

Using a TOP HAT to make FURROWS in the RICE FIELD takes a LONG TIME! A person pent in is obviously captured. Imagine a man put inside a wooden box, his evil capturers waiting for ransom money.

1017

久 畝

1018

囚

captured

1019

内

inside

1020

丙

third class

1021

柄

design

Mr. T´s new belt is huge! When he´s inside it, his feet no longer touch the ground! In this third class flight, the seatbelts are so bad that with the slightest turbulence all the persons hit the ceiling. (it´s almost pictographic here!). This is a "design" as in a "pattern", not a verb as in "to design". The tree grain design was too expensive for the third class airline to use for the panelling. They just painted it.

meat

Here we are looking at an x-ray of a cannibal whose insides are full on people-meat.

rot

The rotting meat adheres to the cave walls.

sit

CONGRATULATIONS YOU´RE HALFWAY THERE!!!! =).

graduate

Ph.D graduation for assembly line of doctors(needles) with the cap and tassel(top hat). It took them 10 years (Bachelor´s, Masters, PhD) to get there.... :-p.

1016

1022 1023 1024

肉 腐 座

1026

卒 傘

1027

匁

1025

monme

FOUR PERSONS can fit under this UMBRELLA if they are thin as a NEEDLE. Dude! What happened to your arm! It´s all bound up! "Yeah man, it´s a bummer... with my arm like this I can only lift one monme!".

by means of

A man earns his living by means of the plow. I imagine a sweating man dragging a bronze-age "ard" behind him as he plows his field himself, too poor to afford an ox.

similar

Mr. T finds that living by means of dragging a plow is similar to slavery. Mr. T furiously works a puzzle in an attempt to join Mensa, the high-IQ society. Horror scene: Hanging from the ceiling, a plough and fishhook dripping with blood down onto the tiled bathroom floor. A flower pot that has been dropped on the floor is like a puzzle of ceramic tiles to glue together.

umbrella

1029

以 似

1030

併

join

1031

瓦

tile

1032

瓶

flower pot

1028

1033

宮

Shinto shrine

1034

営

occupation

1035

善

virtuous

1036

年

year

This Shinto shrine is built with human spines. Have you ever seen the ossuary in Sedlec, near Kutna Hora in Czech Republic ? It is a small church entirely decorated with human bones. Do a web search for "sedlec ossuary", it´s quite a sight. The schoolhouse is the backbone of a foundation that will allow you to find a good occupation. Imagine a priest´s teaching: "To achieve virtue one must first submit himself as a sheep to God´s flock, rejecting the horns of Satan and resisting the mouth of Hell. A horse wears a pair of sunglasses with one lens popped out after a particularly raucous celebration to ring in the New Year.

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

night

Actually, the lower-right primitive isn´t quite "walking legs." It´s a little more like "evening" with an extra stroke across it (look up the stroke order). So, it helps me to see this kanji for night as: evening plus an extra stroke representing the tuxedo tails to match the top hat which my special person is wearing out on the town...

1038

夜 液

1039

塚

hillock

1040

幣

cash

1041

弊

abuse

1042

喚

yell

1043

換

interchange

1037

1044 1045

1046 1047

融 施 旋 遊

fluid

dissolve alms

rotation

trip not

This kanji is NOT a piglett.

thing

The cow´s "thing" is tied in a knot! ouch.

easy

The sun is not an easy place to get to.

grant

A grant is easy money. Animals use their urine to mark their territory. So for them, their body water works as a flag denoting their "country" (why bother? we all know which story you are going to pick).

1052

1053

尿

urine

1054

尼

nun

1055

泥

mud

1049 1050 1051

Under their banner, volunteers are requesting alms for scorpion sting victims. A merry-go-round with a big banner on top and below a veritable zoo of bakelite animals on poles in perpertual rotation accompanied by silly music. Giraffes, elephants, zebras, rhinos... The BANNER warns that CHILDREN PLAY on the ROAD. The boat starts to leave on it´s trip across the Atlantic. Underneath a huge banner that spans the width of the ship and says "Bon Voyage", the people wave their rags signalling a safe journey for all on board the Titanic.

play

旅 勿 物 易 賜

1048

A wet dream........water fluid that comes out at night.... There´s already King of the Hill. This is Queen of the Hillock. It´s Ms. Piggy sitting on top of a mound of soil in her crown. A counterfeiter is using a shredder to shred a towel in order to print up some cash (he needs some rag paper) . The Bush administration taskmasters hid their abuse of power by shredding documents as fast as they could using both hands....　　　　　RTK2: 　ヘイ　弊害　へいがい(abuse)...　　　Pure Group:　幣1041. Think yelp when you hear yell to help dinstinguish this from shout (1508). I think of the sounds that would come from the mouths of the 4 dogs if they were bound up together. I´m imagining lots of yelping. After months of practice, you finally managed to teach a nice trick to your sled-pulling four bound up St. Bernard dogs: one snap of your fingers and they interchange their positions. I have created the element "old camera" out of the left side of the kanji: from the subject´s point of view, the light is captured by one mouth (the lens). The photographer is under a big hood, we only see his legs, and he is holding a spike in his right hand, which is the shutter release. Now, at the time the photographer takes the photo, a little insect is flying near the flash. The flash is so powerful that the insect is burnt and dissolves in the air.

Red cross nuns sit in a tent under the red cross flag, spooning out food to the hungry. TV gets weirder and weirder... Now they´re doing mud wrestling shows with nuns splashing around in the water. What will they think of next?

#

1056

1057 1058

kanji

塀 履 屋

keyword

fence

footgear

koohiiStory1 [fence; wall; (kokuji)] A fence separates one soil from the other. On a large scale, large pieces of soils in the world have a virtual fence called nation. Picture a world map where all countries have their soil with one color, their national flag as the legend and a fence on the borders... don´t you think it looks like a giant puzzle? NOTE: The most common use is in はく, meaning to put on footgear, rather than actual footgear itself. STORY: You are asleep in camp when you are woken up with news that the FLAG has fallen to the enemy. You quickly PUT ON YOUR FOOTGEAR and run off to RESTORE the FLAG.

grip

Flag at the climax (highest point) of a castle roof. Fingers gripping the roof as your about to fall to your death. Think of an action scene in some movie.

yield

When yielding, soldiers raise the white flag before exiting from the trenches.

dig

If you dig with your fingers hard enough, soil eventually yields. (See dig (#1061)). When soil finally yielded thanks to your digging efforts, what you have is a ditch.

roof

1061

握 屈 掘

1062

堀

ditch

1063

居

reside

1064

据

set

A humongous American flag in Florida marks the place where all the old people reside. The man set his finger firmly on the map and said "Here is where they reside, I am certain of it".

1059 1060

1065

層

stratum

The strata have piled up in an ever increasing pile of dirt. As the geologists go down the rocks, they flag each stratum with the name of the corresponding era.

1066

局

bureau

The Federal Bureau of Investigation has email scanners that flag certain phrases.

1067

遅

slow

1068

漏

leak

1069

刷

printing

A sheep crossing guard waves a SLOW flag for his fellow sheep crossing the road. WATER always LEAKED in the spot left by the FLAG planted in the roof everytime it RAINED. Not too hard to picture a hole left in the ceiling from a flag, now leaking water. We printed a japanese flag on his white towel by stabbing him with a saber while he was wearing it. Slang for blowjob and that´s priceless for stories...but also the character looks like the letter R which I think of as standing for RULER (12 inches) other meanings include: rule, measure, length.

1070 1071

尺 尽

shaku

swamp

A women is so exhausted by her "shakuhachi" that see needs to ice her jaw. You´re hiding from the enemy underwater in a swamp. To breathe, you have your shakuhachi flute poking up through the surface of the water.

translate

You cannot pretend to translate into words the melody of the shakuhachi!

choose

Hand job or "shakuhachi", choose. Roosters in Japan are very civilised, they play the shakuhachi at nightbreak to signify the beginning of daytime. Traditional Japanese storefront doors have several flags, known as "noren," hanging down from a curtain rod in front of them. I see this as a pseudo-pictograph, and use the horizontal line across the top to represent the curtain rod, since noren don´t usually hang from the ceiling.

exhaust

1074

沢 訳 択

1075

昼

daytime

1076

戸

door

1072 1073

#

kanji

1078

肩 房

1079

扇

1077

shoulder

koohiiStory1 The shoulder is the best part of the body to bash a door open with (Don´t ever try this. Use your foot).

tassel

Explanation here: http://forum.koohii.com/viewtopic.php?pid=14684#p14684.

fan

It´s insanely hot today! I´m standing in the doorway, fanning myself with feathers.

keyword

1080

炉

hearth

1081

戻

re-

1082

涙

tears

1083

雇

employ

1084

顧

look back

1085

啓

disclose

1086

示

show

1087

礼

salutation

1088

祥

auspicious

1089

祝

celebrate

1091

福 祉

1092

社

1090

blessing welfare company

1093

視

inspection

1094

奈

Nara

1095

尉

military officer

1096

慰

consolation

1097

款

goodwill

This hearth is equipped with a fire-proof door. On the kanji you can see somewhat pictographically the fire-proof door keeping the fire behind, and nothing comes under the door primitive, where you would have expected to see another primitive. The St. Bernard dog whining at the door of his master’s house in order to re-enter / return inside. I see the story of Hachiko: the faithfull dog who still waited for his master to return long after he had died. Brings a tear to the eye. Our company has no standards. We´ll employ any turkey who walks in the door. I was EMPLOYED to give HEAD...when I look back, maybe that was not a wise career move. Behind closed DOORS, the TASKMASTER tortures to get prisoners to open their MOUTHS and DISCLOSE information. A boy made an altar, but he´s afraid to show it to God because he thinks it´s two little. Indy, my friend, you must be very careful! If you approach the altar and do not give the proper salutation a large fishhook will rip you away. Bringing a sheep to sacrifice on the altar was a sign of an auspicious life. The poor could only afford a pigeon, the more auspicious an expensive sheep for an offering. It´s a Bar Mitzvah. At the altar, the teenager is singing in his awful, mid-puberty voice. We´ll all celebrate when that part is over! This recalls the selling of indulgences in the history of the Church (As an aside, Protestantism began as a protest of this practice). Basically, one gave wealth to the altar (i.e. priest) and received a blessing. If you prefer a Jewish version, think of the donation (wealth) that is expected when you´re called to the ark (altar in the kanji) to give a blessing over the torah. And in front of every altar, she stopped to pray for the welfare of the others. When you enter a Japanese company it´s like you join a cult... your workdesk becomes your altar and you worship the very soil the office is built on. The beaurocracy in Japan is such that even altars need to be inspection approved. A little man with glasses comes once a year to give the altar a "visual once over" as he calls it (perhaps checking for unauthorised symbology?). It´s beautiful place, but the dark side of Nara is that they sacrifice St. Bernards on evil altars every night after the tourists leave! Of course it had to be the military officer´s idea to glue a national flag to the altar he´s stationed at. A military officer must offer consolation to the hearts of the families of his fallen men. Samuari, altar, yawn The samurai is on the altar, preaching about goodwill. The audience just yawns however, they want to see the man fight!

#

kanji

keyword

1098

禁

prohibition

1099

襟

collar

1100

宗

religion

1101

崇

adore

1102

祭

ritual

1103

察

guess

1104

擦

grate

1105

由

wherefore

1107

抽 油

1108

袖

sleeve

1109

宙

mid-air

1106

1111

届 笛

1112

軸

1110

1113 1114

甲 押

pluck oil

deliver

The liquid oil that sprouts from an oil field. Imagine some magic cloak, that when worn, has little green sprouts appearing on the sides that grow into sleeves. Jack´s beanstalk sprouted up, pushed at the roof and lifted the house so that it hangs in mid-air suspended on the SPROUT. In the US, when the mail is delivered, a flag sprouts up on your mailbox. (We don´t have that in Australia.).

armor

Funny.. this appeared to me as a pictograph of a samurai´s armor. Then I looked up images of the samurai armor and it is not even remotely similar. Then I realised it looks in fact like the belly of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, which I somehow associated with the samurai armor because of the "turtle samurai" that appeared earlier. Fits me. The bit that pokes down is to protect the genitals, I guess.

push

Push the roots down, instead of plucking the seedling. A headland is a mountain that is firmly rooted despite being surrounded on 3 sides by water. (Just like your head is a mountain surrounded by air on 3 sides, a headland!).

headland

1116

挿

insert

1118

I have an informed guess about whose house the dark rituals are performet at. If you mis-guess the cheese you´ll grate your fingers on the cheese-grater (happens to me all the time). Wherefore art thou, Sprouteo? (Juliet has fallen in love with a brussel sprout) (OR: A brussel sprout has fallen from Juliet´s dinner plate and rolled off). [When I see the word pluck, I think eyebrows, not vegetables. So, to avoid confusing with pick (#733):] Each time this singular, long, wiry black hair starts to sprout out of my chin again, I pluck it with my fingers.

axis

岬

申 伸

A collar is the part of your cloak that, if tightened too tight, will prohibit breathing. I never really did figure out what religion my host family was - all I knew was that they kept an altar in their home. In ancient Greece, it was the religion of the time to adore the gods who live on Mount Olympus. A ritual such as a circumcision: a small piece of flesh from the crotch is left on the altar.

Flute is made of bamboo sprout. The Germans manufactured so many cars during World War II that it was almost as if they were sprouting from the factories of the Axis.

flute

1115

1117

koohiiStory1 Similar to radical tyro´s story. If you live in Japan, your main exposure to this kanji is probably "no smoking" signs. So I imagine the government enacting a prohibition of tobacco, and burning whole groves of tobacco plants on an altar (the altar of public health, or self-righteousness, if you will).

speaketh

A rice farmer´s delicate fingers have inserted 1,000 rooted seedlings into his field. I imagine thomeone who can not pronounth the "s" and speaketh like thith becauth they have a cane in their mouth.

expand

Here we see Mr. T. expanding his gang with some trained fighter monkeys.

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

gods

The Gods are gathered around debating Zeus´ latest purchase for Mount Olympus. A huge and extremely kitsch gilded altar in the shape of giant "speak no evil" monkey. Hera decides she will never let him go shopping alone again .

search

The monkey searches around with his fingers for his crotch.

fruit

naked

If only Eve had used her brains and not taken the forbidden fruit from the tree. This candy is made in the shape of a flower, each petal with the taste of a different fruit. After I finish each chapter of RTK, I eat a piece of fruit to celebrate all the new words I´ve learned. (Thanks Misha!). Here we have Adam and Eve eating of the forbidden fruit and realizing they were naked, and so clothing themselves in a cloak.

ax

Errata: stroke order in 4th edition is wrong. Top stroke is first.

chop

pray

We chop down trees with axes to analyze their rings. You outsiders better learn your place! An axe stuck in the door when you get home is a pretty good indicator that this might not be the best place for you. Religious freedom has not always been respected throughout history, and nobody knew how to force religion on an indigenous people like the Spanish missionaries. They posted conquistadors at either side of the altars at the local missions, and if anybody refused to pray, they would get the axe.

near

The end is near. The axe-murderer is waiting for you on the road...

fold

It´s the latest Japanese game show: Forudo! Contestants are given a sheet of paper and are told to fold it into a complex origami shape. If they´re not done in 60 seconds, a huge axe descends from the ceiling and chops their work in half. Contestants know to recoil their hands from the falling axe, but some have been so absorbed in folding, they ignore the buzzer and get their fingers chopped off.

philosophy

A two-hour lesson of philosophy in high school. All the students, bored to death, are folding sheets of paper into planes, love notes or whatever, while the mouth of the teacher is talking about Platon, Kierkegaard and many other notorious philosophers.

1121

神 捜 果

1122

菓

confectionary

1123

課

chapter

1119 1120

1126

裸 斤 析

1127

所

1124 1125

1128 1129

1130

1131

祈 近

折 哲

place

1132

逝

departed

1133

誓

vow

1134

暫

temporarily

1135

漸

steadily

One of the dearest of Japan´s dearly departed is Sasaki Sadako, who developed Leukemia after the bombing of Hiroshima, and became famous for folding more than a thousand paper cranes, never giving up hope. To this day, people in Hiroshima still fold origami cranes in her memory. For this character, let us imagine a parade in her honor, the entire road lined with folded cranes. This Japanese couple wrote the vows that they had made to each other onto a piece of paper and then folded it into an origami, and put it somewhere in their appartment. To everybody else it is an origami, but to them it is also a symbol of their vows. -- "the folded words are vows". Note : in this story and a few others I use the image of an origami for the primitive "fold". Your car has been savagely (see steadily) attacked by an ax. It will be some days before your car is fixed. So you are temporarily without car. I imagine firemen working steadily to rescue a man from a crashed car. First, they spray it with water; then, they use an axe to break through the window.

#

kanji

keyword

1136

断

severance

1137

質

substance

1139

斥 訴

1140

昨

yesterday

1141

詐

lie

1142

作

make

1143

雪

snow

1144

録

record

1145

尋

inquire

1146

急

hurry

1147

穏

calm

1148

侵

encroach

1149

浸

immersed

1138

1150 1151

寝 婦

reject accusation

lie down lady

1153

掃 当

1154

争

contend

1155

浄

clean

1156

事

matter

1152

1157 1158

唐 糖

sweep

koohiiStory1 [Based on fuaburisu´s] A man puts some rice on a fishhook as bait, but catches a fish so strong, he needs to take out his axe and sever the line lest he be dragged into the depths. What is this substance on this clam? I´ve already broken 2 axes on it! (Good question...質問). The kids at school used to reject me.. Made me feel really bad till I brought my axe to school. See the drop of blood on it? I strongly reject the accusation implicit in your words. One can use a simple word play to remember this character - the day that I saw before today was yesterday. Pinnochio gets frustrated that every time he utters a word of a lie, his nose grows and he has to get the saw out again. Mr T.´s favorite magazine is Make. He loves to make things. But he´s a purist: he only uses saws, no power tools. SNOW isn´t all that different from RAIN, except it can be removed with a BROOM because it only forms in freezing temperatures. A monk won a gold metal for breaking the current record for most swept rice in one minute. The policed inquired into the erotica scandal. They tried to sweep away the evidence, but some of it stuck. (Note: katakana エロ ero in the middle of this kanji is the Japanese word for erotica.). She was always bound to a broom, her heart pounding in a hurry to finish before she was punished for being slow. The farmer is calm knowing that his wheat fields are protected from vultures by his strawman with a heart (all the better to do the job properly). The parson ENCROACHES on the French maid; driven wild by her little broom, dainty tiara and sinfully short skirt showing her knickers (crotch)! The French maid draws a bath for her amorous master, but slips and falls in - getting immersed. (thanks to Nukemarine for the French maid image!). After work, the French maid goes home and lies down with a turtle. Turtle? Well, he´s sloooow and always hard... (thanks to Nukemarine and Wakela!). In high society, a lady is a woman who never touches a broom or an apron. Whether I SWEEP something away with my FINGERS or my BROOM, I should always wear my APRON.

T'ang

Some mothers use a small broom to hit their children when they misbehave. This can be seen as a Retarius, a roman gladiator. The Retiarius always fought with a net to bound up his opponents, and with a trident, which was able to pierce enemies after tying them. They were terrific contenders, so they were only paired with gladiators specially equipped to fight them. Bottled water marketers contend to make their version of tap water sound the cleanest. I had to take one day off from work due to ´personal matters´ after stepping on a rake and having the handle snap up and smack me across the mouth. I certainly wasn´t going to tell anyone about it. Two archeologists are in a cave looking at Chinese artifacts from various eras. One picks up a rake and says, "What about this – T´ang, do you think?" The second puts the rake in his mouth and answers, "Yes, it does tang a bit".

sugar

Sugar made from rice has a tangy flavour.

hit

#

kanji

keyword

1159

康

sane

1160

逮

apprehend

koohiiStory1 A psychiatric hospital is located in a CAVE. To determine, which patients are sane and can be released, they are given a SIEVE and asked to empty a bathtub (the sane ones take out the plug and get the water out with ease). Think police roadblocks. They act like road sieves, letting good people through but apprehending criminals.

1161

伊

Italy

The "boot" of Italy has gotten Europe all muddy. Who else could mop it up but Mr T?

old boy

There´s a tendancy in Japan to make the younger members (kouhai) clean up after the older members (senpai) of a group, which results in a lot of grumbling and whining. "Well old boy," a senpai might say, "If you did as much work with the mop as you do with your mouth, you would have been done an hour ago".

1163

君 群

1164

耐

1165

需

demand

1166

儒

Confucian

1167

端

edge

1162

1168 1169

両 満

flock #NAME?

Good ol´ boys are like sheep; they tend to flock together. [akrodha] My comb is rust-proof, water-proof, and fire-proof. But unfortunately it is not idiot-proof--and I glued it to myself. Supply and demand is a simple concept: when it rains, the demand for combs goes up to deal with wet hair.

both

No more Confucian jibba-jabba! I demand you tell me why it´s raining combs!". Have you ever seen those shots in movies where the hero is standing at the edge of a sheer mountain face, hair blowing in the wind? It probably wouldn´t seem so heroic if you saw him ten minutes earlier, when a crew of stylists was carefully combing his hair so it would fall perfectly. Primatives celing; belt; mountain as per Cumulative Errata. See volfy post for link. Both effective ways to commit suicide, hang your self from the celing with your belt or jump off a mountain.

full

Add water THEN the flowers. With both the vase will be full. You decide one day to paint a kanji on your ceiling. Unfortunately, you don’t have a brush, so, being innovative, you use a sprout. Knowing it could be messy, you search for a drop-cloth, but can’t find one. Instead, you put a shovel down on the floor to catch any drips resulting from the BRUSH-STROKEs.

1170

画

brush-stroke

1171

歯

tooth

1172

曲

bend

Stop shoveling rice into your mouth, you´ll hurt a tooth! Use chopsticks instead. It looks like the mouth of Bender the robot, from Matt Groening´s animated series "Futurama". Thus, I use the character Bender the robot as a primitive.

1173

曹

cadet

A space cadet eager to make one bend around the sun. (a dangerous maneuver).

1174

遭

encounter

1175

漕

rowing

Close encounters of the third kind. The space cadet encounters aliens on the road. Bender the cadet (see frame 1172) is rowing, during some army exercise, and he´s very afraid of water (Bender is a robot).

1176

槽

vat

1177

斗

Big Dipper

Also as part of some army survival exercise, the cadets (including Bender see frame 1172) are sent into the woods to build a vat (for collecting water for example). Since the meaning of "big dipper" is rather specific and the sense of measurement seems to be a more common usage, I concentrate on the primative meaning of measuring cup. This is a pictograph, with the first two strokes representing the measuring ticks on the side of the cup.

#

kanji

keyword

1178

料

fee

1179

科

department

koohiiStory1 When buying rice, the fee is calculated by the cup. Naturally we don´t just use any cup; it has to be a proper measuring cup. The national DEPARTMENT of WHEATS and MEASURES. Get it? This one was hard until I came up with this. Can´t see direct relation to Big Dipper (#1177) since its writing order is completely different. As raulir noted, it´s written as overlapping at the last stroke of ツ and the first of メ. I take it as a pictograph or treasure map. Two dots represent big trees and the cross (marking the treasure) is placed relative to them.

1180

図

map

1181

用

utilize

1182

庸

comfortable

To tenderize meat in an emergency wilderness situation, just utilize your walking stick! To live a comfortable life, single men need only a cave for living, a rake for cleaning and a screwdriver for fixing.

equip

Mr. T wants to climb up and pick the flowers at the top of the cliff. He equips himself with screwdrivers to use as climbing spikes to reach the top of the cliff. Imagine a large AMMO belt full of philips screwdrivers instead of bullets.

1184

備 昔

1185

錯

confused

1186

借

borrow

1187

惜

pity

1183

1188

措

once upon a time

set aside

Once upon a time, the children were forced to eat their salad every day. A long time ago, people of the world got confused because there were so many kinds of Metal coins. today we only have the euro. Once upon a time I let Mr T borrow my salad bowl, but he won´t give it back. "This be mine now, foo!". What a pity! My state of mind when i think of the opportunities I missed from once upon a time. Long ago our ancestors set aside the use of fingers and began to use cutlery. (Raichu,11-7-2006) The way I remember it´s 昔 once upon a time (#1184) rather than 旧 olden times (#35) is that they began to use cutlery to eat salad. (I also think about how when you visit the Medieval Times theme park, which is set in Once upon a time, their gimmick is that you eat with your fingers.). The taskmaster is dissatisfied with the meal she´s served, and scatters the salad & meat across the floor for the servants to clean up.

1190

散 廿

1191

庶

commoner

1192

遮

intercept

1193

席

seat

1194

度

degrees

1195

渡

transit

A generation is 30, one stroke less is twenty. Commoners have to huddle in caverns around a campfire, while higher class people get heating and central air conditioning in a hotel. The commoners are revolting! We must intercept them on the road before they reach the castle! Remember those poor commoners huddled in groups of 20 in a cave? The only thing they had for a seat was some old toweling (while their lords could recline on luxurious couches). The cavern refugees are so poor that they can´t afford thermometers. So, the menfolk expose their crotches inside the cavern, and approximate the temperature in degrees from how shrivelled everything looks downstairs... This particular form of transit is a ferry (one of the actual meanings of this character). Naturally it can only cross the water if it´s not frozen, so the temperature must be above 0 degrees.

1196

奔

bustle

Hustle and bustle = a big St. Bernard dog frisking about in a haystack, knocking it down and spreading the hay about, after the field hands just stacked it up.

1189

scatter twenty

#

kanji

keyword

1197

噴

erupt

1198

墳

tomb

1199

憤

aroused

half

Ah, there´s no better way to bake a pizza than an oven fueled by a burning strawman. And if you listen carefully, there are stifled strawman screams coming from the kitchen. Think of this image: http://users.mtrx.net/funnypics/content/-rdm1ABCD1234-rdm1-/2005/2005-08-23-0002/Doughboy.jpg. The sun rising beside a straw man in a corn field is a classic cartoon depiction of daybreak. Imagine karate chopping the number three in half with a WALKING STICK and pausing the picture just as the first "board" breaks.

consort

The person who is your consort is most commonly "your other half".

paddy ridge

A PADDY-RIDGE divides the RICE FIELD in HALF. In the bible, King Solomon´s JUDGMENT was admired not by saying to cut the baby in HALF with the SWORD, but that it revealed who the true mother was. Entering the movie, the dude asks for your ticket, so he can tear it in half. He looks at you funny when you hand him a ticket already torn in half. He quietly tears the stub into quarters after you show him your dagger with a smile.

1200

焼

bake

1201

暁

daybreak

1204

半 伴 畔

1205

判

judgment

1206

券

ticket

1202 1203

1207

巻

scroll

1208

圏

sphere

1209

勝

victory

1210

藤

wisteria

1211

謄

facsimilie

1212

片

one-sided

1213 1214

版 之

koohiiStory1 History of Pompei: An unexpect eruption and from the mouths of the volcano come lava that threatens the farmers collecting haystacks in the fields and the fisherman catching shells on the coast. After the eruption all is a tomb. The soil has covered the remains of the farmers gathering haystacks and of the fisherman collecting shells. Note: this word in Japanese has the idea of "indignant". So aroused here refers to being aroused because of anger over some unjust or wrong act, unfairness etc. It doesn´t seem to carry a meaning associated with arousal in the sense of sex or pleasure. So, my story: think of the angry state of mind aroused at finding all your clams buried under your haystack stolen, gone!

At a mysterious bazaar, you happen to come across something interesting: a rolled-up scroll for only 25¢. You buy it up impulsively until you realize that the powerful spell contained within is cursed by a poisonous snake. If you try to cast this spell, the snake will pop out of nowhere and bite you! Hrmph. No wonder it was so cheap... I assosiate scrolls with spell casting, the efect of this spell is pent in a certain sphere of influence, outside it no damage is done. After your VICTORY cut your enemy´s FLESH into QUARTERs to show your POWER. According to legend, the great Ogaki wisteria tree grew and flowered from magical rice grains that were planted under the quarter moon. Sending a facsimile to the moon can be problematic only a quarter of the words actually get there.

printing block

Fuaburisu´s pictograph of a man kneeling and presenting the ring to his future wife is a one-sided version of the story. Others say he was giving her the finger. Before the advent of printers in Japan, typewriters couldn´t be built as they were in the west due to how many kanji there are. Lots of small printing blocks had to be used instead. One side of the printing block would have a mirrored (anti) image of the kanji. This is true.

of

Of all the kanji, this is the only one 之orro can write.

#

kanji

keyword

1215

乏

destitution

1216

芝

turf

1217

不

negative

1218

否

negate

1220

杯 矢

1221

矯

1219

1222 1223 1224 1225

1226

族 知 智 矛 柔

1228

務 霧

1229

班

1227

1230 1231 1232

帰 弓 引

1235

弔 弘 強

1236

弱

1233 1234

cupfuls

koohiiStory1 Children in complete destitution have no hope of ever getting toys to play with, so when they find even a tiny drop of a building block they are overjoyed. Artificial turf made easy: flowers stuck on top of building blocks that you can place anywhere. [Smithsonian] Scene: Mr. T hanging from the ceiling being tortured. He is asked if he is going to talk. Spitting (a drop of saliva) in the torturer´s face, he says "Negative". To distinguish between 否 negate, and 不 negative (#1217): Note that negate contains 口, which is a kind of gate. The maple tree is very negative about it, but the farmer still collects cupfuls of maple syrup from it.

tribe

Zeus ran out of lightning bolts and has to drop darts from the heavens. Angels have now been given a powerful tool to rectify human behavior instantly, without delay - they have been allowed to drop darts on those who misbehave... spare the dart and spoil the man... With a banner declaring "Keep Out!" and blow darts to back it up, the Amazon tribe is not that friendly.

know

I should know. After all, I did graduate from Dartmouth!

wisdom

Wisdom is knowing everything OVER the sun (fools assume everything UNDER).

halberd

マオ Zedong always carried a halberd.

dart

rectify

task

[tender; weakness; gentleness; softness] Love me tender, Love me perfect, Never cheat on me. Or I´ll impale you on my Halberd, And hang ya atop a tree... It is with the halberd he holds that the taskmaster exerts his power over those actually performing the task.

fog

This fog is the perfect weather for us to perform our task undetected.

squad

Am I the only one who took this as penis and balls? In order to be in the man-squad, naturally you need to have two balls with your "spear" in the middle there.

tender

bow

A female warrior returns home from battle. Her husband takes away her spear to symbolize the end of fighting and gives her a broom and an apron. “Boy, this is some kind of HOMECOMING,” thinks the veteran. (Adapted from johnskb). My personification for this primative is Legolas from the Lord of the Rings: a master at the bow. I suppose robin hood etc would work too.

pull

Put a walking stick in the bow and pull it back, ready to fire at the geezer.

condolences

Perhaps a pictograph of a soldier´s weapons--his sword and bow-placed ceremonially over his body before burial, while people offer their condolences.

vast

If you pull the bow back with your elbow, you can shoot a vast distance.

strong

An insect who can fly vast distances is strong. Two weak archers agree on a duel to the death. They constantly shoot at each other but never manage to hit their target. But what they lack in skill they make up in determination, and they keep shooting for hours, and days, and months, until it´s wintertime and their bows are coated in ice.

homecoming

weak

#

kanji

keyword

1238

沸 費

1239

第

No.

1240

弟

younger brother

1241

巧

adroit

1242

号

nickname

1243

朽

decay

1237

1244 1245

1246 1247

誇 汚 与 写

seethe expense

boast

koohiiStory1 Re CharleyGarrett: This liquid looks like ordinary water, but it will instantly seethe when it comes in contact with counterfeit dollar bills. The inventor must be rich (and probably has dollar signs in his eyes). An expense is an expense, whether you put it in dollars or in local money. The No. 1 currency in the world is the dollar. But, the Asian nations are fast catching up and may in reality have already surpassed it. So, let the bamboo represent the No. 2 currencies (the yen, etc.). The reverse order (bamboo on top and the dollar on the bottom) is really a look at the future. Younger brothers are always more prone to mischief. Mine, you can almost see the little horns on him and the dollar signs on his eyes when he comes up with a moneymaking scheme. Adroit: dextrous, deft, skillful. Snare is a little generic so I´ll use BEAR TRAP, with huge teeth cartoon style that snares you around the ankle. In the crafting of a bear trap, one must be particularly adroit. Otherwise they will become the victim of their down device. My nickname is "No Lips". Yep, I shouldn´t have put my mouth on that bear trap... This snare isn´t terribly effective, because it´s swinging from a decaying tree. Imagine the tree as being so decayed that when an animal gets caught in the snare, its struggles cause the tree to collapse into a putrid mess. The hunter´s boast: I say, it was a "big one", but the snare broke and it got away. (credit to many others before).

bestow

A hunter Washes, with WATER, his TWO SNAREs, because they are dirty. David went to battle with a slingshot and it only took him one shot to slay Goliath. Partly because of this, the prophet Nathan was later instructed to bestow upon David the throne of all Israel.

copy

A crown was bestowed to the British royalty museum, but it was only a copy.

somebody

Somebody was just looking for you. He had a longnose that reaches down below his mouth, and a long jaw that sticks out past his nose, and a scar across his face. (greenapple,16-3-2006) The way to remember that this is somebody rather than someone (#1256) is that the story is full of body descriptions.

shoot

You SHOOT SOMEBODY with a GLUE-gun.

apologize

dirty

1250

身 射 謝

1251

老

old man

1252

考

consider

1253

孝

filial piety

1254

教

teach

Dick Cheney... An old man, wondering what it´s like in a grave, sits in a freshly dug plot. When a gravekeeper mistakes him for dead and begins burying him with soil, the old man saves himself by flailing his walking stick in the air. Before shooting an old man with a slingshot, one shold carefully consider the possible consequences. This child has taken filial piety to the next level. He is actually carrying the old man on his shoulders. In early Japan, filial piety was the cornerstone of education, and harsh taskmasters were employed to teach it.

torture

In Torture 101 class they teach you to Consider the Fingers as the first part to inflict pain to. Then you can move on to other parts (like feet, groin, head, etc. etc. ; ) ).

1248 1249

1255

拷

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

1256

者

someone

1257

煮

boil

1258

著

renowned

1259

署

signature

I find the best way of memorizing this kanji is in conjunction with the Japanese compound for ninja: 忍者 -- i.e. someone who endures (see FRAME 597 for the kanji 忍). A 忍者 is not just a 身 (somebody), it´s 者 who can 忍 great 拷! I had a hard time with the next several frame numbers trying to use "puppet." So i thought of "voodoo doll" but then found "love doll" (which is just a special type of puppet) fit well with these 8 frames. Observe: Here I am boiling my love doll over the flames to warm her up a bit... Here I am, putting a wreath of flowers on my love doll´s head and pretending she is someone of great renowned. Before giving your SIGNATURE to accept the LOVEDOLL, you should EYE over the LOVEDOLL for any damages, then give your SIGNATURE.

1260

暑

sultry

Ahh, a fine sultry day with my love doll under the hot sun. I think she´s getting a tan!

various

Because i get tired of saying the same old thing, I have lately been trying to use various terms of endearment to my love doll. I think she appreciates it too.

1261

1262

諸 猪

boar

1264

渚 賭

1265

峡

gorge

1266

狭

cramped

1263

1267 1268

挟 追

strand gamble

sandwiched

When we gamble at the shell game, I always win against my love doll. A gorge is where God has cut into a mountain with a pair of scissors. (synewave,6-102006) http://www.travelblog.org/Photos/197361.html. A pack of wild dogs, waiting in a very cramped waiting room, to get their hair cut by Edward Scissors Hands, who is very popular. 挟まる 【はさまる】 (v5r,vi) to get between; to be caught in; (P) Story: You know how in tokyo there are those really packed trains where train staff in gloves shove people in? Well imagine being sandwiched in so tight, that when the doors close, only your FINGERS are sticking out. The train staff have no choice... they must cut them off with SCISSORS =( snip snip..

expert

Maestro, coattails flapping wildly, is being chased down the road by his fans. A maestro in a large auditorium with high ceilings is conducting his orchestra of expert musicians at a fever-pitch, sweat pouring out of him. When the piece is over he reaches for his towel to wipe his brow.

commander

The COMMANDER is a military MAESTRO who never throws in the TOWEL.

chase

1270

師 帥

1271

官

bureaucrat

1272

棺

coffin

1273

管

pipe

1274

父

father

1269

My love doll is made of special pheremone impregnated vinyl. Unfortunately, a pack of wild dogs mistook her for a wild boar and tore her to pieces. Oh dear! I was stranded on a desert island surrounded by water for hundreds of miles on end. I wasn´t upset though - I had my love doll! What a great strand of sand to be stranded on - just me and my love doll!

No one likes classical music anymore. Our Maestro is here at home without his baton sighing sadly before he heads off for another day as his new job as a bureaucrat. The maestro at home was sick of being a bureaucrat, so he got some wood and built himself a coffin and got in. Japanese bureaucrats send all their messages through an inter-office bamboo pipe system. Luke, I am your father. Darth Vader (really surprised nobody put this one up before: 2 laserswords).

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1 Even though your FATHER is an old man, he can´t give up his party lifestyle. Once a week he still dons his cool TOP HAT (well, it was cool 40 years ago) and goes out on the town to MINGLE with the ladies. This is a pretty common thing in Japan, where old motherfuckers still think they can pick up 19 year old girls.

1275

交

mingle

1276

効

merit

1277

較

contrast

1278

校

exam

1279

足

leg

1280 1281

1282 1283

1284

1285

促 距 路 露 跳 躍

stimulate

Mingling with the powerful can bring you success, bypassing the need for any merit. The people I had invited to the party were mingling quite well with one another, until they all suddenly started talking about the cars they own. Pretty soon the crowd divided itself into distinct, contrasting crowds: rich snobs with fancy cars, soccer moms with minivans, and hippies with bicycles. With the exam scores posted on a TREE, the students MINGLED around looking at the results. test. 試. Captain Ahab lost his leg to the great white whale´s mouth and had to mend it with a peg leg. Mr T, ever the optimist, is trying to stimulate Capt Ahab´s wooden leg by rubbing it down. Capt Ahab normally wouldn´t let anyone do that, but he appreciates Mr T´s stimulating conversation.

long-distance

You can step a long-distance if you have a leg that´s gigantic!

path

When pirates try to hide, it´s always easy to find them. Their wooden legs leave distinctive prints, showing where each is hiding and the exact path he took.

dew

After the rain the path was covered with dew.

hop

A girl with a wooden leg always wanted to play hopscotch with the other girls, but every time she tried to hop she´d lose her balance and injure another girl. That´s why the other girls make fun of her and see her presence as a portent to injury.

tread

Well, there are weekdays weekday (#576) and there are laundry days laundry (#577), and on February 29th leap day, the manufacturer recommends servicing or replacing your peg leg because they tend to wear out every 4 years. The pirate with the wooden leg chased after the parade float and was run over by the next one, leaving tread marks all over him and his leg.

step

You have to watch your step when moving your leg on a watery day.

skeleton

Your body meat is attached to the bone joints of your skeleton. Don´t give water to a skeleton. When he drinks it, it´ll sluice right through his bones, forcing you to put one of those "Caution - Slippery Floor" signs up on the resultant puddle. A skeleton is shuffling along the shoulder of the road, so you pull up next to him and ask where he is going. He says he´s going to donate his marrow to the hospital because he got into some financial trouble and lost everything; his marrow is the only thing he still possesses. Continued from auspicious (#1088). Once a year, the people pray for a sign from the gods. But if the gods are feeling particularly mischievous, they´ll send down a jawbone to the altar. The people see this as a sign of calamity to come. The gods think of it as an amusing prank. Grampa´s flushing the toilet, when his denture (Jawbone) pops out and gets sucked down the whirlpool!

leap

1288

践 踏 骨

1289

滑

slippery

1290

髄

marrow

1291

禍

calamity

1292

渦

whirlpool

1286 1287

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

1293

過

overdo

Jaws XII~! Jaws strikes the highway! Man, they´re really overdoing it now.

Heights

If you´re scared of Heights, you don´t want to stay at The Pinnacle; you are anti- The Pinnacle. Primitive: The Pinnacle is a dream-like gated community at the top of a mount. This allows for innumerable stories for all the kanji with this primitive since you have a whole city to work with. Also prevents confusion with "mountain".

Africa

Can you see Africa from The Pinnacle? I can! I can!

1295

阪 阿

1296

際

occasion

1297

障

hinder

1298

随

follow

1299

陪

auxiliary

1300

陽

sunshine

1301

陳

line up

1294

1302

防

ward off

1303

附

affixed

1304

院

Inst.

1305

陣

camp

1306

隊

regiment

1307

墜

crash

1308

降

descend

1309

階

story

1310

陛

highness

1311

隣

neighboring

Many rituals are practiced every day (blessing before meals, evening prayer, etc.) Only the peak rituals (wedding, Bar Mitzvah, etc.) qualify to be called an occasion. The officer at the gate to The Pinnacle with a giant badge sewn to his chest hinders all visitors. But not the handicapped. They´re hindered enough already. They´re given a badge and can pass right into The Pinnacle. [Image: Follow the ´Yellow-Brick Road´ to success] The pinnacle signifies your personal goal and destination. What you´re seeking to possess lies at the end of the yellowbrick road. You must follow the road to get what you want. In case of emergency, The Pinnacle has auxiliary guard dogs, but they keep them muzzeled until they´re needed. A kid is perched on a pinnacle with his piggy bank. He uses the coins to catch the sunshine, and redirect it into people´s eyes, far below. Every morning at The Pinnacle, the residents line upon the East side for morning stretches and leisure. A giant compass is The Pinnacle´s self-defense system. It points in the direction of any invaders so the city is prepared well ahead to ward off the intruders. A sign was AFFIXED on the PINNACLE of the Acropolis so that tourists would ADHERE to the rules. The Institution of The Pinnacle is perfect in every way. It is the new House of God, his chosen city. Paparazzi make camp outside of The Pinnacle in their cars, waiting for the celebs to come out. Every regiment of The Pinnacle´s army is lead by a Miss Piggy with a viking helmet on. One of the members of our air force regiment has been shot down; he managed to safely eject, but his plane crashed into the ground. Sunglasses-missing-one-lens is obviously the monocle. The proper, high-class way to descend The Pinnacle is wearing a monocle with your walking legs splayed to a full gentlemanly stride. All buildings of The Pinnacle are multi-storey. They don´t have much room, so they have to build up. It sucks when someone presses all the buttons on the elevator! You have to stop at each storey! Your highness is the pinnacle of finesse compared to all of us commoners who are but like dirt on the ground. America thinks it is the pinnacle of the world, looking down on all neighboring countries through its mirrored, aviator sunglasses.

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1 The Pinnacle, to me, is a city that makes itself out to be perfect but is filled with dirty secrets that photographers are always trying to reveal (see dissolve (#1044) The city´s councilmen have isolated all professional photographers to make sure they don´t photograph these "dirty secrets". (which are up to your imagination). The wheat farmer´s heart is calm (#1147) about the eagle not stealing his crops because of the broom scarecrow. But he still conceals all his wheat at The Pinnacle in case anyone else trys to steal it.

1312

隔

isolate

1313

隠

conceal

1314

堕

degenerate

1315

陥

collapse

1316

穴

hole

1317

空

empty

1318 1319

控 突

withdraw

The craft of creating a black hole is in creating an emptiness which can attract things. With my fingers, I punch in my bank code and withdraw some money from my account. And now it´s empty again, as usual!

research

When you stab something you often leave a big hole. Most research scientists have 9 holes.....two nostrils, two ears, a mouth, and four eyes...... :-).

plug up

Sticking a plug up your hole will lead to stronger climaxes. This more commonly means "steal", like how a thief cuts a hole to steal the jewels. A depression is a hole in the ground. Water naturally collects there which provides moisture for vines to grow.

stab

1321

究 窒

1322

窃

stealth

1323

窪

depression

1324

搾

squeeze

1325

窯

kiln

1326

窮

hard up

1327

探

grope

1328

深

deep

1329

丘

hill

1330

岳

Point

1331

兵

soldier

1332

浜

seacoast

1320

Any attempt to possess the pinnacle will degenerate into a land ("ground") war. The Pinnacle is actually bound up by supports from olden times. Eventually, they give out, and the whole thing starts to collapse. A black hole is a "House of Infinity". Infinity is of course represented by a sideways "8", but here we have a Japanese "8" instead.

You have trouble squeezing your hand through the hole so you use a saw to enlarge it. Be sure to put a hole in that ceramic sheep before you put it over the fire. Otherwise, it´ll just explode in the kiln. (If you´ve never done ceramics before, it´s important that the object have a hole in it, or this really will happen.). Hard up = nothing but your body, living in a hole, with just a bow to hunt for your food. A pictograph of a japanese schoolgirl getting groped by perverts on the train. The fingers of course, a crown (her too short skirt) and her legs below (which to be honest are pretty thick like tree trunks). If the groper´s "tree" goes up the girl´s miniskirt too deep, he´ll ejaculate fluid. (Sorry it´s kinda coarse but it works.). Excalibur is the sword planted in a rock. Lesser known AXCAHILLBUR is the axe planted on top of a hill. A point is a extra little hill at the top of a mountain. We´ll call it ´Fireman´s Point´. Listen up soldiers! We´re going to take that hill. You are no longer men with human legs. You are voracious animals, with animal legs! Got it? Animal legs! Now take that hill! Seacoast -> Coast Guard -> "water soldiers" lined up on the seacoast defending our shores.

#

kanji

keyword

1333

糸

thread

1334

織

weave

1335

繕

darning

1336

縮

shrink

1337

繁

luxuriant

1338

縦

vertical

1339

線

line

1340

締

tighten

1341

維

fiber

1342

羅

gauze

1343

練

practice

1344

緒

thong

1346

続 絵

1347

統

overall

1348

絞

strangle

1345

1349 1350

給 絡

continue

koohiiStory1 I also went with Spiderman. However, in the cases where this primitive appears under other primitives, as opposed to on the left (I think there are ~5 times in this chapter) I´ve opted to use a similar character: Venom. This helps keep the positioning clear, especially on such characters as dainty (#1363) and accumulate (#1364). Spiderman weaves his way through the skyline while listening to his theme song on his ipod. It is played, of course, by kazoos. After a day being virtuouos and keeping the city safe, Spiderman´s outfit is in need of some repair. Luckily, as he can shoot out threads darning is very easy for him to do. After spending the night at an inn, spider man discovered to his dismay that his costume had shrunk in the wash, and no longer fit! Important: Luxuriant does NOT mean luxurious, as the other stories indicate. Definition: abundant or lush in growth, as vegetation. When Venom realized he couldn´t beat Spider-Man in a fair fight, he showed his cleverness by spraying venom all over Spider-Man´s luxuriant garden. When Spider-man does his amazing vertical wall climbing, a throng of photographers accompanies him to get a good shot of the action. This kanji is used for train lines. Spiderman does a hot spring tour of Japan using the train lines. You can see the Spidey costume hanging on the washing line as he enjoys the onsen. The sovereign appears to be ruling, but in reality someone behind him (for instance his wife) has a thread around his throat, and if he dares to make a decision she doesn´t like, she starts pulling the thread and tightens it around his throat. Hey, Spidey! Eat that turkey if you want, but make sure you eat some fibers: you want spidey threads, don´t ya? Lots of girls in Japan wear gauze patches over one eye made of course white fibers. They think it is cute, and I must admit, I have come to think so too. You practice your Japanese skills in a discussion thread with lots of people from the Far East (since many of the people who are interested in studying Japanese are Asian). Spiderman has a secret fetish, he likes nothing better than to dress his lovedoll in a thong. Wierd, eh! If you attach strings to the things you sell, you will be able to continue making profit from them even after the fact.

salary

There´s never a picture of Spiderman meeting Peter Parker... I wonder why? Spidey is alloted the biggest crime fighter jurisdiction in NYC because his OVERALL arrest record is the best. Spiderman hates going to parties and having to mingle. He wants to strangle someone after just a little small talk. If your threads 糸 don't fit 合 right you're not going to be able to get a job with a decent salary.

entwine

When threads become entwined, each thread is tangled to another.

picture

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

1351

結

tie

1352

終

end

Ok, here, you have to think of the phrase "TIE the knot" , which means a wedding (this kanji is used in the marriage compound 結婚 けっこん ). Now, at US weddings, it ends with the couple driving away with cans being dragged behind the car. So here, think of SPIDERMAN, who will TIE the knot with Mary Jane. At his wedding, Spider THREAD attached (or TIED) to SPRAYCANS are being drug behind the limo as they drive off. This winter is so cold that spiderman´s web gets brittle! Could this be the end of spiderman?

class

This Kanji is the same ones used in the Japanese Language proficiency tests; i.e. ikkyuu (一級) The Kanji doesnt describe class as in a "class of students" or "classroom," but rather a grade of quality or ability. ---------- Spiderman is taking the JLPT Level 1. In desperation he REACHES OUT to grab his friend´s answer sheet next to him, who seems to be doing well. The other test takers are obviously a class above him. Looks like this test is above his class of knowledge.

1354

級 紀

1355

紅

1353

1356 1357

納 紡

1359

紛 紹

1360

経

1358

1361 1362 1363

紳 約 細

crimson

In a CHRONICLE the THREAD of the story can twist and turn like a SNAKE. After Spider-Man is whacked in the head with a I-beam, crimson blood flows from the wound.

settlement

Have you heard about patients who have surgery and the doctor mistakenly leaves a medical instrument INSIDE the patient’s body and proceeds to stitch up the patient’s incisions with stitching THREAD? Can you say “malpractice SETTLEMENT”?　.

chronicle

spinning distract

Spiderman can spin his webs in any direction. It is easy for arguments to get distracted from the main thread by a tendency to part threads (splitting hairs).

sūtra

Spiderman seduces all the girls he´s introduced to. The word ‘sutra’ literally means a rope or thread that holds things together. Here we see that it is a spool that is holding the threads together.

sire

Monkeys are very adept at swinging around trees. But when they met Spiderman, who could swing around even better than they could, they all quickly addressed him as sire.

promise

He tied a thread around the ladle as a reminder of his promise to do more house work.

dainty

Dainty women would always rather work with thread than in a field.

introduce

1364

累

accumulate

1365

索

cord

1366

総

general

1367

綿

cotton

1368

絹

silk

When you accumulate knowledge in your brain, neural pathways are constructed. All those pathways end up like a huge ball of thread tangled together. The more knowledge you accumulate the more threads you throw into the mix!! A coaxial cord has a needle-like pin, a crown cap for screwing it in, and insulation made of thread. Spiderman could not achieve general acceptance by the media even after winning the public´s heart. Spiderman´s polyethylene suit starts to ride up after a while, so he always looks forward to the white cotton towels he wears while lounging around his apartment. Silk threads are coming out of the caterpillar's mouth to cover its flesh while it transforms into a cocoon.

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

1369

繰

winding

Winding thread around wooden goods (paper) to ready them for safe transport.

inherit

A poor chinese fisherman could expect to inherit: the thread for his pole, a hook for catching something to eat, and some rice to live off of. (not concentrating on stroke order, sorry if that throws anyone off). (Adapted from bigloui,12-4-2006).

green

When you attend a green tea (緑茶=りょくちゃ) ceremony, you can cherish the threadwork on the kimonos people don, the broom-like whisk (茶筌 =ちゃせん) you use to grind up your tea, and the delicious rice cakes you eat with your tea!

1370

1371

継 緑

1372

縁

affinity

1373

網

netting

1374

緊

tense

1375

紫

purple

1376

縛

truss

There once was a lonely little pig that constantly followed Spiderman, always nuzzling his leg and oinking tenderly. Spiderman finally caved in and decided to keep the little pig under one condition: the pig was to take a broom and sweep up all of Spiderman´s leftover threads after having fought crime. The pig felt such affinity for Spiderman, he happily accepted—and did a good job too. Spiderman traps The Rhino under the hood of his famous netting, where even Rhino´s horns can not break free, in fact if the netting did not dissappear after a few hours then Rhino might even perish in there. Whenever Venom is tense, he loses control of his sex drive and becomes a slave to his crotch. Stop sitting for so long - or else you'll get those purple threads (veins) on your legs from bad circulation. [link purple with those huge purple, bulging, crawling, worm-like varicose veins .....]. Spidey received good word that the acupuncturist working down the road was actually the evil Doctor Octopus! Spidey headed over to the clinic, and trussed the acupuncturist Doc Oc up using the maniac´s own metal limbs! The tortoise has escaped! We tied it up with a straw rope, but all that´s left of the rope are some torn threads, and the unbound tortoise is nowhere to be found. (Note that the right half here is not "eels". This is (in my opinion) a mistake in the RTK book, as we already decided in waterfall (#537) to refer to the simplified form of dragon as "eels". It is much better to call the right half of this character an "unbound tortoise".). In its infancy, a butterfly is protected by a cocoon, as it doesn´t yet have any power of its own. Column of walking legs (caterpillar) getting into a cocoon, about to leave its past self behind. The villagers haven´t the faintest idea that giant coccoons resting in the mountain are soon to hatch. It is a little awkward when you are at a fiesta and the host serves some rare delicacy, like moth cocoons, the guests must decide how many it would be polite to eat. You do the math in your head and it comes out to two cocoons per person. This is why the horizontal line is a fraction bar with two cocoons on the top, and one person the bottom.

1377

縄

straw rope

1378

幼

infancy

1379

後

behind

1380

幽

faint

1381

幾

how many

1382

機

mechanism

1383

玄

mysterious

An abacus is a mechanism made of wood used to calculate how many ´anythings´. What could be more mysterious than a cocoon in a top hat trying to sneak in...? (Pimitive: GANDALF).

1384

畜

livestock

The livestock are disappearing! I´ve placed Gandalf over the rice field to protect them.

#

kanji

keyword

1385

蓄

amass

1386

弦

bowstring

1387

擁

hug

1388

滋

nourishing

1389

慈

mercy

1390

磁

magnet

1391

系

lineage

koohiiStory1 One sneaky farmer wanted to amass a large collection of livestock. We all know that cows like to eat flowers, so he planted lines of flowers leading to his own fields. The livestock followed the lines, eating the flowers one by one, and amassed in his field. A magic bow that only Gandalf can yield: there is no bowstring on it, and he uses his magic to fire arrows. A mysterious turkey with human fingers wants to hug me... I will never go to Tokyo Disneyland again! Water is doubly mysterious. It´s in all our nourishment...and yet, it´s really not nourishing at all. Here we see the DOUBLE-MYSTERIOUS Siamese twins again, at the MERCY of the machines that pump blood through their veins, since the single HEART they share won't do the job... A magnet is a rock with two sides; one that mysteriously pushes and one that pulls; doubly mysterious. (see astridtops´ story). A single drop of your blood holds the proof of the unbroken thread of your lineage. Mister T gets a DNA test, and discovers that he was meant to be the person in charge after all.

1393

係 孫

1394

懸

suspend

1395

却

instead

1396

脚

shins

[instead; on the contrary; rather] Gone is the time for stamps - use e-mail instead. Shins are the part of the body that one uses instead of one´s eyes, for finding furniture in the dark. (Ouch!).

wholesale

Wholesale refers to the sale of goods in quantity to retailers for resale. When this kanji was invented, large loads of goods needed to be transported by horses who left steep footprints because of the weight they carried. The wholesale goods needed a special stamp to indicate that they were legal for resale.

1392

1397

卸

person in charge grandchild

1398

御

honorable

1399

服

clothing

1400

命

fate

1401 1402

令 零

1404

齢 冷

1405

領

1403

orders zero age cool

jurisdiction

Your grandchild is the child of your DNA. The prefecture has suspended all DNA research for heart disease because of corruption. All involved will be suspended by their wrists.

An honorable man will not try to cut in front of the line at the wholesale stamp store. (Imagine just how much honor it takes facing those long lines at the post office!). It´s customary to cover the flesh with clothing, but some designs are so outrageous they´re not bigger than a stamp that just covers your crotch. When you´re born, your fate is measured, fitted, and stamped onto your soul. Good luck defying it. (re: dingomick) "These are your orders," declares the general while passing out documents at the meeting. As everyone started to leave, the general exclaims "Oh wait! I need to certify these orders!" and went around stamping each paper with his personal chop-seal. The amount of people that can order the rain to rain. You know you are fast approaching a ripe old AGE when you get ORDERS from the dentist to get new TEETH. To keep your water cool, just order some ice. Two cowboys are crossing a state limit. One says to him “Did you know that in this Jurisdiction there are Orders to get your head?”, so he takes out his gun and shoots him. He claims the reward afterwards. (Thanks Fuaburisu).

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

1406

鈴

small bell

Some restaurants have a small gold bell to call someone to take customers´ orders.

1407

勇

courage

I imagined some kind of initiation rite in old China, where every young man has to show his courage. They then receive a chopseal which is a mark of their courage.

1408

通

traffic

1409

踊

jump

1410

疑

doubt

1411

擬

mimic

1412

凝

congeal

1413 1414

範 犯

pattern

I bounce down the road on my pogo stick, easily getting through the dense traffic. (Note: New primitive: chop-seal + utilize = pogo stick. Because a chop-seal is long and thin with a rubbery bit at the end. If it were big enough, you could utilize it as a pogo stick). [Edit: pogo stick also appears in 1409, 1690, 2530]. The winner of the long jump competition was disqualified when they found he used a pogo stick tied to his leg to jump further. (Katsuo) You come at the zoo entrance. ´Here sir, a spoon to feed the animals.´ cool ´and a dart(gun) in case stuff go wrong´ ....´ please chop-seal (sign) here for in case of accidents the zoo is not responsible.´ ´lion feeding time is. bla bla´ You are having serious doubts about if you still want to go into this zoo. Ask a MIMIC to give an impression of DOUBT, and he will no DOUBT scratch his head with his FINGER. I doubt that the jello would congeal sitting on the counter, so I placed it in the icebox. This pattern made of bamboo is for a new model of car designed to leave as small an ecological fingerprint as possible.

unlucky

Crimes can often be solved using the tools of dogs and fingerprints. Seeing some finger prints at the edge of a cliff, I wondered who that unlucky person was.

dangerous

If you live a dangerous life, eventually you're bound to get unlucky.

address

Your address should be displayed on your house and mailbox.

arm

Like in Memento, I tattoo my address on my forearm flesh so I don´t forget it. Japanese "gardens" aren´t anything more than a pot of flowers on top of the mailbox. I couldn´t drop my grudge against him. So I put a severed pig´s heart in his mailbox. He got the message.

crime

1418

厄 危 宛 腕

1419

苑

garden

1420

怨

grudge

1421

柳

willow

1422

卵

egg

Having decided to use SIGN OF THE HARE rather than RECEIPT and STAMP my mnemonic goes as follows: The WILLOW is the TREE that droops likes a HARE´s ears. The Easter Bunny dropped an egg on my desk and got yolk all over my receipts and stamps.

detain

The use of RANSOM NOTE (think of a receipt with a dagger through it on a door) works great with DETAIN. Here the RANSOM NOTE says that the girl has been DETAINED in an undisclosed location. To get her back take the RANSOM to a empty FIELD.

trade

There´s a buyback program where you can trade in your dagger for money. But it´s quite ineffective, since only registered dagger-owners with the original receipts can participate, and not criminals with illegally-purchased daggers.

stamp

Before sticky backs, they had to staple stamps to letters.

1415 1416 1417

1423

1424 1425

留 貿 印

#

kanji

keyword

1426

興

entertain

1428

酉 酒

1429

酌

1427

1431

酵 酷

1432

酬

1430

1433

酪

sign of the bird

koohiiStory1 To me, this looks like a pictograph of a road leading to the big city (see the buildings?) where there are plenty of places to be entertained. Unfortunately in this city, every store is the same: staples. What tools! [ayoung24]. The sign of the bird on this whiskey bottle is of course the Famous Grouse blended Scotch.

bartending

Sake is just watered down whisky. At the local pub, their bartending practises are unusual. They serve the whiskey by pouring it from a ladle, like one would from the punch bowl.

fermentation

The secrets of fermentation are passed to the son who displays the most filial piety.

cruel repay

It´s cruel to pour alcohol down a cow´s mouth. Imagine a different kind of tax refund - instead of money, the state repays you with whiskey.

dairy products

Imagine if at each supermarket you went to, the section for dairy products was next to the alcohol aisle. so for each wheel of cheese you decide to buy, you get an accompanying bottle of wine...perfect for a "wine & cheese" party. :).

vinegar

Drinking alcohol that´s turned to vinegar feels like a saw going down your throat.

drunk

God you´re drunk! How many whiskeys did you have? 9? 10?

saké

1435

酢 酔

1436

配

distribute

1437

酸

acid

To DISTRIBUTE WHISKY during Prohibition you had to be as sneaky as a SNAKE. The prostitute carries an old whiskey bottle filled with acid to throw at any difficult Johns.

waver

The waver for this kanji means to hesitate. I wavered before going into the bar with a bunch of horned wild dogs drinking whiskey straight out of the bottle.

revered

People don't know this, but ("revered" patriot) Paul Revere had trouble staying awake during his midnight ride, so he drank Red Bull (horns) and whiskey (a drink invented by his friend Sam Adams) and glued himself DOWN to the saddle. [thanks to akahige].

beans

If I eat BEANS, after ONE MOUTHful I fart like some kind of HORNED ANIMAL.

head

The head of the family sits at the head of the table.

short

He is so short so he has to throw darts from the table. The bountiful feast was so bountiful that it bent the table below it under its weight! いただきま〜す！. Japanese festivals have drums so big, a samurai has to SIT (not stand) on a table to beat one with a tree branch! http://www.d2.dion.ne.jp/~hidafyh/furukawayh/gyouji/image/maturi03.jpg.

1434

1438

猶

1442

尊 豆 頭 短

1443

豊

bountiful

1444

鼓

drum

1445

喜

rejoice

1439 1440 1441

1446 1447

樹 皿

timber-trees

The samurai sitting on the drum is on a stage, and the people below him are rejoicing with their mouths in unison. It helps me to imagine the placement this way. The hippies object to trees being cut down for timber. They have glued themselves to the timber-trees and are beating their drums.

dish

Three dishes stacked side-by-side in a dishwasher.

#

1448 1449

1450 1451 1452

1453 1454 1455 1456 1457

kanji

血 盆 盟 盗 温 監 濫 鑑 猛 盛

1459

塩 銀

1460

恨

1458

1461 1462 1463 1464 1465 1466 1467 1468 1469 1470 1471 1472 1473

根 即 爵 節 退 限 眼 良 朗 浪 娘 食 飯

keyword

koohiiStory1

blood

Vampire orders blood in one of those posh restaurants. Imagine his shock when all he gets is a giant white bowl and just a single drop of blood in the centre and a drizzling of balsamic around the edge. Disgusted he calls the manager over tells him its overpriced tosh and bites into his neck with a huge gush of blood spraying everywhere.

basin

The part of the kitchen sink in which you wash dishes in is the basin.

alliance steal

In order to form alliances, you should sit down for a meal and eat until your dish is bright or clear; in other words, get to know people first, before you talk business. You are so poor you dont know where your next dish will come from all you know is that you will have to steal it.

oversee

If you leave water out in the sun in a dish, naturally it will get warm. While the slave-buyer is perusing (perusal (#855)) the stack of slaves reclining on the floor, the slaves' overseer supplies them with dishes of gruel -- don't want the slaves starving to death before they can be sold!

overflow

Who´s job is it to oversee the water level on the dam? It´ts overflowing!

specimen

The overseer tags his slaves with gold earrings, just like specimens.

fierce

The fierce WILD DOG attacked the CHILD who came near his feeding DISH.

boom

Japan´s economic boom turned their empty plates into full ones.

salt

In the old days, salt was a worth alot, so it is not surprising to find someone reclining on the ground, mouth to plate, getting every last grain of that delicious salt.

silver

Like gold, silver is a metal.

resentment

The athlete´s state of mind is nothing but resentment after getting the silver medal.

root

Since trees eat through their roots, one could imagine roots as tree silverware.

instant baron

He scratches off the silver stamp and discovers that he is an instant winner. The baron is very suspicious, always looking around with vulture eyes and keeping the silver glued to the table so no one can steal it.

node

Counting the nodes on bamboo is an instant way to tell its age.

retreat limit

If you see silver on the road (eg. gun, armour, sword) => retreat! He was pushed to the limit at the end of the marathon, climbing on top of the Acropolis, but had to settle for the silver medal.

eyeball

Be careful putting silverware near your eyes: you could lose an eyeball!

good melodious

With a drop of silver, the forces of good can vanquish the werewolves. [Image: ´Moonlight sonata´] The moon has inspired many good composers (like Ludwig van Beethoven) to write something melodious.

wandering

Water is a good thing to have when you´re out wandering.

daughter

Your daughter is a good girl......well, let´s hope so... :-).

eat

That umbrella looks good enough to eat!

meal

After I eat a meal, I always have to take an anti-acid.

warm

#

kanji

keyword

1474

飲

drink

1475

飢

hungry

1476

餓

starve

1477

飾

decorate

1478

館

Bldg.

1479 1480

養 飽

foster

This Bldg. is like all the other government buildings - they house bureaucrats who sit around sipping wine and eating expensive meals at the taxpayers expense. A sheep became the foster parent for a wolf pup, feeding it with milk. This story cannot end well...

sated

My gluttony was only sated after I ate the hamburger AND the wrapper!

call

Distinguish from formerly (#501). Think of previously as "the previous customer" in a restaurant. At a cheap sleazy diner, the waitress gives you unwashed silverware that was previously used by the previous customer. Yuck. The police tried to draw a chalk outline around the dead waitress, but it was kinda tough with all the tree roots underneath her. If you don´t leave some silver as a tip, you will rue the day you earned the resentment of your waitress. There´s an even covering of water lilies on the pond at 金閣寺（きんかくじ） the Golden Pavilion in Kyoto. 'Budd' - 'weis' - 'er' call the frogs mouths from the liliy pads, working to get you hooked on beer.

two-mat area

A two-mat area is just about as much ground as you will need for a lily pond.

evaluate

Good evaluation should always be words of even fairness. A SABRE is used to cut the stalks of plants being REAPED at harvest. They are then combined into a SHEAF.

1481

既

previously

1482

概

outline

1483

慨

rue

1484

平

even

1487

呼 坪 評

1488

刈

1485 1486

koohiiStory1 My experience with Japanese enkais (dinner parties): plenty to drink drink drink, but a severe lack of food, T_T. The smell of cooked food wafts past you in the wind, making your stomach rumble and feeling hungry. All those starving models in Hollywood - they want to eat, but their ego (about their appearance and trim look) makes sure they grin and bear it! [decorate; ornament; adorn; embellish] We decorate a table before eating, reclining a towel over it.

reap

1489

希

hope

1490

凶

villain

1491

胸

bosom

I hope this works, you say as you stuff a sheaf of stalks under your blanket but above your linens. Your real hope is that your parents don´t find out that you left the house. Here the villain digs a hole with a shovel and covers it with a sheaf, hoping someone will fall in. Just think of the heroine's bosom in a movie. The villain ties up the heroine (to the traintracks or the conveyor belt etc) but her bosom is the body part that is always left sticking out. I´ve finally met my arch-rival, the evilest of all villains. Finally, I´m about to fight him. But what´s this? He´s suspiciously quiet. I move to attack him, and his right arm falls off at the elbow. Strange. I walk up to him and detach his left arm. Very strange. I undo his belt, and take off his top hat... BLAST! It was just a decoy turkey!

1492

離

detach

1493

殺

kill

1494

純

genuine

X marks the spot on the tree where the missile hit. No doubt, it was meant to kill us. For remembering the primitive earthworm: Drops of rain were falling so I took my shovel to dig up some earthworms to put them on my fishook..... My story: To have a genuine fishing line you don't just pick up a stick but you also attach some thread onto it and at the end an earthworm must be hung.

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

1495

鈍

dull

1496

辛

spicy

1497

辞

resign

The metal hook is too dull to even pierce an earthworm.... Eating spicy food makes you stand up ten times faster than usual, ´cause you just need to get something to drink! This guy´s job is tasting the spicy curry at the local Indian Food Factory. He has to resign from his job before his tongue is rendered completely useless after all the spicy food that he has to try all day long...

1498

梓

catalpa

1499

宰

superintend

1500

壁

wall

1501

避

evade

1502

新

new

1503

薪

firewood

The CATALPA is the tree that bears the SPICY Indian bean (NOTE - The Catalpa is also known as the "Indian Bean" due to the bean pods that grow from it). The superintendent of a Japanese school district needs a spicy relationship at home after watching girls in miniskirts all day. Did anyone else used to put ketchup packets on the ground and jump on them so they spattered on the wall? You can try and evade them, but they´ll ketchup with you on the road... Sorry, couldn´t resist it. Don't confuse left primitive with catalpa (#1498). Every time the farmer cuts down the peppers from the red pepper plant, he has to use a brand new axe. This is because the spicy peppers cause the metal to erode very quickly, thereby rendering the axe completely useless. New flowers grow in areas of forests which have been chopped down for firewood. A wise parent lets their kids learn. A kid wants to try to eat the red pepper plant, the wise parent says "Try it and see for yourself".

1505

親 幸

1506

執

tenacious

1507

報

report

Happiness adds a bit (or ten) of spice to your life. Tenacious-D is happy band led by a fat man. (It´s Tenacious-D time, ya muthafucka´, gwaoh!). Recall the fashion model wearing just a stamp over his crotch (clothing (#1399)). When he got happy, of course, it ended up in the news report.

shout

There was a man in a village who had a special gift : whenever he shouted and screamed, his mouth became a cornucopia, overflowing with fruits and food of all sorts. Many of the locals thought he was a cruel man, always screaming at his wife, until they realised he was in fact very kind, and his gift brought prosperity to his family.

twist

A cornucopia is a twisted goat's horn decorated with coloured threads.

income

Prostitutes can make a veritable cornucopia of income by using their crotches -- they put the "come" in "income." (A bit lewd perhaps, but effective in keeping this character distinct from similar keywords like profit (#906) or earnings (#893)).

lowly

Lowly people only have a drop of brains and use nothing but 4-letter words.

tombstone

There is a grave of a lowly man with a tombstone made of a simple, small stone. If you bow really low you can read the very small inscription engraved on the stone, it says “Now that you bowed so low to read this, you are as lowly as I once was”.

land

My rice-seedlings have become sentient and will go on a mission. I can only apologise for the next 6 frames. In the distance, there is a pinnacle, which the newly-awakened rice-seedlings who are still stuck in the ground can see. Could it be the Promised Land?

1504

1508 1509

1510 1511

1512

1513

叫 糾 収 卑 碑 陸

parent happiness

koohiiStory1 The farmer was never very intimate with his wife. He always kept his eye on his precious rice seedlings in the soil. What power makes rice seedlings in the ground grow into well rounded plants? The forces of nature. Heat up those RICE SEEDLINGS you pulled from the SOIL in a ROUND pan over a low FLAME. (Note: the hot pan image helps reinforce the idea that this kanji for "atsui" refers to something hot to the touch, as opposed to hot weather). Some girls want diamonds, but others will be satisfied with just flowers. However if you think you can win her over with rice seedlings, expect her to get up on her walking legs and walk on out! Ancient Japanese built a mausoleum for the "unknown rice farmer". It's on the pinnacle of Mt. Fuji, and it has a statue of a guy with huge walking legs planting rice seedlings as he goes. A greedy hog in a top hat who has eaten all of the acorns. He even elbows people out of the way to get them.

#

kanji

keyword

1514

睦

intimate

1515

勢

forces

1516

熱

heat

1517

菱

diamond

1518

陵

mausoleum

1519

亥

sign of the hog

1520

核

nucleus

1521

刻

engrave

In the nucleus of the acorn, all the DNA is stored -- the building blocks for a new tree. This famous ninja (I always use ninjas with sabres, distinct from samurai) used to engrave the kanji for his name onto acorns, and throw the acorns to distract his enemies. The legend goes that by the time his victims would pick up the acorn and read the engraved kanji, they were already dead.

1522

該

above-stated

I asked my teacher what this strange word meant, and she furiously replied that it was explained in the above-stated paragraph before throwing an acorn at me! Censure is the political equivalent of a "strongly worded letter," according to Cornell's School of Law. It is a flex of muscle by congress against the current president, but it is a very weak one. Imagine censure as congress flexing as hard as it can, only to have a little acorn-sized bump of muscle pop up suddenly.

1523

劾

censure

1524

述

mention

1525

術

art

Why are the roads leading through the woods so sticky and dirty? Hmm... I think the forest ranger mentioned something about excess resin on the roads... Behold the "Boulev´Art" : a life-size section of a boulevard cast in a huge block of resin. Some call it ... art.

cold

Don't mix up with cool (#1404), when the cool boys order each other around. This kind of cold has to do with weather. When its cold outside, I stay at home and have hot celery soup with chicken legs to keep out the ice. 寒い　＝　さむい　＝cold.

1526

寒

1527

醸

brew

1528

譲

defer

1529

壌

lot

1530

嬢

lass

1531

毒

poison

Grass Skirt primitive: Picture some Hawaiian girls, wearing grass skirts and tropical scarfs (or leis), doing a dance. "3, 4, 5, 6 pick up all the celery sticks!". Speaking complicated words to set her head spinning, the island girl in the grass skirt says demurely "I defer (yield) to your judgment, wise one". My dream is to buy a small lot on a tropical island and spend the rest of my days relaxing in a grass skirt. Conversation at a party: A: "Who is that lass?" B: "Which one?" A: "The woman wearing the grass skirt." B: "Alas, I don´t know". If you grow up with a mother that drinks and smokes, you can be sure it´s poison in the stuff you get from her breasts.

#

kanji

1534

素 麦 青

1535

精

1532 1533

1536 1537 1538 1539

請 情 晴 清

1541

静 責

1542

績

1540

elementary

koohiiStory1 This kanji has nothing to do with elementary school - it means element, elemental, basic, bare. Imagine the thread as a thread connecting all life, starting from the basic elements and growing up into everything.

barley

BARLEY beverages give GROWN UPs teetering WALKING LEGS.

blue

The last time I saw a blue moon was in my youth when I was growing up.

refined solicit

Very refined people in the upper classes have skin as pale as rice and blue blood. People who try to solicit you to buy things come up to you and just start taking out of the blue

feelings

Data is feeling blue about not having any feelings ... hey, wait a minute.

clear up

Sun and blue sky! Yep, the weather´s cleared up!

pure

Pure sea water is always a radiant blue. When someone you know who is normally talkative goes quiet, it´s usually a sign that they are contending with the blues.

keyword

quiet blame exploits

As one grows up, one typically starts to blame all of their problems on money. Spidey´s exploits are world famous but still The Daily Bugle´s pages blame him for every problem out there.

1543

積

volume

1544

債

bond

1545

漬

pickling

1546

表

surface

1547

俵

bag

On many wheat cereal boxes, there is a disclaimer stating that "This package is sold by weight, not by volume. Some settling of contents may have occurred." well they only say that because they don´t want to be blamed by people getting really disappointed after they see what a small volume of cereal the box really contains. Bonds are guarnteed by the government so if they fail there is one person you can blame - the prime minister! When pickling you MUST use distilled water! When it doesn´t come out right, generally it is the water that is to blame. When I was GROWING UP, the SURFACE of my SCARF was always covered with snot from blowing my nose on it. Superficial people (ie those who are only concerned about the surface) are obsessed with expensive bags.

1548

潔

undefiled

To ensure she remained undefiled, a young girl growing up in a rough area always kept a dagger concealed under her threads, even when she went into the water.

1549

契

pledge

Imagine a totalitarian regime where, while growing up, you have to pledge allegiance to the flag at dagger-point and with St. Bernard guard dogs watching you.

1550

喫

consume

1551

害

harm

1552

轄

control

This means eat/drink/smoke. Maybe you make a pledge to stop gutsing/binging/puffing, but your own mouth is tempting you to put something in it. With kids growing up in your house, you have to keep them from harm of putting anything in their mouth, paint chips, bleach, knvies, etc. The roads are icy, and a whole bunch of cars have spun out of control! Luckily, it was just a couple of dents; nobody was harmed.

proportion

[proportion; comparatively; divide; cut; separate; split] Hey, don´t take this out of proportion! I did you just a little harm, no need to come over here with a saber...

1553

割

#

kanji

keyword

1554

憲

constitution

1555 1556 1557 1558 1559

生 星 姓 性 牲

life

koohiiStory1 The constitution is important. At least my parents thought so. In the house where I grew up, it was framed on the wall. Under the watchful (sideways) eye of my mother, we had to study it until we knew it by heart. This is the first CELL of a human, the foundation of its entire LIFE, a small DROP that will GROW UP to form a complex organism.

surname

The sun is the nearest star to the only planet with life - Earth. When women marry, they adopt the surname of their husband, signifiying the start of a new life together. (adapted from gorgon).

sex

Sex is the only state of mind for many men through their whole life.

animal sacrifice

Animal sacrifice = taking the life of a cow.

star

1560

産

products

1561

隆

hump

If you were to stand up all the products you have accumulated over the course of your entire life on top of one another, the result would probably be as tall as a cliff. You are struggling to the top across the humps, but you suddenly see the pinnacle and you feel new life in your walking legs.

summit

Walking legs over "bushes" needs to have a primitive meaning of its own. It appears in several kanji, such as 縫 sew (#1563), 逢 tryst (#2417), 蜂 bee (#2687), and 鋒 sword´s point (#2768), and it is clumsy to work bushes and walking legs into every story. "Pointy" works fairly well: the walking legs are stuck on top of the pointy part of the bush; and for this character: a summit is the pointy end of a mountain.

1563

峰 縫

1564

拝

worship

Pointy primitive; with a pointy needle you sew a road (-------) of threads. I put my fingers together in worship of the bush that hangs from the ceiling -- that wonderful mistletoe which has gotten me kissed by many a girl.

1565

寿

longevity

In an attempt to increase a bush's longevity, an incompitent gardener glues all the leaves back on that have fallen off. Maybe he should have tried watering it instead.

1566

鋳

casting

1562

1568

籍 春

1569

椿

1567

sew

enroll springtime

camellia

1571

泰 奏

1572

実

reality

1573

奉

dedicate

1574

俸

stipend

1575

棒

rod

1570

peaceful play music

We take a casting because metal will have much greater longevity than the original. Japanese father enrolls his student in a well-rounded school: they teach eastern traditions (the way of the bamboo), western traditions (like Christmas trees), and also teach literature (once upon a time). In the springtime bonsai get plenty of sun. The tree of spring. Fact: Camellia are highly valued in Japan and elsewhere for their very early flowering, often among the first flowers to appear in the late winter [early spring?]. If you look into Japanese gardens they seem so peaceful - with their small bonsais and the white stones looking like rice grains. When you play music to them, your bonsai will grow like they are in heaven. Bonsais are grown in a house, away from the harsh reality of the real world where they wouldn´t survive. To join the temple, you have to dedicate yourself to raising bonsai for enlightenment, and cornstalks for sustenance. The stipend is given to the student-PERSON who has come to Japan DEDICATED to study. This wooden rod has one very simple dedication engraved on it: "Spare the rod, spoil the child...".

#

kanji

keyword

1576

謹

discreet

1577

勤

diligence

1578

漢

Sino-

1580

嘆 難

1581

華

1579

1582 1583

垂 睡

sigh

droop drowsy

Our eyes droop when we are drowsy.

splendor

surplus

Wasn´t it a cursed spindle that Sleeping Beauty pricked her finger on? Therefore the spindle was the metal that caused her to droop and eventually sleep for 100 years. It´s a hay ride! You sit on piles of silage and everyone likes to imitate old-time farmers with a piece of wheat sticking out of their mouths. If you go for a ride and find a saber beside you, perhaps you got into an Army surplus jeep.

now

My MEETING is at 7- but that´s NOW!

include

This clock includes a mouth that will tell you what the time is now. Hearing impaired people have this kind of watches... now imagine them as a big mouth under the clock.

錘

spindle

1585

乗

ride

1587

剰 今

1589

含 吟

1590

念

wish

1591

琴

harp

1592

陰

shade

1588

versify

1594

予 序

1595

預

deposit

1596

野

plains

1593

With enough diligence, Koreans can turn ordinary cabbage into powerful kimchi. Sino- (Chinese) people had to put a lot of sweat/water into learning the kanji. For righthand kanji primitive - The dumb Western husband of a Japanese woman buys her flowers to apologise, after he opened his big mouth and said "kanji are a stupid writing system".. A sigh escapes the mouth of the scarecrow, who laments: "...if I only had a brain, I could learn kanji". Learning Kanji is difficult for Turkeys. The Queen of England taking a walk round a village: ´Excuse me, I couldn´t help noticing the splendour of the flowers in your garden. Simply splendid. Ten out of ten.´ The villager gruffly replies: ´No it ´aint. It´s all muck. An´ I´m gonna cut it all down and sell it to the farmer for silage.´. The thousand head of cattle let their heads droop as they devour the silage (animal fodder) that is lying on the floor around them.

difficult

1584

1586

koohiiStory1 Muttering words of gratitude for a wonderful meal, I discreetly slipped my cabbage under the table for the dog.

beforehand preface

Versify this kanji as follows: Hickery dickery dock, the mouth ran by the clock. Someone wishing from the bottom of their heart that the clock would stop. A mid-life crisis perhaps. Two kings were fighting over a beautiful koto (harp). So they had a clock built into it that would measure how long each one played it. That way they could be sure none played it more than othe other. There are three types of shade: 1. natural (a high pinnacle), 2. man-made buildings (a clock tower), 3. meteorological (a cloud). Beforehand, this was a halberd but I cut it short so it could be for hand to hand combat. The preface to all human history was written beforehand in caves. Depositing money into your savings account is something you do beforehand if you use your head. If you´re in Japan your passbook says 預金機（よきんき）when you make a deposit. These days we all work in front of computers. Beforehand we all worked out in the fields, in the plains.

#

kanji

keyword

west

Our ninja hero, disguised as a gardener with a rake, is suddenly attacked from both left and right concurrently by bulls with animal horns. Our hero lets out a blood-curdling scream and tears his rake handle vertically in half, so he now has two wooden staffs (split rake handle) to fight with. He grips each staff (left side and right side) and rams it into the horns of the charging bulls. The force of each charging bull causes the tips of each staff to split again (split bottom of each rake handle). Naturally, if you´re dating more than one woman concurrently, they will certainly dislike each other! This is a special sickle with metal blades on both sides. It can cut many things concurrently! When you are self-effacing you use words to concurrently bring yourself down and make yourself look better. Stores don´t want you to know it, but if you find the secret cave, they run bargains there concurrently to their regular prices. (Image: pulling a certain level in a store to find the "bargain cave). The old west represented by a completely empty whiskey bottle (compare sign of the bird (#1427) whiskey bottle about one third full).

value

In the West, people have no value. Only money is important.

need

(ヨウ) When Clint needs a woman, he likes to be on top.

loins

If you want to get closer to the actual meaning, then I think that 腰(こし) is more like the hips or the small of the back. After being sat down in the office too long, people often say 腰がいたい！It´s the part of the body that needs massaging.

1597

兼

concurrently

1598

嫌

dislike

1599

鎌

sickle

1600

謙

self-effacing

1601

廉

bargain

1602 1603 1604

1605

西 価 要 腰

1606

票

ballot

1607

漂

drift

1609

標 栗

1610

遷

1608

1611 1612 1613

覆 煙 南

signpost

In the Old West there were no ballot boxes. Afraid of fraud and fighting among the gunslingers, the ballots were posted into a slot in the top of the local church altar instead. They may have been rough, but the cowboys wouldn´t fight in the church. In Florida, Bush through Kerry´s ballots into the water, watching them drift away and setting the whole country adrift. Trees were frequenly used as signposts in those days, indicating where one had to go to cast their ballots.

capsize

Chestnut tree, west nut tree. Since the days of the Old West, traveling has transitioned from trying not to step on big snakes to driving on big roads. The U.S.S. Old West has capsized, and all the cowboys on board are trying to restore her upright.

smoke

In the Old West, they used to light fires in the ground to make smoke signals.

south

South of my belt leads to happiness.

camphor tree

We traveled to southern Japan just to see a camphor tree. It´s what we came for.

offering

A South Korean street vendor is offering chihuahu snacks. Heisig´s stroke order in the 4th edition (and earlier) is wrong, so be careful -- first is the left-most vertical stroke, then draw the rest of the "sun" attachment as you would normally. In fact, if you just wrote it out as two suns with elongated sides, you´ll get the stroke order exactly correct. A mouth on the Gates of Hell says "Answer me these questions three, or thru the gates ye soon will be".

chestnut transition

1615

楠 献

1616

門

gates

1617

問

question

1614

koohiiStory1

koohiiStory1 A little devil at the gates of hell reviews your record to see if you´re evil enough to get in.

#

kanji

keyword

1618

閲

review

1619

閥

clique

1620

間

interval

1621

簡

simplicity

1622

開

open

You only get through the gates into that person's fiesta if you are in the same clique. The interval between star systems (suns) was too large, so the stargates were created to travel between them. [simplicity; brevity] The ししおどし is a bamboo device for scaring birds from the gates of your garden by clacking against a stone at regular intervals. Its design is simplicity itself. (Inspired by PepeSeco). Sure you can squeeze through these gates by kicking them or pushing them with your body, but if you want to get them wide open, you need to do that with both your hands.

1623

閉

closed

The gates are too big to be closed by man. Only a genie can. "Close sesame!".

1624

閣

tower

1626

閑 聞

1627

潤

wet

1628

欄

column

1629

闘

fight

1630

倉

godown

1631

創

genesis

1625

leisure hear

1633

非 俳

1634

排

repudiate

1635

悲

sad

1636

罪

guilt

1632

unhaiku

To keep this distinct from other kanji such as "watchtower" and "pagoda", I use the mnemonic "towering tower". -- In some old 8-bit kung-fu videogame, with a plot similar as Bruce Lee´s last, unfinished movie, the hero must break through a gate at each level of the towering tower, fighting with opponents using various styles of kungfu until he meets the finale at the topmost level of the "towering tower". Imagine the gates the Garden of Eden, the ultimate land of leisure. You´re not allowed in, but if you peek through you can see trees. Press your ear to the gates and see if you can hear what is going on inside. Forgetting about the moat, the king stepped out of his gate and landed in the water. Needless to say he got wet. [column; handrail; blank; space] I think about oriental (eastern) Torii gates: they have two supporting columns made of wood. During the saloon brawl, one guy got glued to a table and was tossed out through the saloon gates. But he really wanted to fight, so he ran back through those gates (with the table still glued to his back) only to be tossed out again. Imagine him repeatedly running in and being tossed back out. A godown is a dockside warehouse. This is actually a meeting of large doors and mouths. The stroke order is the same as door, not gates, just with the top stroke moved down into the now larger door. Back in the day the people were so excited to get hold of the Sega genesis they looted the godown with sabers. This looks like a pictogram of 3 fingers from each hand trying to open up a crack in a wall. That´s an un-believable way to escape from prison OR the UN- have a prison in the Hague. I pity the fool/ Who put me in this jail cell/ I pity the fool. (Credit taijuando). When ordered to go to the jail cell, the defendant gave the judge the finger and said he repudiated all that the legal system stood for if they were going to send an innocent man like him to jail. Saddness is like having your heart captured and jailed because of some sad or terrible event, etc. Here the sad heart waits for someone to come and un-lock their jail cell and set them free again. Guilty under the eyes of the law, therefore sentenced to jail. [note: ´UNDER the eye of the law´ works in penalty (#833) as well.].

#

kanji

keyword

1637

輩

comrade

1639

扉 侯

1640

候

climate

1641

決

decide

1638

1642 1643

快 偉

front door

koohiiStory1 Some man jailed in Russia, is freed by his comrade (from the Communist party perhaps), who crashes into the jail cell with a vehicle. The only way out of a jail cell is to serve your time and walk out the front door. There are no other doors.

cheerful

Marquis Keydartee (make-believe french name, Key+dart+T). The marquis has absolutely no interest in issuses of climate change. He´s old and near death. [Don´t forget the walking stick to symbolize his old age.]. Decide! "Decide?! Death by drowning in polluted water or death by guillotine. How can I decide?" I asked. A large crowd in a cheerful state of mind applaude each criminal as they become victims of the guillotine.

admirable

LOCKETs often carry inside them a picture of a PERSON we find ADMIRABLE.

marquis

1644

違

difference

1645

緯

horizontal

1646

衛

defense

You lose your precious locket on the road to somewhere. You ask people if they´ve seen it, but no luck. "Just buy another one," someone says. "I mean, what´s the difference?" Then of course you say "Well, it makes a huge difference!! Since it has sentimental value, I don´t want a different one! " Then of course they understand. The thread that holds the locket around my neck is choker-length so it stays horizontal. [defense; protection] For "defense against the dark arts" class, you go the magical boulevard and buy an enchanted locket.

Korea

There´s a young Korean male actor, Yon-sama, famous amongst middle-aged Japanese women. Extremely famous. Read about his affect on Japan/Korean relations on Everything2.com. In any case, women just flipped over this guy, traveled to Korea to see his home, started taking Korean language classes, etc. So, imagine here the misty eyes of the Japanese women as they clutch their lockets with Yon-sama´s picture inside watching his Korean romantic mini series called "Winter Sonata".

1648

韓 干

1649

肝

liver

1650

刊

publish

1651

汗

sweat

1652

軒

flats

1653

岸

beach

1654

幹

tree trunk

1647

1656

芋 宇

1657

余

1655

dry

potato eaves too much

Dry one item in ten minutes on the clothesline. Well you all know that the liver is the part of the body that would be quite grateful if you led a dry lifestyle (i.e. no alcohol). The newspaper pages are hung on the clotheseline to dry and then cut down with a sabre to be published. The way sweat is supposed to work: it gets your skin wet, and then as it evaporates/dries, it cools you off. Flats in the city are crowded. You get a space for your car in front, and a clothesline out back. Nothing else. At the base of mountain cliffs, there is usually a beach. You often can see people lying there, drying off after a swim. A fine mist is falling, and so everyone gathers around near the tree-trunk, effectively using the rest of the tree as an umbrella in order to keep dry. If your potatos are growing flowers and those little hooked roots, you should either buy less or eat them faster. Under the eaves of the house the poor family has potate plants. You hang an umbrella upside-down on a hook of the scales and fill it with little potatoes. No luck: it weights too much.

#

kanji

keyword

1658

除

exclude

1659

徐

gradually

1660

叙

confer

1661

途

route

1663

斜 塗

1664

束

1662

1666

頼 瀬

1667

勅

1665

diagonal paint bundle trust rapids imperial order

1668

疎

alienate

1669

速

quick

1670

整

organize

1671

剣

saber

1672

険

precipitous

1673

検

examination

1674 1675 1676 1677 1678 1679

倹 重 動 勲 働 種

frugal

koohiiStory1 You won´t make it unless you exclude something. The climb to the pinacle cannot be completed if you are carrying too much. You just have to decide what you can afford to exclude. You can´t expect weight loss to happen overnight. You should limit going to the scale to weigh yourself to once a day or once a week, in order to observe the anticipated weight loss gradually. Amazed at the weight of his crotch, they conferred every honor upon him. (Image: guy with his junk on a scale getting a medal pinned to his chest/around his neck/being knighted, etc.). On this route, all trucks have to check in at the scales before they can get on the road. The main bar of an old-fashioned scale(balance) will be very diagonal if you place a giant measuring cup on one side. If you add too much water to the paint it will drip onto the ground. Mnemonic: Bundle of joy. Here I see the proverbial stork with a baby hanging from its mouth fly straight into a tree. Painful, but he doesn´t drop the bundle. When you trust in something, you've got your head 頁 all bundled 束 up (wrapped up) in it. You need complete trust in your water guide to attempt Class 5 rapids. This is an imperial order for pizza. To deliver the huge bundle of pizzas to the emperor, the pizza boy needs huge muscles. [True story] In Osaka the homeless (the alienated) live in large numbers around the city zoo. Picture them in winter all bundled up in rags trying to keep warm, alienated from the society, living literally worst than the animals in the zoo who at least are bundled in their natural furs and have pens to live in sheltered from the elements. Jack be nimble, Jack be quick, Jack jump over the bundled sticks in the middle of the road. (dingomick). Recycling in Japan, you have to make sure all your bundles are organized correctly otherwise the taskmasters won´t accept them. If it helps, make the awl primitive ice pick instead. They´re basically the same thing. This kanji is an easy David vs. Goliath story of the icepick vs. the saber... The rock climber trying to get up to the pinnacle is dangling from a precipitous edge, hanging only one with his icepick. After intense cross-examination from the prosecutor, the tree confessed to murdering the wood-pecker with an awl... "He just kept at it, he kept poking at me with that beak, so I thought I'd see how HE liked it!!" The autopsy examination revealed at least a dozen puncture wounds, what a brutal case. Mr. T is as frugal as they come. He uses his one ice pick for everything: to eat, pick his teeth, clean his toilet, kill people, cook, etc.

move

The first computer in the world was as heavy as thousand computers are now. Even though the furniture is heavy, it´ll be easy to move with all the muscles that he has.

meritorious deed

A meritorious deed? Like moving a damsel in distress out of a fire, maybe.

work

A person who moves something is doing work, physically speaking.

species

Our species has a wheat heavy diet...

heavy

ill

koohiiStory1 Two heavy trucks in a game of chicken collide while racing toward each other on the boulevard. Do you know how they make those FRAGRANT air fresheners? Well you take some FLOWERS, compress them with a HEAVY weight, and put them on an OVEN FIRE for a while... (cmp perfume (#493)). Caveman got ill after flying third class. The cabin air and food got to him. (Primitive: these all got MUCH easier when using CAVEMAN instead. ).

stupid

Of course caveman is stupid. He doesn´t know anything. He´s a caveman!

#

kanji

keyword

1680

衝

collide

1681

薫

fragrant

1683

病 痴

1684

痘

pox

Caveman has horrible pox. They look like edamame beans oozing bight green paste.

1685

症

symptoms

1686

疾

rapidly diarrhea

Once you have all the symptoms right, you have correctly identified the sickness. I picture a sick caveman, and two people rapidly blowing darts at him. One is blowing poison darts, the other is blowing antidote darts. Will the sick caveman live or die? Depends on how rapidly they fire. For a country full of pay-per-use public toilets, sudden diarrhea is certainly the most profitable sickness!

tired

I picture an exhausted sick caveman snuggling up in a comfy pelt blanket.

epidemic

Sickness-missiles are being engineered by bio-terrorists to spread epidemics all over the world. Imagine seeing footage of a place where those sickness-missiles are built : rows after rows of missiles, and if you look closely on each is inscribed in tiny letters the name of different sickness such as "flu", "plague", etc.

1682

1687 1688

1689

痢 疲

疫

1690

痛

pain

1691

癖

mannerism

1692

匿

hide

1693

匠

artisan

1694

医

doctor

1695

匹

equal

1696

区

ward

1697

枢

hinge

1698

殴

assault

Think of the phrase pain in the xxx. Then think of a pogostick up your xxx. That's painful, right? The real question is why a pogostick is up your xxx. That's sick, dude. Caveman has a bad mannerism of putting ketchup on everything he eats. I guess that´s ok since raw mammoth can´t be too good... Young kids likes to hide in cardboard boxes. (Primitive: CARDBOARD BOX, especially kids playing with them.). Hint: Artisan/Ax Def: An artisan is a skilled manual worker; a craftsperson. Here we see his tools represented by the artisan's ax stored in his toolbox. Easily confused: Dr. (#47), doctor (#1694), examination (#1673), check-up (#1724), medicine (#1736). To avoid confusion I renamed this medic, and picture the medic from Team Fortress 2 returning to his box of darts in the supply cupboard every time his syringe gun is empty. This kanji is used commonly as a counter for small animals. This is a pictograph of a SMALL ANIMAL´S view from inside a CARDBOARD BOX looking out at his masters HUMAN LEGS. He´s probably hiding so the master does not COUNT him with the other animals which will probably be eaten (thus he avoids everyones EQUAL fate on the farm: the kitchen table). In the homeless ward of the city you see people sleeping in CARDBOARD BOXES using a SHEAF as a pillow. Make sure you install the hinge the right way. If it opens treeward (= tree ward), you won't be able to get the fence open, make sure it opens houseward. The biggest assault on Japan during WW2 is when the wards in Hiroshima and Nagasaki were wiped out by nuclear missiles.

#

kanji

keyword

1699

欧

Europe

1700

抑

repress

1701

仰

faceup

1702

迎

welcome

1703

登

ascend

koohiiStory1 Do japanese consider Europe like just a ward, boring enough to make them yawn?? This kanji is offensive! They would repress dissents by cutting off their fingers and mailing them to relatives in small boxes (of course including stamps for proper postage). Mr T with the post package at the post office: ´these stamps don´t stick to the box, foo´ Postguy:´ Try it again but this time with the stamp, face-up.´. Welcome home daddy! Is that box for me? You were on the road a long time! I collected all the stamps from the letters you wrote me　:-) ...　　RTK2:　ゲイ　歓迎　かんげい(welcome). When an American Indian warrior dies, his body is placed on a TABLE inside a TEEPEE, and a ritualistic ceremony is held to encourage his spirit to ASCEND to that big buffalo hunting ground in the sky.

lucidity

Scuba divers know that when you ascend in the water, your lucidity increases (For nondivers, the deeper you go, the more you become mentally impaired by nitrogen narcosis, every 50 feet is like drinking one martini). Scuba divers also know that as you ascend in the water, the lucidity of the water improves, too.

1704

澄

1705

発

discharge

1706

廃

abolish

Two pairs of human legs poking out of a teepee: you know there´ll be a discharge soon, be it sexual, violent (husband returns home with a weapon), or dishonourable (soldier caught molesting a native), or perhaps all of the above. Slaves have been discharged from the caves where they were kept thanks to the abolition of slavery. A colleague implies someone that you share work with, such as in your company or profession, etc. Here your colleague helps you to erect your pup tent during a company outing. Note: Heisig's warning to keep this distinct from other similiar kanji such as companion (#19), friend (#704), consort (#1203) and comrade (#1637). That is why I chose to have the person element pictured as someone (the colleague in this case) helping with the work of building the pup tent.

1707

僚

colleague

1708

寮

dormitory

1709 1710

療 彫

1712

形 影

1713

杉

1711

1714 1715 1716 1717

彩 彰 彦 顔

heal carve

shape shadow cedar

coloring

A dormitory is right in the middle between living in a house and living in a pup tent. On the battlefield, the only place to heal from your sickness is inside the medic's pup tent. Think of M.A.S.H. A lathe is used to carve a shape with circumference into wood or metal. Everyone in the kindergarten came up with fun and interesting shapes made out of Play-Doh, except for the kid with the amputated arm. Seems like you really need both hands. The sun over the capital cast a shadow with the same shape. Cedar is an evergreen tree that keeps its SHAPE all year long. That is, it doesn´t loose its needles/leaves in the winter. In Sydney we occasionally get exotic birds. You first notice a colouring in a tree. You look more carefully and you make out the shape of a bird (here represented by its claws).

lad

The shape of a sheriff´s badge makes it patent who he is. A lad standing on the top of a cliff, looking into the far, and thinking how to shape his future.

face

A lad's head still has a baby's face.

patent

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

1718

須

ought

Why, I OUGHT to RESHAPE your HEAD...

1719

膨

swell

1720

参

visit

1721

惨

wretched

1722

修

discipline

1723

珍

rare

This kanji does not mean swell as in a inflammation. There is a different kanji for that meaning (腫れる). This kanji means swell as in, a tire swelling/expanding, your income swelling/expanding, dough swelling/expanding, etc. Johnskb's story is best b/c it does not involve swelling in the sense of inflammation, just general expansion of the stomach. STORY: "If a PART OF your BODY begins to SWELL/EXPAND and resembles the SHAPE of a bass DRUM, you’re either pregnant or in desperate need of a diet.". I´m going to visit my grandpa in the hospital. He broke his elbow, and it became really big and contorted into a weird shape. I hope he will be all right! Whenever I have to visit the relatives... that puts me in one hell of a wretched state of mind. Mr. T is a harsh taskmaster who will discipline you (beat you into shape) with his walking stick. It's rare to see the king carrying his own parasol - typically he gets one of his attendants to do it for him (thanks to Katsuo for umbrella + shape = parasol and to Peppi for the story idea).

1724

診

checkup

At my last check-up, the doctor said to me: "Start carrying a parasol, or you might get skin cancer. You've been tanning too much!" [Umbrella over shape = parasol].

sentence

A twist on greenapple: The teacher puts a tophat on all pupils with gramatically correct sentences, while the rest are left with a big red X on their homework.

vis-à-vis

When sitting vis-a-vis, Scots will glue their kilt down to avoid embaressment.

family crest

The Scottish weave their family crests with thread on plaid fabric.

mosquito

The mosquito (an insect) knows only one sentence: Bzzzzz. The Scotsman goalkeeper adjusted himself. He reached down and adjusted the two things between his skinny fencepost legs. When my medicine dose is way too large, I adjust it by cutting it into smaller pieces with my saber.

1728

文 対 紋 蚊

1729

斉

adjusted

1730

剤

dose

1731

済

finish

1732

斎

purification

1733

粛

solemn

1734

塁

bases

1735

楽

music

1736

薬

medicine

Playing baseball in a rice field with sparklers stuck into the ground to act as bases. Zelda: Ocarina of Time - The white sparkly thing is Navi. She´s hovering/dancing around a tree to the legendary Lost Woods music. New-age medicine involves using things like music and flowers (aromatherapy) as treatment.

ratio

It´s quite mysterious how each sparkler gives of sparkles at a precise ratio of ten to one. Physicists have been studying this effect for decades, known as the Sparkler Effect, and using it to explain why stars look like sparklers in the night sky.

1725 1726 1727

1737

率

When the goalkeeper finishes the game, he drinks a lot of water and adjusts himself. Purification? I think of Japanese during new year's eve praying(saying sentences) in front of Itsukushima's shrine torii(fenceposts) and its altar. They expect to enter the new year totally purified. Even though it´s a maddening task, the monks stay solemn as they rake rice between the fenceposts.

#

1738

kanji

渋

keyword

vicarious

I think that Heisig meant this as the "slightly bitter but fresh" meaning that it can have to describe foods like lemons (しぶい). So imagine a guy trying a cocktail (water), feeling like he´s been kicked in the face (footprint) and sparks are flying from his tongue. ´How did it taste?´. ´Hmm, yes, slightly bitter, but fresh". Now that I´m a responsible adult, I have to get my vicarious thrills from watching stupid people put sparklers up to their ears and burn their fingers.

center

Youve got the st bernard dead centre in your sights (the box). The original great seal of the king of England had a very ornate flower in the center. In the solar system, the Sun is the central source of all light, everything else just reflects it.

astringent

1740

摂 央

1741

英

England

1742

映

reflect

1743

赤

red

1744

赦

pardon

1739

1746

変 跡

1747

蛮

barbarian

1748

恋

romance

1749

湾

gulf

1745

1750 1751

黄 横

koohiiStory1

unusual

He was stabbed with a dagger, and little drops of red blood dropped onto the ground. The student blushed until his face was red, so the schoolmaster decided to pardon him. It´s quite unusual and abnormal to see an apple with walking legs running away from the person who wants to eat it!

yellow

Pirate pokes the tip of his wooden leg into an apple to disguise his tracks. The barbarian picks an apple from above and eats it even though there is a worm (insect) in it. The romance between Snow White and Prince Charming started when Snow White took a bite of poison apple and her heart stopped. In his most daring feat, William tell used his bow to shoot an apple off the head of his son across the water of the gulf. The salad did not look very appetizing... The sprouts were yellow and there were animal legs sticking out of it.

sideways

A tree went all yellow. It died and fell down, ending up sideways.

tracks

1752

把

grasp

1753

色

color

Japanese censorship laws require pornos to use a mosaic screen, so you can´t see what the porno chick is grasping with her fingers (but you can assume, neetch). Ever look closely at mosaics? They contain a bunch of images bound up into a larger one. It seems amazing until you realize that the only quality of the smaller images that really matters is their colour.

discontinue

I can't finish my sewing project because the thread color I was using was discontinued.

glossy

To print something with bountiful colour, they use glossy paper.

1754 1755

絶 艶

1756

肥

fertilizer

1757

甘

sweet

1758

紺

navy blue

1759

某

so-and-so

PART OF YOUR BODY excretes something that is commonly used for FERTILIZER. Sometimes this process is slow, so you solve a RUBIK´S CUBE while you sit and wait. Little red riding hood is carrying around a wicker basket filled with sweet baked cookies for granny. Thanks raulir - As many Japanese perverts know, navy blue threads conceal school girl sweetness underneath. I had the same idea as fuabrisu. A generic person is described here as having body sort of like a tree trunk and head sort of like a wicker basket.

#

kanji

keyword

1760

謀

conspire

1761

媒

mediator

1762

欺

deceit

1763

棋

chess piece

1764

旗

national flag

koohiiStory1 I imagine a clique of catty girls conspiring against a another girl...they are exchanging lots of words, chatting about how so-and-so girl is now up to such-and-such (gasp!), and how they will spread the word about it. The woman 女 hoped her friend would act as mediator to set her up with the guy she liked. She didn't mention his name, just referred to him as "A certain unnamed person - I'll call him 'Mr. So-and-So 某' ...." He escaped using deceit. That is, he ran past while the guard was yawning and hid in the bushel basket. Tree + Bushel Bucket: Chess pieces carved from trees were tossed into a bushel bucket for sorting into sets. The national flag of Croatia. It's a banner with the Croatian coat of arms, commonly referred to as the Chessboard (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coat_of_arms_of_Croatia).

period

The slowest remote chess game ever: a one month period between every move.

Go

Go is chess played with stones.

fundamentals

Fundamentals of chess: use the rooks to protect your ground. It´s a tremendous match between the two chess-players. They are clearly eachother´s equal.

1765 1766 1767

期 碁 基

1769

甚 勘

1770

堪

withstand

1771

貴

precious

1772

遺

bequeath

1768

tremendously intuition

Intuition is a tremendously powerful resource of the mind. Because I hid myself behind a huge dirt barrier I dug, I was able to withstand the tremendous nuclear blast. Inside your purse is all of your money and your keys (き) etc. All of your precious valuables. Bequeath is an odd old word, isn´t it? Basically, it just deals with how I want my precious possessions dealt out, after I die, later down the road. "Being of sound, but antiquated, mind, I bequeath this to you!".

1773

遣

dispatch

1774

舞

dance

1775

無

nothingness

1776

組

association

1777

粗

coarse

Bond has stolen a lady spy's purse while she was asleep after their evening together. When she discovers it's gone, she dispatches some henchmen on the road after him to dispatch him, but Bond evades them and escapes with the purse. The yakuza boss reclines in the oaken bathtub wearing his shades while his personal harem dances naked for him. When I enter the wooden tub heated by flames in the onsen, I can let all my worries slip away and be submerged into nothingness. A common thread associates the knick-knacks on your knick-knack shelf. Souveneirs from Spain on one, from Japan on the other. Japanese carpenters don't use sandpaper, they use rice-paper(rice glued on to some paper). Here the carpenter is using the coarse paper to smooth out the shelf he's making. The EU and US impose such high tariffs on food imports that third world wheat (the most basic of staples) never reaches first world supermarket shelves.

1778

租

tariff

1779

祖

ancestor

1780

阻

thwart

The ancestor worship is so common in Daoist and buddhist countries that you can buy tiny altars to put on the shelves, one for each deceased family member. Keeping porn on the pinnacle of a bookshelf can thwart snooping kids (thanks bodhisamaya).

#

kanji

keyword

1781

査

investigate

1782

助

help

1783

1784 1785

宜 畳 並

best regards

tatami mat row

koohiiStory1 Like the "ero inquiry" that had been partially swept under the rug (see inquire (#1145)), this kanji depicts the investigation into the forestry scandal being shelved. HELP! Someone´s pinned under this bookshelf and it´s gonna take a lot of muscle to lift it off! It seems like every time my Japanese friends send me their best regards, they accompany them with a gift. Over time, I´ve gotten so many that I had to buy a second house which contains nothing but several fancy shelves. Each shelf is dedicated to a certain friend of mine and contains every last one of their presents. The king is peacefully sleeping on his new tatami mat when all of a sudden a shelf falls over and kills him. You can see his crown poking out and the brains splatter out the top of his head from all the pressure. This is a simplification of 竝, a ideogram of two people standing in a row. A row of suns is actually a normal, plain, and ordinary occurrence in an infinitely large and expanding universe. FUtsuu.

1787

普 譜

1788

湿

damp

Musical scores are in a universal language. You first wash you clothes with water and wring them until they are just damp before hanging them in a row under the sun to dry. If you don´t wring them damp first they will take days to dry!

1789

顕

appear

Somebody's head appears from behind the laundry in a row drying under the sun

1786

universal musical score

1790

繊

slender

1791

霊

spirits

1792

業

profession

1793

撲

slap

1794

1795 1796 1797

僕 共 供 異

1800

翼 洪 港

1801

暴

1798 1799

At the end of Thanksgiving it's tradition for everyone to stand in a row and measure their waist with a strip of thread. Whoever is the most slender wins the leftovers. After raining for two days in a row, you plead with the SPIRITS for some relief. (Adapted from johnskb,21-5-2006). The oldest profession: prostitution. I was once in a brothel in Amsterdam where the working girls had a group of businessmen blindfolded and hanging upside down in a row, not yet spanked and whipped, but waiting eagerly. After a row husbands take their wives upsides down over the knee and slap them with their fingers on the bottom (if that doesn´t get me banned…).

together

Mr. T also finds himself as one of the HUSBANDs, whose wives have had them hung UPSIDE DOWN IN A ROW. But when his wife comes up to punish him, he pleads, “It’s ME, Baby. I wasn’t behaving badly like these other foo’s.”. The character for deluge (#1799) gave me the idea to use together as a primitive for Noah´s Ark. Noah kept plenty of salad on board to entice the animals with their animal legs to scurry on board together, two by two.

submit

You have to SUBMIT all required documents together, in person!

uncommon wing

Brains together with beauty is an uncommon combination. The thing about feathers is that they usually cover the entire bird. A creature with feathers only on its wings would be very uncommon.

deluge

Lots of water coming together is called a deluge.

harbor

During a deluge, all the poor snakes get washed into the harbour. If you think of it as of outburst of an atomic bomb (which will also prove useful in the next frame), then imagining thousands of suns blasting in one single outburst of rage and turning people into rice grains is not that hard.

me

outburst

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

bomb

Actually means explosion, like an outburst of fire.

respect

well

If you wanna stay together you have to show your valentine respect. Isn't this how the US presedential election works? You are given a choice between two snakes. Their politics are actually strung together but you get to feel as though you chose which one you want to lead you down the political road for the next four years. So which snake are you going to elect? Mr. President in his palace, ordering missiles to be fired at a harmless enemy in order to unite us together under the flag. I nearly died by falling in a well. Actually, on two separate occasions. I´m glad to see they´ve added these fence posts. Now the well will be much safer.

surround

The village surrounded the well with a wall so kids wouldn´t fall in.

till

If you just grow your christmas tree in a well, there will be no need to till the soil.

1803

爆 恭

1804

選

elect

1805

殿

Mr.

1802

1807

井 囲

1808

耕

1806

1809

亜

Asia

1811

悪 円

1812

角

angle

1813

触

contact

1814

解

unravel

1815

再

again

1810

1816

講

bad circle

subscription posture

Ideal posture is standing tall like a tree and having a V shape like a funnel

gutter

A gutter funnels water. Right part: academic conference (a meeting, some of the attendees making notes in scrapbooks during presentation). Argument at academic conferences is naturally carried out using words. Mr. T talks about ethics at the academic conference. "I pity the fool who gets caught plagarizing someone else´s stuff!".

lecture

1819

1820

論

argument

1821

倫

ethics

1818

The shape of a Yen coin. A museum display of two walking sticks bound together under a glass canopy, showing the first device used to measure an angle. For insects to get in contact with each other, they need to place their antennae at just the right angle. Did you know that you can unravel a cow? If you stick the dagger in at exactly the correct angle, the whole cow will just unravel. The king has eaten too much and has to get a new belt again. See his fat rolls hanging over? I have a funnel attached to my laptop that takes my prof´s lecture and puts the words into a text file. The bigger the funnel, the more accurate the conversion, so picture a bunch of laptops with large, unwieldy funnels attached to the USB port. Subscription is like a money funnel, because the receiving end is small (just one company) and the other end is wide (the whole country).

購 構 溝

1817

In Asian countries, people use II chopsticks to get things into their mouths. Just imagine someone shoving a piece of sushi into their mouths with chopsticks. Because Asian people started to eat Western food, their hearts became bad and they started having heart attacks.

1822

輪

wheel

1823

偏

partial

During a talk at the academic conference, speaker shows an introductory slide depicting the structure of car, and then moves on to the more narrow topic of wheels. Mr. T is partial to konbini hentai. He reads them for hours every day after work at his local konbini. (Primitive: KONBINI HENTAI, all the magazines(scrapbooks) by every konbini door in Japan).

#

1824

1825 1826 1827 1828 1829 1830 1831

1832 1833 1834 1835

kanji

遍

編 冊 典 氏 紙 婚 低

抵 底 民 眠

keyword

koohiiStory1

everywhere

Go down the road in Japan and you will find comics EVERYWHERE, newpaper stands, 711, Tsutaya, even the supermarket. Comics are everywhere here along the road.

tome

Raulir has a good idea. I prefer to think of the manga compilations as the individual comics (serials from the anthologies) bound together with a coarse thread down the spine, produced quickly and put on the market. Good way to recycle those pulpy manga, and since when has the consumer not gotten screwed in Japan? ;-). Pictograph. I think of that Harry Potter spell book that had to be bound shut coz it wanted to eat you.

code

Coding is a tool which you can use to bend the computer to your will.

family name

Looks a bit like Ft => Family title => Family name.

paper

All that threads you to your family name is a piece of paper. (birth certificate).

marriage

Marriage is the day in this woman´s life where she gets a new family name.

lower

A person bows low when presenting his business card.

resist

Japan business etiquette tip: When someone hands you a business card, resist the impulse to fiddle around with it with your fingers, and by all means resist the urge to use the card to pick gunk from under your fingernails. Just examine it carefully, ask politely about the (few by now) kanji that you don´t know, and put it away carefully in a location that shows your counterparts how important they are to you.

bottom

I put all those useless business cards at the bottom of a cave.

people

All the people of the world with all their family names shouting with their big mouths.

sleep

In an Orwellian sense, the eye watching the people never sleeps. I was retreating from the battlefield. In the chaos, my friend threw his dogtags at me to give to his family. I managed to catch them with my fingers as the chopper was lifting off.

compilation

1837

捕 浦

1838

蒲

bullrush

1839

舗

shop

1840

補

supplement

1841

邸

residence

1842

郭

enclosure

1843

郡

county

1844

郊

outskirts

A shop in an impoverished country is just a cottage with a dog tag identifying it. I usually hear supplement in "dietry supplement". So you´re given a cloak for extra fibre and dogtags for extra iron. Keeps you regular and stops you feeling tired and rundown. The business card says his residence is just to the left of the city walls. Can you find it? Yep, got it. The city finally received the enclosure that it desperately needed, city walls to protect it against attacks from the tall kids. The old boy had never been outside of his own county because he couldn't get over the city walls. The country folk and and the city folk mingle at the outskirts of town, just past the city walls.

1845

部

section

Within the city walls, this section of town was so noisy that we had to muzzle them up.

1836

catch bay

The water of the bay washes all the dog tags up after the battle. Bulrush was the flower that you could see near almost all bays in japan before the japanese started putting concrete everywhere. Just check how many percent of Japan´s coastline that is concretised... you´ll be surprised.

#

kanji

keyword

1846

都

metropolis

1847

郵

mail

1848

邦

home country

1849

郷

hometown

1850

響

echo

1852

郎 廊

1853

盾

shield

1854

循

sequential

1855

派

faction

1851

1856 1857

脈 衆

son corridor

vein masses

1859

逓 段

1860

鍛

forge

1861

后

empress

1862

幻

phantasm

1858

parcel post grade

koohiiStory1 In a metropolis people are just puppets inside city walls, there is no individuality if you live so close together. The drooping citywalls was generating a lot of angry mail for the city officials. Hint: think "hate mail" and you will remember this one. [thx CharleyGarrett]. He reminisced about his home country: "Ah, back in my home country, the bushes grew so high that they covered the city walls!". Your hometown is where you broke out of your cocoon (born), and where you left when your hair was silver (died), your whole life was spent inside the city walls. People´s voices are like echoes of sounds from their hometowns....you can always tell where they´re from by how they talk. The daughter is a good girl that grows up to be a woman. The son is a good boy that grows up to defend the city walls. Your son plays in the corridor pretending he´s exploring a cave. You paint 10 huge eyes on your shield to scare the enemy, but consequently your shield is so big and heavy that you have to drag it. This is mostly used in the word 循環, "circulation" (of buses through their routes, of blood, etc). So I think of a column of little Roman soldiers with their shields marching sequentially through the veins of a person, as an anthropomorphization of the immune system. Drag + rag gave me trouble until I came up with zombie for it. The zombie population became more diverse, separating into different factions. One of them being the water Zombies. The vein is the part of the body most lusted after by the flesh hungry zombies (drag & rag - see revenantkioku frame 1855). Masses of zombies, splattered with blood. (any zombie movie). Picture a crude drag-sled - in this case, made from cornstalks that have been belted together - filled with parcels, that the postman drags along behind him down the road along his delivery route. This is a military-grade staple gun! It can be loaded with real missiles. As a discriminating metalsmith, I use the highest grade metals when forging such precision devices as staple guns and missiles. The empress is cruel. Normally she´ll violently pull her servants by the ear when they´ve failed to follow orders. But one time she dragged this one guy around the palace by the mouth. She must have been really angry—ever since that moment, he´s never been seen again. After the play, The Phantasm of the Opera hangs up his cape on a clothes hanger and returns to his cocoon to sleep. The porn director has one big mouth. "Don´t bother putting your clothes on a hanger, just get started.".

1864

司 伺

1865

詞

parts of speech

That person, being the director, is someone you need to pay your respects to. Parts of speech act as word directors, giving it meaning and indicating its correct placement and usage in grammar.

1866

飼

domesticate

When you DOMESTICATE a animal, you are the DIRECTOR of it´s life and what it EATS.

1863

director pay respects

#

kanji

keyword

1867

嗣

heir

1868

舟

boat

1869 1870 1871 1872 1873 1874

舶 航 般 盤 搬 船

1876

艦 艇

1877

瓜

1875

liner navigate carrier tray conveyor ship warship rowboat melon

1879

弧 孤

1880

繭

cocoon

1881

益

benefit

1882

暇

spare time

1878

1883 1884

1885 1886

敷 来 気 汽

arc orphan

spread

koohiiStory1 The lawyer called all the heirs into a meeting. Everybody else received cars, property, and the like. When it got to be my turn the lawyer informed me I would be receiving a scrapbook. My mouth dropped open. A scrapbook?! No Ferrari, no mansion, ...scrapbook?! Turns out the scrapbook was of my great uncle's company, and I had been named the new director of the multi-million dollar business. My mouth literally hit the scrapbook when I learned I'd be director. I see this kanji as a pictograph of a two story boat seen from the front. The glass canopy is the body of the boat. The drop on top is the chimney. The horizontal line is the ceiling/floor between the the 1st/2nd floor. Finally, the two drops in the middle are the lights on the decks. The most famous LINER is the Titanic, which struck an iceberg and sunk. Just imagine that huge LINER strucking an even huger mass of white ice. To navigate a "boat" through a "whirlwind" takes a skilled navigator. Carrier?! This means "general" (as in the general public or generally). OK.. Carriers, i.e. boats with missiles, are not available to the general public. What do you call a "CARRIER" of DISHes? A TRAY. When workers neglect workplace safety, their fingers get cut off and carried away by the conveyor belt, which looks like a ´finger carrier´ in that case. A boy floats his toy boat in a gully and imagines it as an immense ship. The warship towers over the smaller benign boats, overseeing their safe path from port to port. Rowboats are a classic way to court (go on a date with) someone... 何これ???? ok, sorry to be crude... if you claw at a girls melons, she is gonna give you the elbow. When you use a bow to shoot a melon, the arc varies depending on how far away you are. An orphan will never know the joys on sucking on his mother´s melons........ This is a simple two-column manga showing the metamorphosis of a caterpillar into a cocoon. First, the caterpillar gets under a large flower (bees tend to hang around flowers, which scare away other predators). Then, in the first frame, we see the caterpillar (insect). Then, a bar separating this frame from the next frame (remember that Japanese manga run the other way!), in which we see the insect covered with thread, making a beautiful cocoon. The benefit of having sharp horns and fast legs is that an animal can get to the food dish first. Some jackass-like people have way too much spare time. You can find video´s of them all over the internet, if you like such things, you can watch it all day. You see them stapling their mouths shut, or throwing eachother upside down in boxes or kicking each other in the crotch. Instead of being glued to one specialty (#46) 専, I decided to spread my attention in many directions 方, and be a taskmaster at none.

spirit

You horny bastard, don´t come, at least not yet! You´re reclining on the floor trying to hook a sheaf with a small hook through the cracks. That you´ve been doing this for seven hours without success shows your burning spirit.

vapor

Water vapor almost looks like a spirit but has no soul.

come

leather

koohiiStory1 Hooks with small wings attached look like hummingbirds with a long beak. Two hummingbirds are trying to fly away with our little measuring box. What do they want it for? (thx geezer) The maimed waitress (no head and arms just her legs and trunk) is dropped into the water with a cement crown to make sure she sinks. She shouldn´t have been so nosy about her yakuza-boyfriend´s schemes. Ten rakes woman. your wife digs her fingernails into you and it feels like 10 rakes when she finds you ontop of another woman. If you thought that the dude in 哀 was pathetic, you haven´t seen him after his decline. Here he is carrying a stick around in his mouth like a dog, begging people to throw it for him. Note that the mouth is closed only after the stick goes in, as is only logical. The guy from pathetic (#401) shared his inmost feelings with a girl and she rammed a walking stick down his throat. It ruptured his inmost organs. If you´re wearing a mask, a hundred eyes can look at you but none of them will know who you are. I asked the street vendor the price of the LEATHER jacket. He said TWENTY, but with my MOUTH, I talked him down to TEN. (correct stroke order).

shoes

Leather shoes are nice because they change shape to fit your foot. In the old west, animal skins were made into leather and their flesh was eaten, thus using the whole animal, which viewed from the animal side could be taken as humans asserting complete hegemony over them. All your base are belong to us.

#

kanji

keyword

1887

飛

fly

1888

沈

sink

1889

妻

wife

1890

衰

decline

1891

衷

inmost

1892

面

mask

1893 1894

革 靴

1895

覇

hegemony

1896

声

voice

give

Having lost his voice, the samurai comunicated to his troops with a striped flag. Picture of a person facing you. 口 is the head. His right arm is raised (your left), to give you something from a tray 一. His legs ハ are below the tray. 呉れる、くれる, to give: 伯父がこの時計を呉れました, "My uncle gave me this watch." Following -て form of another verb, means "to do the favor of": 窓を開けて呉れませんか, "Won't you open the window [do the favor of opening/kindly open the window]?" Usu. written in hiragana.

recreation

A woman gives up her recreation time in order to raise a family.

mistake

You must give words of apology when you make a mistake. Think of a picture of someone steaming vegetables. On top you see the flowers of cauliflower or something else that is being steamed. Underneath, the pan is completely full of water. Below the pan is a floor - that's the hotplate - and under that the oven fire. Caution: don't confuse with boil (#1257), or the steam radical in spirit (#1885). To get someone to completely acquiesce it takes 3 dunks in the water before they give.

1899

呉 娯 誤

1900

蒸

steam

1901

承

acquiesce

1897 1898

1902

函

bin

1903

極

poles

1904

牙

tusk

Damn racoons ill show them. I put a snare in the bin as well as a few phosphorous sparklers so as to scare the shit out of the buggers as they rummage through my bin. Can simplify this using decay (#1243). Then: The expedition to the poles is bad for your health, and the decay that started in your mouth spreads to your crotch – at which point you fall to the floor. The kanji looks like an elephant with tusks. the box is the elephant´s eye. The final stroke is the tusk.

#

kanji

1906

芽 邪

1907

雅

1905

keyword

koohiiStory1

bud

Buds while they´re still small tend to be tusk-shaped.

wicked

gracious

The wicked queen builds her city walls out of menacing tusks. Goodness gracious! Such an elegant turkey with a tusk. This mnemonic is meant to join RtK´s keyword with a better proposition. Heisig could have used "elegant" here, which is not confounded so easily with graceful (#721), and accurately represents the character´s meaning (it is also the chosen keyword in Kodansha´s Kanji Learner´s Dictionary). Animal track primitive: As expected, animal tracks were left in place of the trail of rice I´d purposely dropped the night before. EDIT - also try the footprint for a primitive meaning, the classic symbol of detective films. STORY: This shakuhachi player is so talented, he can do interpretations of animal noises too. They´re so realistic he soon has animal tracks leading straight to wherever he´s playing.

1908

釈

interpretation

1909

番

turn

1910

審

hearing

1911

翻

flip

1912

藩

clan

1913

毛

fur

1915

耗 尾

1916

宅

home

1917

託

consign

1918

為

do

1914

decrease

The famers take it in turns to watch out for any animal tracks on their rice field. At your divorce hearing the judge tells you to roll dice to see who keeps the house. ("I can´t believe what I´m hearing!" you say). Flipping the bird: After finding out the dice is crooked, you kindly present the middle feather to the dealer. This character refers to feudal clans that were abolished in 1871 (Meiji 4) in favor of prefectures (廃藩置県), and thus were predecessors of the modern prefectures. As we know from 落, flowers and water drops each have their own way of falling. This character says that clans´ location was decided in the way flowers, water drops and dice fall: at random. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Han_%28country_subdivision%29. I´ve heard of people having hair on the back of their hands, but this is ridiculous! That´s not hair, that´s fur! The amount of "fur" (needles) on a Christmas tree decreases, until it doesn´t look all that good.

falsehood

A dog waves its furry tail like a flag. This kanji is, of course, pronounced "taku", and it seems the owner of this home is a little bit otaku himself. He has hung up locks of hair suruptitiously obtained from various females all over his house. A veritable hair fetishist, and certainly someone whose home you wouldn´t want to visit. When you consign a matter to someone, you get their word and a lock of their hair (to be used in a voodoo ritual if they don´t keep their word). In this kanji, you can see 3 katakana characters: ソ, ユ, and then ユ again followed by TAIL FEATHERS. STORY: "So (ソ) you (ユ) wanna DO it?" "Only if you (ユ) do" says the female bird as she raises her TAIL FEATHERS. A person who claims he didn't do something while he actually did, is telling a falsehood.

long

The Geisha with long hair uses an ornate lacquered hairpin to bundle it all up.

tail

1920

偽 長

1921

張

lengthen

1922

帳

notebook

The longbow is follows the design of a standard bow, only it has been lengthened. In ancient China books were rolled-up scrolls of paper. So notebooks were nothing more than long towels.

1923

脹

dilate

Taking Viagra let´s your blood vessels dilate...resulting in a body part getting long.

1919

#

kanji

keyword

1924

髪

hair of the head

1925

展

unfold

1927

喪 巣

1928

単

simple

1929

戦

war

1930

禅

Zen

1931

弾

bullet

1932

桜

cherry tree

1933

獣

animal

1934

脳

brain

1935

悩

trouble

1926

miss nest

koohiiStory1 Japanese teenage girls consider the style of the hair of the head very important. If a particular style is trendy, soon they all want their own hair in the same shape as that of their friends. Unfold flag, take out the salad, pin the flag down with hairpins and have a picnic. I miss my parents dearly. Here they lay, under a big cross, their mouths side by side. I stick hairpins in their graves. CAREFUL: the stroke order/primitive order is: ten, L mouth, R mouth, hairpin. "Soil" is not drawn in its stroke order. The nest atop of a tree contains the fruit of the owl: its offspring. Owls are smart...for this owl everything is simple coz his brain is ten times more powerful than mine. George W. Bush´s plans for war were so SIMPLE. To him, its all just a big FIESTA. Knowing ZEN’s emphasis on “nothingness,” it’s not hard to envision a ZEN ALTAR being quite clean and SIMPLE. Hunting with a bow is too complicated. I´m switching to something simpler--using a bullet. I was taking a picture of my girlfriend under the cherry tree during 花見, when an owl happened to poop on her at the exact moment the shutter snapped. It´s really my favorite picture , just don´t tell her that. The owl looks for its prey in the rice field. It sees so many potential animals to eat but since it only has one mouth, it decides that the tasty looking chihuahua will be its meal for tonight. (adapted from Copycatken,1-9-2006). The brain is the part of the body that can give you the wisdom of the owl... or the wickedness of the villain. When I am in trouble, my state of mind is on two sides: 1. The wise part of me (owl) 2. The villain part of me (villain) Think of the devil and the angel on your shoulders in a troubled situation. This represents a stern looking owl, perched up on a cliff. This cliff is quite famous for daring individuals to cliff dive off of, but is any of them daring enough to threaten the owl?

1937

厳 鎖

1938

挙

raise

1939

誉

reputation

1940

猟

game hunting

The chain on this chainsaw is made of little metal shells. The owl was asked to raise his hand if he needed anything, but he had a wing, not a hand! So he made a tool that looked like a hand which he used when he needed to raise his hand. For raiseing, owl has a tool hand. This owl´s reputation skyrocketed after he created a tool in order to speak human words. [game-hunting; shooting; game; bag] According to unicode.org and wwwjdic, 鼡 and 鼠 (mouse (#2065)) are variants. So, for 鼡 (which I´ll call rat) I have: an owl, flying in the wind, can easily spot a rat even if it´s hiding in the cornstalks. Now 猟 is easy: wild dogs are having fun by game-hunting rats.

bird

There is only one bird with such beautiful white tail feathers: the albino peakcock.

chirp

A chirp is quite simply the sound that comes from the mouth of birds. Do you know how cranes came to be? Well, they used to keep the poor bird cooped all the time. But the crane really wanted to be free, so it would always streatch its head and neck out of the coop trying to be free.

1936

1942

鳥 鳴

1943

鶴

1941

stern chain

crane

#

1944

kanji

烏

keyword

koohiiStory1

crow

The book´s story is just fine, but I found a kanji dictionary explanation also interesting: As crows are all black, it´s hard to see where their eyes are (black on black), so a stroke is removed from the part in the pictograph where the eyes would be.

1945

蔦

vine

1946

鳩

pigeon

1947

鶏

chicken

1948

島

island

1949

暖

warmth

1951

媛 援

1952

緩

slacken

1953

属

belong

1954

嘱

entrust

1955

偶

accidentally

1956

遇

interview

1957

愚

foolish

1958

隅

corner

1959

逆

inverted

1960

塑

model

1950

1962

岡 鋼

1963

綱

1961

beautiful woman abet

In the jungle there is a flowery vine called hedera rhombea that attracts humming birds by the dozens. They scoot around the flowers sucking up nectar off the vine. Feed one pigeon and nine more birds will be swarming you immediately…　RTK2:　On list of rare or no official Chinese reading. There are two types of birds often compared to husbands. Yes there are a few vultures out there, but most husbands are CHICKENS. 鶏 【にわとり】 (n) (domestic) chicken, (P) 鶏肉 【けいにく】 (n) chicken meat, (P). This island is the home of the terrible mythical bird Roc. It sits mighty atop the mountain waiting for the next hapless ship to pass by. Note: Just confirming Heisig has confused these two characters. This is used primarily for weather and climate (and colours). You want to know about a beautiful woman? There´s a woman that´s so beautiful, the birds migrate to her instead of the sun! You abet the escape of migrating ducks by pointing them the way. [slacken; loosen; relax; lessen; be moderate; ease] The thread in this story is a cable line, something like a power or phone line. The thread was tense with all the migrating ducks perched on it, but got back to being slackened when the entire flock flew away. (darg_sama-modified,2-11-2005). These bugs BELONG TO an extremist group promoting insect independence. They are parading the FLAG of their group, the Nationalist GNATS, and wearing explosives BELTS for their planned terrorist war. Entrust is to confer trust in someone else. My mouth belongs to you and your secret is safely entrusted with me. Mr. T accidentially stepped on Jiminy Cricket (a brainy insect, with a belt sort of sash to hold his "conscience" badge). On the road to my interview I accidentally bump into Jiminy Cricket who gives me some good advice. Don´t be foolish! says Jiminy Cricket as he lashes you with his belt. Follow logic, like me, not your heart. If you behave badly at THE PINNACLE, JIMINY CRICKET will send you to sit in the corner.

Mount

There´s a road that´s been inverted- it´s gone from horizontal to directly vertical! The only beast that could possibly climb it is a mountain goat of course. This guy is such a gifted sculptor. He can model a MOUNTAIN GOAT and a MOON with just SOIL mold. White mount , Fuji mount , olympus mount whatever ....The choice is yours but wherever you go they sell those snowglobe souvenir : under a GLASS HOOD you can see the mount with a MOUTAIN GOAT standing on top of it .... So kitsch you just can´t forget it .

steel

Mount Fuji is completely made up of a metal known as steel.

hawser

A sturdy thread is equally obviously hawser (heavy rope). (see previous frame).

#

kanji

keyword

1964

剛

sturdy

1965

缶

tin can

1966

陶

pottery

1967

揺

swing

1968

謡

Noh chanting

koohiiStory1 Mount everest is very sturdy, you can hit it all day with a saber and it wont even wobble. Horses kept in the mountains have a unique savory taste. At least so the text on this tin can would have us believe, which contains 100% authentic mountain horse. Pottery is used for food preservation, the pinnacle of which today is food bound up in tin cans. Primitive: A condor is like a vulture but twice the size and lives in mountainous regions (+1 Elphalpo). Story: I swing my fingers back and forth, trying to fend off the attacking condor. Noh chanting?!? I meant "NO CHANTING!" Now all you, just shut up! Not another word! Don´t you know that chanting can provoke attacks from the local condor? So, no chanting, and especially no Noh chanting.

1969

就

concerning

1970

懇

sociable

In the capital they have been having hearings concerning bioethics and bioengineering they call as their first witness a chihuahua with one human leg. The skunk here is Pepe LePew of Looney Tunes fame. He´s a very sociable skunk, as far as skunks go, but instead of having a "heart of gold" he has a heart of silver (since he always finishes second in the game of love).

groundbreaking

It was the groundbreaking of the new farm, but there was an uninvited guest to the ceremony. It was a famous skunk, the one with the familiar silver stripe. The feet of the crowd rushing from the ceremony site churned up the soil very nicely. The ceremony was ruined but the groundbreaking was a great success.

1971

1972

1973 1974 1975 1976 1977

墾 免 逸 晩 勉 象 像

elude

Obviously this is the rabbit from Alice, excusing himself and rushing away on his legs, as he has a binding day schedule. This is at the same time an image, with bound=ears, day=head and legs are just legs. The image is used in rabbit (#2093). Word play to differentiate elude/evade: elude ~= e-lewd. Alice is following Mr. Rabbit on the road. Mr. Rabbit flashes her in a lewd way and disappears, completely eluding her.

nightfall

At nightfall the sun excuses itself and goes to sleep.

exertion

When RABBITS hop around, they EXERT tremendous force using their MUSCULAR legs.

elephant

An elephant has huge ears, like a rabbit, and a big, fat body, like a sow.

statue

Statues of people are made the same size as statues of elephants. Turkey with the drops at the top removed and tail feathers added (this matches stroke order and there are the tail feathers already, why not have the whole bird). If you take the two drops of 隹 as wings, then horses are like turkeys, but have no wings and have more prominent tail "feathers". Both are actually supposed to be pictographs, though.

excuse

1978

馬

horse

1979

駒

pony

1980 1981

験 騎

verification

The new My Little Ponies show is all about magic horses who utter cute catch phrases. We just verification that there are indeed no soldiers in the belly of this trojan horse. We´re just gonna stab it in the belly with this awl to check.

equestrian

Equestrian events are where you get horses to do strange things.

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

1982

駐

parking

1983

駆

drive

In the olden days you had to park your horse next to a candlestick, a primitive parking meter that you start by lighting a fire and tracks the time by burning down. You have to be craaazzzzyy to drive a buggy led by a team of horses through a ward of Tokyo!

station

Anyone living in Japan knows that train stations play little melodies when the train is about to arrive. In Ye Olden Days, when horses and carriages were used for transport, the carriage driver would play a little melody on his shakuhachi to let the passengers know the carriage was arriving at the next station.

boisterous

Or more precisely: the team of horses are getting boisterous because one of them got bitten in the crotch by a horse fly. The kanji also means to roar, make up noise, to kick up a fuss and to make merry. Perhaps it is exactly the etymology behind this kanji.

burdensome

If a passenger is too plump and heavy, its too burdensome for the horse.

wonder

You stand in AWE at the 8th WONDER of the world, a huge TROJAN HORSE. A fervent horse doesnt need to be whipped with a bamboo stick during a race, it will go fast by itself. Flesh+quarter=McDonald´s quarter pounder. Due to inflation, McDonald´s has had to start making quarter pounders out of horse meat.

1984

駅

1987

騒 駄 驚

1988

篤

fervent

1989

騰

inflation

1985 1986

1990

虎

tiger

1991

虜

captive

Magic wand + first two strokes of pelt (皮) + diced + human legs. A wizard who turns people he doesn´t like into newts with his magic wand goes for variety - he has always wanted a tiger pelt - but things go awry when the tiger promptly dices and eats him, leaving only a pair of legs. (a fitting end for a wicked wizard). Captive men are thrown to the tigers. I think you can imagine something else is done to captive women...

1992

膚

skin

Ending up in a tiger´s stomach is not good for your skin, as it´s full of stomach acids.

1993

虚

void

1995

戯 虞

1996

慮

prudence

1997

劇

drama

1998

虐

tyrannize

1999

鹿

deer

2000

薦

recommend

1994

frolic uneasiness

In Japanese folklore there is no hell, but there is the void. There, a row of tigers waits in the blackness to devour those souls who have failed in their spiritual life. This is a story about the end of the universe. The universe is turning into a featureless void. There´s nothing we can do about it except for throw a fiesta and frolic a little bit before it´s all over. I feel a sense of uneasiness about giving this HUGE tiger a steak. Real meaning: "to ponder". You have to think with prudence (ponder carefully) about approaching a tiger, as is evident from 虎. There would be a lot of drama if a tiger tried to eat a sow but then the sow attacked it with a saber. Here we see the evil tyrannizing tiger. What is on his chest? A giant E, for EVIL, of course. Bambi wanders into a cave and sees a side order of salad and 2 spoons...but what´s the main course? Customer in restaurant asks you (waiter) what you recommend: "I recommend ze deer or ze 'eadless chicken. And I recommend you garnish it wiz some flowers." (let last six strokes = headless chicken).

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1 The hunter experienced jubilation when the deer with melancholy walked up to him and said, "just shoot me, whats the point in running. Everyone dies someday..."

2001

慶

jubilation

2002

麗

lovely

2003

熊

bear

The anthropologist made an exact deer painting from the cave ceiling on the ceiling of his house. Too bad they´re both mediocre. All his wife could say was, "How...lovely.". Most don´t know it, but bears have the ability to walk on fire. They´re invincible creatures! This man may have the dis-ability of no flesh below the elbows, but he can eat with 2 spoons, on in each foot.

2005

能 態

2006

寅

sign of the tiger

2007

演

performance

2008

辰

sign of the dragon

2009

辱

embarrass

This guy has an attitude problem – lots of ability, but his heart´s not in it. I don't know why but when I read sign of the tiger I get the "eye of the tiger song" stuck in my head. So I see rocky training in his house. Hes hitting the ceiling (no punching bag) eating brussel sprouts to keep in good health and running with only the animal legs his dog. Studies have shown that Rocky's PERFORMANCE increases if he downs WATER mixed with gatorade while in a match. I'm going with the Mortal Kombat Symbol, as it's the closest thing to a sign of the dragon I know. In that game, there's a place called the pit to which you can throw your opponent on round two, but only with a hairpin punch. If you get too close to a fire-breathing dragon, your skin can turn red from the burn. When someone is embarrassed, it's as though they have this sign of the dragon stuck to their face.

quake

An earthquake is a sign that a dragon is awakening after a heavy rain... It is angry for having been woken up and it makes the earth thunder and quake above it.

shake

Your mother shakes herfinger violently - no, no, no - no Mortal Kombat today! A woman who is with child can't be sacrificed to the dragon; virgins only need apply. Sign of the Dragon + Mouth: Lips need chapstick during the wintertime so they don't look like the sign of the dragon who kissed you on the mouth. Imagine if you could bend a dragon to your will. Helpful in war, yes, but also a boon for agriculture. The dragon could use its sharp claws to plough the ground, and use its firey breath to clear the land. But first you'd have to bend the dragon to your will -- not an easy task.

2004

ability attitude

2011

震 振

2012

娠

with child

2013

唇

lips

2014

農

agriculture

2015

濃

concentrated

2016

送

send off

2017

関

connection

2018

咲

blossom

The agriculture of Florida is concentrated on making concentrated orange juice. Just add water! Imagine a can of FCOJ, dumping it into a pitcher and adding water. The St Bernard with devilish animal horns must be non other than Cerberus, guard dog of the netherworld. In this frame Cerberus is seen along the road to hell, escorting those who have been sent off to join Hades in his realm. At the airport, the woolly mammoth was too big. When he tried to go through his flight's gate he got stuck and missed his connecting flight. The mouth of the wooly mammoth was so big and furry that plants would actually grow and blossom there.

ghost

鬼(おに) is not a ghost. An ogre or a troll would be a more fitting translation. Such a thing has but a drop of brains and uses its legs and elbows as deadly weapons (a concept which should be familiar from the license (#765) to kill). I'll use "ogre" for this.

2010

2019

鬼

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

2020

醜

ugly

2021

魂

soul

2022

魔

witch

2023

魅

fascination

2024

塊

clod

The ugly oni can´t get a date so he drinks sake by himself at the bar. When you die, your SOUL either goes to the RISING CLOUDS (heaven) or to the ONI (hell, the devil). This modern version of the witch lives in some hippie community. She smokes a lot of hemp, and spends the day talking to ghosts, which not surprisingly appears only to her. Ghosts have not yet left the world, they must still have a deep fascination with their past life on Earth. Without any weapons, our only defense was to throw clods of dirt at the advancing oni horde. (Adapted from dingomick because zombie was used as a primitive for drag+rag). The top 16 strokes are the chinese radical for "dragon". Joining up both meanings of the radical we can name the top part of this kanji "imperial dragon". Two-headed snakes do exist as biological curiosities, and they look a bit like a slingshot (with the heads splitting at a junction). Our imperial dragon here, the pet of a Chinese emperor, is a rare "three-headed slingshot-snake" kept in a vase and fed with meat. When the emperor attacked neighbours, his army wore the imperial dragon garment.

2025

襲

attack

2026

嚇

upbraid

2027

朕

majestic plural

2028

雰

atmosphere

2029

箇

item

To upbraid someone, you criticize them in a menacing way. In other words, you jaw at them with your MOUTH until both sides of their face turn RED (hence the double-red). The queen is not happy. "We (majestic plural) are not amused that the hunger for the flesh of the wooly mammoth has caused it's extinction. Poor Charles is particularly upset. The part of the sky that is responsible for weather and rain is known as the atmosphere. It only occupies part of the sky though. Dragon Quest - You find a hardened bamboo stick, perfect for a weapon, but you can´t pick it up because your items are full.

2030

錬

tempering

2031

遵

abide by

In the East, especially Japan ...there are masters of tempering metal to great strength....on the Spring of Trivia show in Japan I saw how a Japanese sword ...actually split flying bullets...all because of special Eastern tempering techniques. You must abide by the revered rules of the road! No devil´s brew and stay glued to your lane in the road!

quit

Hey, screw you! Don´t you look down on me! I have the ability to quit anytime I want!

barracks

The game characters from Worms sleep in their barracks at night. Moreover is a literary term to shelve what you had just been talking about, to come back to it later. Goods + wood = paper. You know how nori, ie: seaweed, comes in sheets for putting in your ramen or for your sushi? Well that's because it's water paper! Seaweed is also a sea flower of sorts, so it all just works out. In an attempt to free them from being slaves to their desires, the samurai stands behind the altar likening a clear mind to a sieve that lets only the purest thoughts through. (Think rpg!) We were in dire need of healing. Our party was fighting the cavemen, but we didn't fare too well. It was more like a butcher's meeting than a fight... just as they were about to pierce my heart, luckily a priest came along and used his healing spell in the nick of time (#2433).

2033

罷 屯

2034

且

moreover

2035

藻

seaweed

2036

隷

slave

2037

癒

healing

2032

koohiiStory1 How about a rusty cinnabar colored dilapidated boat, found abandoned somewhere. The smoke-stack and the keel have fallen off...

#

kanji

keyword

2038

丹

cinnabar

2039

潟

lagoon

2040

丑

sign of the cow

Right part: mortar bound up over oven fire, comprising boiling cauldron. Lagoon is a shallow pond, thus easily warmed by sun, large-scale equivalent of a boiling cauldron. Pictograph of a stanchion, which includes two vertical posts to restrain cows so they can be milked, with a horizontal stroke showing the number of cows per stanchion: one. A stanchion is a great symbol for the SIGN OF THE COW, since modern, domesticated cows are often stanchioned in barns.

sign of the hare

You know how missing childrens´ pictures often appear on milk cartons? Well here we have a missing hare. His concerned family is having his picture printed on the backs of receipts and even on stamps. So far, however, there has been no SIGN OF THE HARE.

2042

卯 巳

2043

璃

crystal

2044

俺

myself

2045

臼

mortar

2046

毀

break

2047

脊

spinal column

2041

2048

璽

sign of the snake

bewitched

The imperial seal is usually an impressive mark made with a jewel. However when the letter arrives it has been raining on it and you see that the drops of rain have been transformed into little x’s where some animal legs have run over it. If you don´t want to get bewitched (and who would?), then avoid any woman you see carrying what might appear to be a sapling. It´s really a wand in disguise, and if you´re not aware you might get bewitched.

irrigate

You use water to irrigate your saplings.

training

After a hard day of training, wheat is understandably delicious. You ever wondered why this appeared as a primitive in so many RTK1 kanji? Well, you should know that once a vulture grabs hold of a tree, he can never let go. Even Heisig couldn´t shake him loose. A "chop shop" is a place where stolen cars are taken, and parts chopped off with an axe, to be sold. If it looks like a towel, speaks like a towel and walks like a towel... I wonder why Heisig didn´t include this one (as an actual kanji) in RtK 1. To a big guy like Mr. T, eating a whole cabbage at once is nothing. "What? a cabbage? That's just a trifle, foo, where's the meat?". Mr. T don´t take a partner, especially one with no spine. "I pity da foo got no spine", he says.

imperial seal

2051

妖 沃 稽

2052

采

grab

2053

斬

chop off

2054

巾

towel

2055

僅

trifle

2056

侶

partner

2049 2050

The 巳nd! Thanks all. Michael Jackson is the king of pop, wearing his crystal rhinestone glove (see detach (#1492). I did it all by myself! Mr T stands there proud as holding a moray eel in his hand. He´s brought down terrorist organisations, drug syndicates, but gets all worked up when catching a fish... what a guy. I removed all the back to back staples and grinded them in a mortar to create metal dust. To "break the soil" is to make a symbolic gesture that indicates the beginning of construction. Like when a politician in a hardhat gets a shovel and lifts a piece of dirt. This particular project is behind schedule, so to speed things up, they blow it up with mortar and an air-to-ground missile. Look, says the teacher in biology class. "The spinal column holds your flesh together, just like the metal rod of this umbrella (he demonstrates this with an umbrella covered in I-Ching symbols) holds the umbrella together".

#

kanji

2058

伎 凄

2059

冶

2057

2060 2061 2062 2063

2064

刹 剥・剝 匂 勾 嘲

keyword performing artist

metallurgy

His wife has a nifty way of making all types of ice cream in her home freezer. The secrets of metallurgy and smithing: get your redhot metal and bang it against the pedestal as an anvil. Then cool it quickly with lots of ice.

moment

The kendo artist takes a brief moment to practice his skills: he throws sheafs over the tree and tries to cut them with his saber when they come down again.

peel off

Peel off the outside of the broom that sweeps up rice grains to reveal a saber.

aroma

The muchacho sits down bound up to enjoy his own aroma.

hooked

Your elbow is bound up so that your biceps will stay flexed.

derision

When I wake up, I am always late, so I hurry to work. With a bad case of perpetual morning breath, I am the subject of derision at my office whenever I open my mouth.

nifty

2065

咽

windpipe

2066

喉

throat

2067

唾

saliva

2068

呪

curse

2069

唄

pop song

2070

叱

scold

2071

堆

piled high

2072

填・塡

You can´t breathe very well, so the doc looks inside your mouth to find the cause. "Oh, I see the cause of your windpipe blockage. There´s a St Bernard penned up in there!". I think of "clearing your throat". Some stuffy guy opens his mouth to clear his throat so the marquis can speak. When some people are sleeping, their mouths droop open, and saliva drips out. Caution: this means a spell, not to swear. I put a curse on my elder brother so that he can never open his mouth. The new generation of pop songs have no depth. They just mouth empty lyrics to get money. Not like the pop songs of my day.

inlay

A kid gets scolded if they don´t put the spoon properly into their mouth when eating. After our pre-Thanksgiving massacre, we piled high all the turkey corpses atop the soil of the farmyard. In a hole in the ground, the body of the victim was placed. And then the killer stuffed it up so that the truth would not be found out, he hoped.

jealous

The jealous woman bashed the brains in of the guy who betrayed her, with a stone.

envy

If you go through women rapidly you will be the object of envy. The A/C wasn´t making the house cold because the filters had been blocked up with dirt. The baseball team stick flags in their buttocks and wave them at the opposing team to put them off. Standing at the base of the bluffs I announce, "I´m going to climb those ivy-covered cliffs, and then the mountain on top of them." My friends don´t believe me, "He bluffs!" they say. The bow dug more and more into the small of his back as he reclined on it. Will someone please tell the idiot to get up? In the busy pub, one of the dart players shoved his dart into my elbow by accident when it nearly slipped out of his fingers. Ever try WRENCHING a bolt with just your FINGERS? Trust me, you´ll WISH you had a wrench for WRENCHING to save your FINGERS.

2074

妬 嫉

2075

塞

block up

2076

尻

buttocks

2077

崖

bluffs

2078

弥

more and more

2079

挨

shove

2080

捻

wrench

2073

koohiiStory1 Mr T is dancing and singing and all that, but he´s doing it on a branch. All that talent and can still still keep his balance? That´s a real performing artist.

#

kanji

2082

拭 捉

2083

拶

2081

keyword

koohiiStory1

wipe

Why carry a handkerchief? I wipe my nose finger-style.

nab

I felt a finger on my leg as someone tried to nab my wallet. The old lady said that there was a flood imminent, because her fingers hurt in the evening. Come on people, the only way to make headway in this business is to let your fingers do the walking! bust out the yellow pages and dial as many numbers as possible, surely someone is a sucker for a cold call sell.

imminent

2085

捗 憧

2086

湧

bubble up

2087

沙

grains of sand

2088

淫

lewd

2089

氾

widespread

2090

溺

drowning

2091

汰

cleanse

2092

潰

defile

2084

2094

汎 釜

2095

狙

2093

make headway yearn

pan-

Wet sand is simply sand but to see beautiful grains of sand, the water must be few. The vulture is on top of the porter and appears to be commiting a lewd act, so I throw water over the pair of them. It´s a widespread belief that they cannot find fingerprints on a body that has been deposited in the water. Weak people placed in the water start drowning. Get some strength in those arms and learn how to swim! I couldn´t find any reference to this kanji as meaning cleanse. It seems to be most often used in the following compound 沙汰（さた）to mean affair. The other meanings seem to be closer to ´select´ so maybe Heisig meant cleanse in the ethnic sense here.. I´m going to use the keyword "selection", as in natural selection. Story: natural selection first began in the water, and those that were too plump were selected out. Man continues to defile precious water and it may prove to be his downfall (Think of Exxon, BP, etc.). Yeah, all our water is fairly mediocre, but if we work together in some pan-continental union, we can make some better water! As if.

numb

Your father uses his legs to stop himself from being put in a metal cauldron. When her home was invaded by a pack of dogs, the little girl climbed on the shelf and aimed various items at the dogs below. Oh, the committee´s in for a surprise: I put some nightshades into their drinks. They´ll be numb for sure, probably worse.

cover over

You cover over the shredder with flowers when the FBI comes a-knockin´. My favorite are heart shaped candles that smell like sweet flowers. The trick is to find one with a thick wick, they give off the most flower scent (but burn the quickest).

cauldron aim at

2097

萎 蔽

2098

芯

wick

2099

藍

indigo

2100

苛

bullying

2101

蓋

lid

2102

蔑

revile

2096

A paedophile´s state of mind is to yearn for juveniles. The courageous man who went into the water to save a drowning victim couldn´t be seen, except by the air that bubbled up.

Indigo flowers have to be overseen because they are often picked for their beauty. How many flowers can I stuff in your nostrils? Well I´m just gonna have to go and see. Bullying at its worst! The lid of this dish is gone! Now the whole room smells of the flowers that were used in the cooking. They gays were reviled by society, so they put flowers above their eyes and marched around.

#

kanji

keyword

2103

葛

kudzu

2104

遜

modest

koohiiStory1 Flower, siesta: The muchacho was not careful. He passed the warning signs and decided to hold a siesta in the kudzu field. The kudzu grew so fast, he was completely covered by it in a few hours and not able to escape. Now, the kudzu flowers mark his grave. My parents aren´t at all modest about their grandchildren, at every opportunity they take them on the road showing them off to their friends!

chink

There was only one chink in his plan. Even standing atop the highest pinnacle, standing above even the sun, the little man was still just as little as when he was under the sun.

unclear

The sun´s love is equivocal: it warms yet burns us.

obscure

Something that is obscure has not yet been brought before the light of day.

effulgent

The Sun King (Louis XIV) was known for his effulgent reign. When the sex slave misbehaves, threaten to sell his body parts starting with his kidney.

2105 2106 2107 2108

隙 曖 昧 旺

2110

腎 股

2111

臆

cowardice

2112

膝

knee

2109

2115

肘 腺 腫

2116

膳

2113 2114

kidney

elbow

Where´s my flesh missile? Between my thighs, naturally... Cowardice is the situation where you get the thought that maybe running away and saving your flesh is a good idea. Before lacquer (#932) was made with water, it was made by draining this body part of fluid: the knee! Sometimes I get carried away and do elbow curls until the point where my forearm snaps off! When that happens I simply pull out the glue and re-attach the elbow to my flesh.

gland

A body part that acts like a spring for hormones is a gland.

tumor

A tumor is a useless body part that is nothing but heavy. Some people insist that the serving maids who bring in the dining trays are especially virtuous and never let any man touch their flesh.

thigh

dining tray

2117

枕

pillow

2118

椅

chair

2119

柿

persimmon

2120

桁

girder

2121

梗

spiny

2122

椎

sweet oak

2123

柵

palisade

The guy who was thrown into the river to sink was given one last request. "If I´m gonna be sleeping with the fishes," he said, "can I at least have a pillow? I´m real sensitive." The mafia bosses laughed. "Look, my doctor said I can only use wooden pillows, I have a real serious condition. Can I at least die comfortable-like?" The mafia dudes said fine, and let him have his pillow. They tossed him the river and drove off...and after a minute, he bobbed to the top, thanks to his floating wood pillow. To the Japanese, the first time they saw a chair, it looked like a strange use of wood! Probably why they still like to sit on the floor... Nobody buys persimmons at the market, because there´s a tree in the middle where you can pick them for free. Girders are support beams that are nowadays mostly made out of steel. But in the ancient houses that are placed at the boulevard the girders will be made out of wood. I learned this one from the movie Evil Dead, but when it grows late, trees change shape and become spiny creatures! Lesson: don´t go out at night. Why is the sweet oak so sweet? Not sure, but to me it tastes just like turkey (with gravy and cranberry sauce!) Now that is sweet. A palisade is a "fence of stakes especially for defense," usually the stakes are very strong, set closely together, and pointed on top. Tome can be seen as a pictograph of several close-set wooden stakes, braced by one horizontal bar.

#

kanji

keyword

koohiiStory1

2124

煎

roast marine blue

In many asian restaurants, meat is roasted right in front of you over flames. “The king has been detained by some marines!” “How do you know they were marines?” “Because they were wearing marine blue.”.

speckled

Speckled is a pattern, like plaid, but with lots of little balls all over the place.

tinker with

scar

The king used both hands to tinker with himself in his spare time. The ball was the only thing that people at the beginning of time had to use as a toy. Poor cavemen. The girl was apprehensive about going home, having lost her precious hairpin in the paddy field. But then, it wasn't like she'd lost both, just ONE... The most horrific way to lose weight is from that devastating sickness that came from a monkey's crotch. I suffer from silver-sickness, that is, if anything made of silver even touches my skin it leaves a scar.

obvious

Open your eyes, it's obvious that not all of us can fit into that small puptent!

eyebrow

hem

The eyebrows hover over the eyes like a divided flag. After Osama blew a hole in NY, the counterreaction forced him to yield and retreat into caverns. Something is residing in the hem of your cloak. Maybe you should consider cleaning it? キョ コ すそ cuff; hem; foot of mountain.

basket

The only cage that can keep a dragon is made of bamboo.

2127

瑠 斑 弄

2128

玩

toy

2129

畏

apprehensive

2130

痩

lose weight

2125 2126

2133

痕 瞭 眉

2134

窟

2131 2132

2135 2136

裾 篭・籠

2137

箸

2138

綻

2140

舷 蜂

2141

罵

2139

cavern

Bamboo, lovedoll: At dinner, my lovedoll decided to eat her meal the Japanese way using chopsticks. But well, what a problems she had getting those bamboo shoots into her mouth (which should not be that difficult, I would say!). chopsticks Even though his costume is coming apart at the seams as he chases the bad guys, come apart at the seams Spiderman is still determined to catch them. The gunwale is perhaps the most mysterious part of a boat for it is neither a gun nor a whale. gunwale bee

insult

2143

戴 謎

2144

誰

who

2145

詣

visit a shrine

2142

2146 2147

諦 詮

accept humbly

A bee is an insect with a pointy (see summit (#1562)) stinger. In ancient Japan, the most grievous insult was to poke a rival´s horse in the eye (consider how rare an expensive a steed was in those days). It was the final step in preparation for a duel to the death. At Thanksgiving, it’s uncommon for people to accept humbly the food: most people just dig in.

renunciation

Words meant to lead you astray are those of a riddle. Do you remember that song where they say "Who let the turkeys out!? Gobble.. gobble.. gobble"? To fat, effete Japanophiles (cheerily munching on 肉まん in the back of the tour bus) hearing the words of the tour guide "Now we will visit a shrine" elicits squeals of joy. "Oooooh, how absolutely delicious!". The words of the sovereign king inspire the people: never give up! Never surrender! Okay...maybe it wasn´t a king.

elucidate

Words that tell you the results of the whole story really elucidate.

riddle

#

kanji

keyword

2148

貌

countenance

2149

貼

post a bill

koohiiStory1 Anyone who watched a looney tunes cartoon know those kind of scene : pepe embraces a poor kitty mistaken for a SKUNK and the smell of pepe make the unfortunate girl loose all countenance : she turns WHITE then runs as fast as her LEGS can carry her . So much for cat s dignity and countenance. Fortune teller writes your fortune on a piece of paper and tells you to affix it to a shell and throw into the ocean for it to come true. Picture licking the back of the shell like a stamp and affixing it to the fortune. It might sound simple to bribe someone, but then you have to graft the guy above him and the guy below him, and soon you´re just giving shells to each and everyone!

2150

賂

graft

2151

蹴

kick

2152

酎

hooch

2153 2154

醒 麺

awakening noodles

2156

鍋 鍵

2157

闇

pitch dark

2158

頓

immediate

2159

頃

about that time

2160

頬・頰

2155

2161 2162

顎 餌

pot key

cheek chin

The soccer player was concerned that his peg leg would affect his ability to kick. While the keyword is "hooch", this usually means 焼酎. It has similar effect as whiskey and sniffing glue has: you get intoxicated. On awakening the first thing I notice is a (nearly empty) whiskey bottle by my bed. Then I see the stars are still shining. “I think I’ll go back to sleep and try awakening again later.”. #NAME? A gruesome kind of cauldron that Snape might have used is a metal pot in the shape of a skull. The metal thing you need in order to enter things you build is a key. I like to think of a horror movie where the protagonists enter a graveyard when suddenly their flashlights go out and it becomes pitch dark, whereupon they hear the sound of the gate creaking shut behind them. Ever chopped the head off an earthworm? Notice how it will grow back immediately! Beware the killer earthworms... An alarm clock with a unique design: You set it for, say, 7:00 am, and at about that time the clock reaches out with a spoon and hits you on the head. Your cheeks contain your jawbones, which are known as the "scissors of the head.". Your chin is the part of your head under your nostrils that forms the double snare that is your jaw.

mochi

Food made of ears is animal feed. Call your friend and he answers the phone "Mochi, mochi!" whatever he is eating sure is making it hard to understand. I will puzzle over the content of our conversation for some time to come.

foot of a mountain

Many deer can be found in the grove at the foot of a mountain.

feed

2164

餅 麓

2165

冥

Hades

The beast of hades one day will wear a crown, and the number of the beast is 666.

2166

挫

sprain

I sprained my fingers when I sat in meditation (by sitting in a strange position).

go upstream

You decide to go salmon fishing, so you ride a mountain goat to the top of the road. Under the light of the moon, as it's illegal, you catch the salmon going upstream.

bracing

The St Bernard is bracing itself for an operation requiring four stitches.

uprising

An erection can shoot like a needle from its crown and has the power to make a child.

2163

2168

遡 爽

2169

勃

2167

donburi

koohiiStory1 The remains consisted of a skeleton which had the remains of some acorns in its stomach area. Whether it died from eating the acorns remains to be seen. Your half-uncle is leading a parade of your relatives. (Note: 上 + 小 makes up part of "uncle" 叔, so I´ve called it "half-uncle".). A little one is eating a domburi while standing over, looking down into, a WELL. He drops it, and it falls down & down until it looks like nothing more than a DROP, landing at the bottom of the well!

capital suburbs

People aside, I wonder how many rice fields there are in the capital suburbs.

#

kanji

keyword

2170

骸

remains

2171

戚

relatives

2172 2173

丼 畿

stationery

1) I hold a roll of quarters in my hand when I make a fist. 2) I hold a quarter in my hand as I prepare to play the Iron Fist Tournament: 鉄拳 （てっけん） at the arcade. The maestro lives on top of a large hill so that he can play music at over ten decibels without anyone giving a damn. If you arrive with two swords at the city walls, expect some interrogatives before they´ll let you in. Note: the spelling should be stationery (= paper, office supplies), not stationary (= not moving). The error is in the original book.

glossary

People who read the glossary are mutually exclusive (exclude the top line of mutually (#757) ) from those who eat crowned fruit イ はりねずみ same kind 語彙.

2174

拳

fist

2175

阜

large hill

2176

那

interrogative

2177

箋・䇳

2179

彙 嗅

2180

喩・喻

2181

訃

2178

2187

楷 諧 錮 恣 惧 憬

2188

拉

2182 2183 2184 2185 2186

block letters

Your mouth stinks: you need to sniff your breath. Metaphorically speaking, all the equipment in your mouth is basically just a meeting of butchers, designed to pulverize whatever meat you put in there. Obituary. As a famous man lay dying, the media were already preparing the words of his obituary until a magician, with a wave of his wand, restored the man back to health. Block letters (as opposed to cursive) are rigid and lifeless like wood; they're all the same size so that all can read them.

orderliness

To have orderliness, your words must be in all the right places.

weld

You weld metal in the knowledge that it will harden again.

selfish

A selfish person doesn't care about the next person's heart, only their own.

disquieting

My mind found the tool disquieting.

hanker yank

My mind hankers for sunrise over the capital. He quickly yanked his fingers out of the vase. Maybe no one noticed the attempt to steal the cookies...

arrogance

He showed his arrogance as he poured dirt on those who tried to emulate him.

trail

A trail of destruction is left by pirates and religion invaders. THREAD, DOTH. fine THREADS DOTH make fine cloth. Think of a Shakespearean character stating this to someone else. Picture fine threads on one side of the picture and an aftershot of a fine cloth. Even more valuable and perfect (完璧) than a holed gem is a delicious meatball (ball = たま = 玉) with ketchup. Yum! When you clasp something you tenaciously 執 hold on to it with your hand 手, te. 真摯、しんし, sincerity, earnestness.

sniff metaphor

obituary

2190

傲 踪

2191

緻

fine

2192

璧

holed gem

2193

摯

clasp

2189

#

kanji

keyword

2194

貪

covet

2195

慄

shudder

2196

辣

bitter

2197

瘍

carbuncle

2198

哺

suckle

2199

鬱

gloom

2200

羞

humiliate

koohiiStory1 Whatever you covet at the moment (now), can be bought with money. Well, _almost_ anything.... Shudder. If chestnut trees were sentient, shudder would be their state of mind as the tree shaker approaches. Note: Tree shakers are used commercially to harvest nuts and cider apples. A tree shaker makes a tree shudder causing all the ripe chestnuts to fall. The bitter taste was so awful that I put whole bundle of spice in my mouth to get rid of it. His sickness caused numerous carbuncles, which when emptied by the doctors also emptied his piggy bank. The scaredy-cat soldier puts his dog tags in his mouth and suckles them nervously. It sounds like he's a suckling infant. The pixie, wearing a tin can crown, watches from the middle of the grove, the sparkling villain approach. She sits down in gloom wondering if she belongs amongst the trees, for she has never seen such a beautiful shape. The sheep had his coat shaven in the winter and a sign of th cow branded on him. How humiliating.