Know Your Picture Characters Entry #12
A. 北 B. 西 C. 東 D. 南
A. 上 B. 下 C. 左 D. 右
Okay, so there wasn’t much challenge in the first part of the challenge this week. You all figured out that the cardinal directions were on top. But it seems I haven’t completely lost my touch, because none of you were able to pick out North. Shirley was the closest, briefly considering A, the correct choice, before being lured away by the subtle, intoxicating stuff going on at the very top of B, which in fact points due West. We can also give her some credit for identifying A and B of the second line as up and down, respectively. A Fan and Dragon, meanwhile, fearing the cold winds of the North, fled South to D and took refuge beneath its all-encompassing roof. If A Fan had known a little more about Hokkaido, he might have remembered that its name is written with character A, thus providing him with a key clue. And Dragon has learned that it is not “x,” nor “squished t” that marks the spot, but, er, . . . “capital H that has been ripped down the middle and flipped inside out . . . with a couple extra lines.” C, the East, unlike it is every year in the world of U.S. sports, was completely ignored.
Oh, and Bottom C is left and Bottom D is right, but as Shirley pointed out, they’re not really important anyway.
Since it went pretty well last time, this week we will be taking a look once more at animals. These ones are going to be somewhat more exotic, because this time my source is the Chinese Zodiac, or as we refer to it in Japanese, the jûnishi. Just for reference, the twelve animals involved are rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, sheep, monkey, rooster, dog, and boar. While you’re free to attempt to identify the entire zoo, the specific challenge is to pick out the tiger, far and away the best of the lot.
A. 猪 B. 兎 C. 龍 D. 虎 E. 鼠 F. 羊 G. 蛇
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6 Comments »
July 5th, 2010 at 10:38 am
I’m going to have to go with E. On the box on the top that obviously serves as its head, there’s a little bump that could represent one of those pointy cat ears. It’s kind of hard to tell what’s going on under the head, but it looks as if the tiger may have put itself in a crouching position. Obviously, the ancient Japanese made the tiger crouch because they liked that movie. It does make me curious as to how they managed the dragon, though.
July 5th, 2010 at 11:53 am
Seeeing as I have no idea about this one, I can feel free to participate. I’m going with C because all of those little horizontal lines give the impression of stripes.
July 6th, 2010 at 7:32 am
F., because it is the least elaborate, but still has stripes. The Japanese didn’t need to over do this one. A tiger is a tiger.
July 6th, 2010 at 3:17 pm
D looks the most like a tiger, crouched to spring, every sense intently focused on it’s helpless prey. What immortal hand or eye could frame that fearful symmetry? Wait! Symmetry? The most symmetrical is F, and it does have stripes. Still, it’s a bit of a stretch to think the ancient Japanese would be influenced by an early nineteenth century English poet. Can’t be F.
The other thing that I wonder about is what WW means by “far and away the best of the lot”. The lot of animals? Of the characters? Or does he mean the constellations in the Chinese zodiac? If it’s the characters, what is the criteria? Of the 7 I find C the most aesthetically pleasing. (Somebody stop me before I get carried away.) OK, I still like D.
That was fun.
July 7th, 2010 at 10:41 am
Looking up the years associated with each animal of the Chinese zodiac might help explain why this particular source considers the tiger to be the best of the lot.
July 8th, 2010 at 10:39 am
Dragon,I always knew you are brilliant. Great idea. I googled Chinese zodiak and, wow, why don’t we humans just move over and let tigers take over? (But I still don’t want to meet one when I’m alone in a jungle.) Who knew?