剣（けん）：sword
あなたのため、私の剣はこの世界を指される。:vsign:

I think that the reason behind this can be the chinese writting reform that simplified a lot of characters. I know that Japanese undergo similar reform but as far as I know not so simplifying as the Chinese one. That may be the reason, why the Chinese used 加 and the Japanese 嘉, donť you think?

off-topic
the simplification of chinese symbols got its breakthrough with the newly established communist government in mainland china in the 50's and the 60's. by simplifying the characters it was easier to spread the propaganda from bejing. that's why the symbol used in hong-kong, taiwan, vietnam ect. may be different.

not at all correct i believe. both 加 and 嘉 exist in Chinese and Japanese. they have different meanings.
The chinese dictionary i checked lists:
加 - add to, increase, augment
嘉 - excellent; joyful; auspicious
the Japanese one:
加 - add; addition; increase; join; include; (also Canada)
嘉 - applaud; praise; esteem

roughly the same meaning in both languages.

@ blimp, the simplification was done to increase the terrible literacy rate found in mainland china. it was believed with simplified characters the language would become easier for a greater number of people to learn to read and write. it has later been shown in more recent studies (from hong kong) that the simplified system has little benefit over the traditional system.

lol :D theres no kanji for rock (the genre) is there?

I'm quite sure, that there is not. It is written in katakana ロック (rokku) as all the other words that come from English (there are loads of english words in contemporary Japanese)

Anrakushi - you are probably right. It was just an idea....

[quote=Doutas;474198]I'm quite sure, that there is not. It is written in katakana ロック (rokku) as all the other words that come from English (there are loads of english words in contemporary Japanese)
QUOTE]

You are right. It's always written ロック　in katakana.

・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・

夢　（ゆめ）　Dream

悪夢　（あくむ） Nightmare

Found these on my Kanji book and simply liked them.
玄 gen
dark, black, abstruse; heaven, quiet
幻 gen, maboroshi
vision, phantom
弦 gen, tsuru
string (for musical instruments), bowstring, chord

I've been away for a while, pretty sure no one noticed though. Either way, good to be back.

人々 ひとびと people, everybody
日々 ひび everyday, daily
時々 ときどき sometimes, at times
方々 ほうぼう here and there, this way and that way
我々 われわれ we, us

The second symbol goes by a few names, 漢字返し (かんじがえし)、 同の字点 (どうのじてん)、 or のま. I'm not sure which is it's actual name, but I'm sure it's commonly known as のま. It's purpose is to repeat the kanji before it, but it doesn't sound exactly the same. It's not something I'm able to explain, hopefully one of the greats here can shed some light on it.

The first three I hear somewhat often, he fourth I think I've heard once before, never had a good opportunity to use it myself. The fifth is archaic, I believe, I only hear it in TV shows, games and some anime, usually stuff based in feudal Japan. I like hearing 我々は... and so forth. Probably not something to be used in conversation, at least not serious ones.

There's a basic rule to the change in the starting consonant of the second half of the word. You simply 'voice' the consonat when it's voiceable. By 'voicing', I naturally don't mean it in the English sense, but in the Japanese sense where you add 濁点　（゛） to a kana. This is seen in your own examples right away.

ひと　＞＞　びと
ひ　　＞＞　び
とき　＞＞　どき
ほう　＞＞　ぼう

われ　＞＞　stays the same because there's no 'voiced' form of 'w'.

There are some exceptions to this rule as in:

深々　＝　しんしん　（never pronounced しんじん） = describes the sound of snow
燦々　＝　さんさん　（never pronounced さんざん） = describes the brightness of sunshine

Finally, we actually use both 方々and　我々quite often. Adults use these words considerably more often than kids/teenagers. As for 我々, males use it more often than females.