The correct answer was F, though not because it’s a dollhouse.  I could tell you where the character for mother comes from, but it could be seen as somewhat vulgar, and besides, the picture’s sideways anyway.  The television is the character for older brother, the frazzled aerial means younger brother, and the Boy Scout weenie roast means father.  The two similar-looking ones are, appropriately enough, older sister and younger sister (B and C, respectively).  200 points to everyone who participated, and 153 to everyone who didn’t.

But now let’s move on to your next challenge.  I was recently reminded that several friends of mine just finished their first year of med school.  So let’s see if you’re up on your anatomy.  Can you pick out the nose?  Don’t worry, it’s as plain as . . . whew, just caught myself there.

A. 顎　B. 頭　C. 顔　D. 口　E. 鼻　F. 耳　G. 目

The animals were, in order: dog, cow (or ox), horse, monkey, bird, and cat.

犬　牛　馬　猿　鳥　猫

Now for the scoring.  Fifty points each to Shirley and Dragon for being on the right track (last time I checked, horses also have four legs and a tail).  A Fan gets 100 points for poking fun at his brother and making obscure song references, plus another hundred for his three guesses.  Then he goes into the double bonus for saying that E was a dinosaur (because, as we all know, dinosaurs evolved into birds), with a triple word score for identifying cat as dog and vice versa.  Unfortunately, the system is not capable of calculating so many points all at once, so he has been reset to 1.

But anyway, time for this week’s challenge, which is on the family.  Since yesterday was Mother’s Day, pick the character for “mother” out of this lineup of family members.

A. 兄　B. 姉　C. 妹　D. 弟　E. 父　F. 母

And the answer is . . . C!  Here are the days of the week in the correct order, starting with Sunday:

日　月　火　水　木　金　土

The days in Japanese, rather than being named after the sun, the moon, and various ancient European deities, are named after the sun, the moon, and the classical Chinese elements.  They are fire (Tuesday), water (Wednesday), wood (Thursday), metal (Friday), and earth (Saturday).

We hereby award 10 MWP’s to A Fan for having the most creative answer, 3 to Dragon for using logic in a situation where there’s no reason to expect it to work, and 2 to Shirley for knowing how to pick her ponies.

And speaking of ponies, this week’s challenge is animals.  Since most of my readers have at least some experience with dogs, let’s see if you can pick the dog out from this lineup.  Bonus points to anyone who wants to try to guess what the other animals are (yes, they’re all animals).

A. 犬　B. 牛　C. 馬　D. 猿　E. 鳥　F. 猫

And the long-awaited answer is . . . F!  Here are the numbers four through ten in the proper order:

四　五　六　七　八　九　十

We hereby award one (1) MWP (Meaningless Wordsman Point) apiece to A Fan, Shirley, and Gramma F, because this is a game where you get points not for getting the right answer but for justifying your guess.  Thanks to all who participated.

Before we move on from numbers, I’d just like to point out that kanji are always out to get you, even the simplest-looking ones.  The numbers that I am using here, and which anyone would learn in a first-year Japanese class, are in fact simplified forms, meaning that they have more complex versions that are used in formal documents.  One and two may be easy to recognize when they’re just one or two horizontal lines, but how about when they look like this?

壱（１）　弐（２）　参（３）

But now let’s proceed to another basic task: identifying the days of the week.  Just as in English, in Japanese the days of the week follow a simple pattern, varying the beginning but all ending in the same way.  Rather than ending in “-day,” however, they all end with this:

曜日

And let me tell you, as a freshman just starting to learn Japanese, that first character really made me wonder what I was getting myself into.  Fortunately, none of the characters that actually differentiate the days are anywhere near that complicated.  So here’s this week’s challenge: since today is Monday, tell me which of these characters is placed in front of the two shown above to mean “Monday.”  And remember: points for creativity.

A. 火　B. 金　C. 月　D. 水　E. 土　F. 日　G. 木

Since Monday is the official day for experimentation around here, I thought I’d try something new.  This project is a little different than the other ones I’ve done so far, and without reader participation it’s not going to be any fun at all, so I may have to give it up after a few weeks.  Also, I will warn you right up front: it may be mildly educational.  So, with that in mind, let’s proceed.

A true wandering wordsman must wander not only among the words of his native tongue but those of other languages as well.  All languages are connected, and there are few better examples of this fact than the use of kanji characters in Japanese.  These pictographs were originally developed in China, but they found their way across the sea to Japan, and now all Japanese writing consists of either these symbols or other characters that were derived from them (except for things written with the Roman alphabet).

Now, you might think that, while Japanese is obviously linked to Chinese, this oriental language can’t possibly be all that connected to English.  But everyone who’s ever drunk a Kamikaze, and every tycoon who’s ever had a factory destroyed by a typhoon or tsunami, should know better.  And we know about kanji, too.  We see them in martial arts movies, and on countless tattoos.  But let’s see if we can’t learn a thing or two about what they mean.

We’ll start with something easy: counting to ten.

The kanji character for the number one is the simplest there is.  It’s a single horizontal line.  It looks like this:

一

For two, we add a second line, and get this:

二

And I’m guessing no one will be too shocked to discover that three turns out like this:

三

So now you’ve got the pattern.  Unfortunately, this is where they decide to pull the rug out from under your feet.  The number four isn’t four horizontal lines, and none of the other numbers up to ten follow any easily recognizable pattern.

Okay, here’s the audience participation section.  Which of the following characters do you think represents the number four?  Put your guesses in the comments section.  And remember, there’s no prize for getting it right, so don’t bother looking it up.

A. 九　B. 五　C. 十　D. 七　E. 八　F. 四　G. 六

The answer will be revealed next week.