to: tiangotlost@gmail.com
date: Fri, Sep 17, 2010 at 8:42 AM
subject: My tattoo..
Hey hi Tian.. stumbled over ur blog so thought i should hav my tattoo meaning verified.. I asked the artist to put the my birth date that is 24..
I would appreciate ur feedback..
Thanks
Pb..
The bottom character does not exist in Chinese or Japanese vocabulary.
肆 is used as four (banker's anti-fraud numeral)
It does seem that 䦉 is a variant of 肆.
ReplyDeletehttp://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E4%A6%89
(Not everyone will be able to see the character up there, though.)
I thought it would be a variant character as well... but why would you tattoo "24" on your body anyways....
ReplyDeleteIs the way the top character is written acceptable? Its almost like its split into 2 unlike the original 贰 which seems taking liberties even for 行书. But overall this could be much, much worse.
ReplyDelete@Anonymous-
ReplyDeleteWhy, indeed?
And why the need for these extraordinarily complicated anti-fraud numbers? Why not the normal, understandable 二十四? Is he afraid that someone will attack him in the middle of the night with a tattoo needle and alter his numbers?
I think we have the makings of a mystery thriller here.
When people want an Asian language tattoo, they want them to look cool, and in their jargon it means "complicated". There was this guy who asked me about his girlfriend's name in Japanese so that he could tattoo that. And I wrote the katakana name, he said: "This doesn't look good". The point is 二十四 don't look as elaborate to them as, say 弐拾四 (the Japanese Anti-fraud variant, because I couldn't type the Chinese version)
ReplyDeleteThe reason for complexity most likely stems from westerns wanting "some pretty chinese words" written in calligraphy style. No offence, I understand and agree that complicated characters look way better than the normal, everyday stuff. As long as means the same thing there's no problem. My brother's friend got his (now ex) girlfriend's name 'zoe' tatooed on his arm. Only there is no way it says Zoe. Of course, writing Zoe in katakana is way too boring as a tatoo apparently.
ReplyDeleteI agree with anonymous #2.