I have two favourites XD　

写真　　(shashin, photograph)　　　　　　　　　　　　　　大食い (oogui, glutton)

The first one because I use it so often. My bf says I could be really annoying about shashin. :p
The second one because you can make so much funny stuff with it. Like 犬食い or　太食い.

It is true that you will have problems reading newspapers, magazines, legal papers, etc. if you haven't mastered nearly all of the 常用漢字. This is why many Japanese kids work hard to learn them by the time they graduate from high school. They do so not because the government or schools tell them to, but because they just KNOW that kanji are unavoidable.

In our private lives, however, where we are communicating with friends and family, we tend to slack off and use slightly less kanji than we actually know. We do so on purpose. This may be the difference between Japanese and Chinese. We can always resort to using the kana where situations call for 'casualness'. To me, anrakushi's use of 未だ or 彼処　looks pretty ...hmm.. academic, especially the latter. And I'm not even that young (I've lived nearly half a century), either. Those words look unusually formal written with kanji mainly because their meanings aren't that 'important'. But then as anrakushi and MMM know, we wil never write a whole passage in kana. That will only kill our own eyes and hinder communiaction. So we will find a balance somewhere.

So the government can set up guidelines, but it can't come into your home and watch how you write anything.

Well, given that we only have one writing system in Chinese, we don't have much of a choice :mtongue:

Ok, fine, some will argue, but MOST of us are brought up in either Traditional or Simplified, so thats what we are stuck with

How about some simple ones for the biginners on JF?

山　（やま） = mountain　

川　（かわ） = river

人　（ひと） = person

月　（つき） = moon

Don't these kanji look like what they mean? At least the first two or three? These are among the ones learned in the first grade.

One of my favorites has to be:

物理

Pronounced "butsuri." It means Physics. The characters roughly translate to principle of objects, which is why I like it. The word "Physics" in English comes from Greek, if I'm not mistaken, which makes it harder to know the meaning of the word without looking up its root. For Japanese, the meaning is right in front of you!

I also like it because I have a huge interest in Physics.

Here's the Fun Trio.


木　（き） = Tree

林　（はやし） = Woods

森　（もり） = Forest

Logical, isn't it? The second one is also the family name for YOSHIKI of X-JAPAN...in case you're a fan.

I've been away for awhile and came back to find this nice thread.
It'd be great for learner's if all those kanji came with yomikata and romaji.

The word I like is:
龍 (ryu, dragon)

because it looks and sounds grand and powerful.

おんな
女
woman, female :D
I really do like this kanji as it is simple and not "squared", and maybe because I still have some trouble in writing it as it should...

Then I find funny these ones:
姦
noisy (sorry girls, I'm not a male chauvinist, just find it funny)

嬲る
tease, make fun of
note: 男 means man, male

PS: if you're beginner (like me) and studying japanese go for firefox and add Rikaichan, I find it great.

Oh, I know another one. XD

安い　　　cheap

Good one, Katja!

That's better than:

高い　（たかい）　＝　expensive