su-ki, su-ku, kono-mu, kō Suki means “be fond of” and “like.” “Watashi wa anata ga suki” means “I like you.” The subject “watashi wa” means “I” but if you think this expression is too exaggerated, you can remove the subject and say, “anata ga suki” meaning “I like you.” In fact, Japanese people often forget [...]

nō, Noh When we studied “kan bun,” the Chinese classics, at school, we learned to interpret this character as a modal verb. It means “can.” In classical Japanese, there used to be a word meaning “cannot” with this character, that is, atawazu. The ata of atawazu is today’s character and has the same function as [...]

fumi, bun, mon A friend of mine is Chinese. Her name has this character, which reads “wen.” We usually read this character “bun.” Bun means text or a sentence. To write a sentence is “bun wo kaku.” To write sentences is “bunshō wo kaku.” Shō means a chapter. Chinese writings are kanbun. Bunmatsu means the [...]

naka, chū, jū The inside of something is “something no naka.” For example, the inside of a box is hako no naka. Hako is a box. No is joshi (a particle). We use the particle, no, to combine two nouns. The latter belongs to the former. The center is chūshin or chūō. Both shin and [...]

ji, aza A letter, number, symbol, or character you write is ji 字 or moji in Japanese. A pictorial symbol is emoji. An emoticon is called kaomoji. The kao of kaomoji is a face. One’s last name is myōji. Here in this blog, we are putting the number of strokes. Strokes or the structure of [...]

ki, ke   Considering the word, qi, is in some English dictionaries (e.g. here), perhaps, the Chinese qi is better known than the Japanese ki. I believe they are the same meaning. Kanji has its origin in China. It was introduced into Japan in the fourth century. There are some compounds using this character, and [...]

haru, shun From today, we are going to show you four seasons. Let’s begin with haru, that is, spring. The spring on the lunar calendar is roughly from January to March. Although most Japanese people are not familiar with the lunar calendar any more, they know hatsuharu means the New Year. The hatsu means a [...]