#mnemonics

Challenge #04847-M098: Mnemonic Intervention

Their plumage was red, black, and yellow. Beings thought they were either venomous, or poisonous. But they've never heard of the false coral snake, or other such pretenders. -- Anon Guest

"Red then yellow, kills a fellow. Red then black, venom lack." -- Terran Mnemonic.

It's rather shocking that truly dangerous creatures bear the same rough colour scheme. So it was no shock that the dangerous things became marked in a similar fashion... and then dangerous people. The code was well established by the time P'rrti entered the greater Galactic Alliance concourse. Ze was new to this world, and initially thought people were respecting hir space as a Havenworlder.

Until someone asked the question, "Are you venomous or poisonous to touch?"

Couldn't think of anything I learned this past week to share, so here are some mnemonics for hiragana characters I've had for a while:

1. せ (se) - sounds like: sedative; looks like a needle being administered to someone's arm.

Bear with me while I try to draw this. -.-"

2. つ (tsu) - A common mnemonic for this is that it looks like a tsunami wave. However, I also like that it looks like the letter U, so you can say "It's U shaped!" ("t's U" = tsu).

Credit: Flaticon (wave icon)

3. け (ke) - This one takes a bit more knowledge. "Kendo" is a Japanese sport of fencing usually with bamboo swords (Merriam Webster).

"Kenjutsu" is another term you may hear in anime, which refers to sword techniques (e.g. "Sasuke Uchiha is skilled in kenjutsu."). The character, け looks like a sword and its sheath.

Going to try sharing some mnemonics I've learned or found every week.

For this week, I'll go with some Chinese characters (Hanzi)

Note: I'll tag #kanji & #hanzi in posts where the characters share the same meaning in both languages.

I've been practicing Mandarin passively on Busuu, and I've started to recognize a few characters and can even read some super basic sentences.

学 = xué (to study)

Reminds me of the classic lightbulb (new idea!) element in cartoons/comics.

I also find it kinda cool that 学生 (student) is literally "study life" (生 meaning "life" or "born," it's usually paired with life/growth related words).

A common mnemonic I see for 生 is that it looks like a tree with leafless branches. Trees often represent or have ties to the concept of life in mythology.