The Brain Dump

Alright, I'm gonna make it quick. I'm tired. Christina and I had to get up at 5:15 today so we could make it to a hospital in Zhengzhou (pronounced "jung-joe"), the provincial capital, so we could get examined for our residence permits before the crowd hit the hospital. So here are the doodles I learned for week two:

Monday

[mian2] - (roof), doesn't appear by itself
匕 - bi3 (ladle)
它 - ta1 (it), the top part of this is the above [mian2]
了 - le (marks verbs or sentences as "completed action" or "changed status")
子 - zi3 (child)
好 - hao3 (be good, well/consider good, like, love)
厶 - si1 (be selfish, private)

Tuesday

幺 - yao1 (coil/be immature, be tender, be little)
[si1] - (silk), the bottom half of the character below this one is si1 for silk
累 - lei4 (be tired)
彳 - chi4 (to step)
艮 - gen4 (be tough/be stubborn/be leathery/be blunt)
很 - hen3 (very)
口 - kou3 (mouth/a measure for humans)

Wednesday

灬 - huo3 (fire)
马 - ma3 (horse/a family name)
吗 - ma (marks sentences as questions and marks off subjects in sentences)
言 - yan2 (word, words/a family name)
讠 - yan2 (word, words)
隹 - zhui1 (dove)
谁 - shei2 or shui2 (Who?/Whom?)

Thursday

大 - da4 (be big)
夫 - fu1 (husband/"big man")
天 - tian1 (heaven/God/day/natural)
气 - qi4 (breath/vapors/exhalation/animus/energy/soul)
笑 - xiao4 (to laugh, smile/to ridicule)
儿 - er4 (child, son)
尢 - wang1 (be lame), or you2 (still) . . . Here's how I remember this one: I knew a kid growing up named Bobby Wang, so this is what I tell myself: "Bobby Wang is pretty lame, but you are still OK." Chinese mnemonics, sigh . . .

Friday

辛 - xin1 (be bitter/be toilsome/a family name)
幸 - xing4 (lucky)
[zhu3] - (dot), the top dot of the next character is zhu3
主 - zhu3 (lord, host/principal/to indicate)
住 - zhu4 (to live/to stay/to stop)
[shui3] - (water), the left part of the next character is [shui3]
注 - zhu4 (to comment on, annotate/to concentrate on/note, commentary/to pour into/bet, stake/a measure for business transactions or for sums of money) <---this one's loads of fun to remember.

That's it--two weeks worth of doodles. And I still can't read any signs . . .