Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo?

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - Printable Version

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Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - kolkim - 2011-12-30

I am getting a tattoo with these 7 words but I know that there are different Kanji words for the same word as well as different languages of Kanji.
I am wondering if these are the best choices of those words and if those words are artistically correct.
If there is a better way to write a certain word please tell me.
I hope this link works
http://s795.photobucket.com/albums/yy237/kolkim/?action=view&current=Tattoos.png

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - Zgarbas - 2011-12-30

The first one is the Kanji for the emperor of Japan...do you want "a ｇod"? That's 神
The second one is indeed respect...sort of...It's the kind of respect as in "respectfully yours" at the end of a letter. What kind of respect are you aiming for? I think 敬慕 would fit with the rest
Fourth means carefulness。。。faithful as in religious? faithful as in devoted? faithful as in a loyal servant?
wealth, Karma and family are ok
Last one is, technically, a word for soldier...but only a low-ranking one. Kinda like "private", sort of. Go with 兵

It's good that you decided to have it checked!　But the word combo spells out a particularly regretful gangsta tattoo.

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - EratiK - 2011-12-30

Well, it depends, do you want your tatoo to be in modern Japanese, or in old Chinese (different font)? If it's modern Japanese, 家族 (kazoku) might be better for family imo. No need to tell you you should all do them in the same style too. Also, you might want a sentence better, for example, there are a lot of kanji idioms like 酔生夢死 (more on
http://www.kanjizone.com/fourkanjiidiom.aspx?category=All
) instead of a long list of characters (without grammar that looks like Chinese).

Lastly, I don't know if you plan to live in Asia some day, but know that a god of death or a yokai or a ukiyoe will earn you more respect than a sentence looking like you hadn't had a pen so you had to tattoo it instead (memento style).
Sorry I couldn't help more, I'm still not super fluent.

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - temporary - 2011-12-30

Please, don't do this to yourself. You'll regret it. I know I'm not your mother; I'm one of those who'd laugh at you if we met on the street. Just sayin'.

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - Harpagornes - 2011-12-30

I'll second temporary and warn you against this project. If however you must get a tattoo...

Check it out with people who are fluent (native speaker level) in both Chinese and Japanese before going ahead with this project. Depending on the language, the nuances may be different. I am no expert, but as Zgarbas pointed out, this looks looks like the sort of thing a low ranking gangster would adorn him/herself with.

Think about it very hard and for a long time before committing myself. Why do you want this particular design anyway?

You may want to check an earlier thread about tattoos here. It points out some of the implications tattoos carry in East Asia as well as carrying pictures of custom designed tattoos from a studio in Hong Kong.

http://forum.koohii.com/showthread.php?tid=8754&page=1

You may also want to pay a visit to the Hanzismatter site (which I mentioned in the previous thread) to see what native speakers think of some particularly unfortunate Kanji tattoos. At least you are making enquiries. That's good. A tattoo after all lasts a lifetime.

EDIT: This website documents common mistakes that Westerners make with Chinese character tattoos, as well as offering a service providing correct stencils. The more research, the better

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - yudantaiteki - 2011-12-30

If you want to get a a tattoo that seems like something a half-literate Yakuza would get, it looks fine to me.

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - Evil_Dragon - 2011-12-30

Do yourself a favor and don't put something on your body that you can't even read.

Also, I'll just leave this here..

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - Tzadeck - 2011-12-30

Hopefully you're not actually getting these done in the fonts you posted here. It would be pretty weird to get seven characters tattooed in seven different fonts. Though, even if you do get them in the same font, tattoo artists that don't know Chinese or Japanese usually write the characters in a very ugly way.

Anyway, I only know Japanese and not Chinese, which makes it hard for me to confirm whether or not the nuances are good (sometimes people get something in Chinese that is correct, but means something funny/stupid in Japanese, or vice-versa)

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - Javizy - 2011-12-30

More people should try to imagine having the English tattooed on their arms and realising that putting it into Chinese characters doesn't make it sound any less ridiculous, and gives the added factor of looking doubly silly in front of people who can read it.

If you have to get a kanji tattoo, go with a yoji-jukugo, because it's at least going to make sense in Chinese and Japanese. Don't make your first attempt at constructing a Japanese sentence something you have permanently written on your body.

I still wouldn't trust anybody who doesn't know either language to tattoo the characters on my body though. I've seen some outright botched attempts on the street, and nothing that looked like it was done by anybody who knows what they're doing.

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - temporary - 2011-12-30

No matter how well you know, or how carefully you research the kanji, you are almost surely bound to fail. If not now then ten years later. A word may mean "courageous" now, but in ten years it gains certain sarcastic overtones and they'll only use it for "chickenshit".

Real world example: 乙(おつ) originally represents the second sign of the Chinese calendar, that's what you can read in a dictionary, that's how a Japanese person (over 30-40) would translate it, and I can imagine it as a tattoo on some superstitious chick. Unfortunately in the last decade it's meaning changed to "thanks", thanks to 2ch and the IME-s (it's short for おつかれさまです). Yes, it could be worse but still... Anyway, no one can predict these changes.

You should wait at least a year before doing it. If 12 months later you still want it... well, you really want it. I guess you are around 20; you will wear this thing for 49 years not 50. Not much loss.

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - kolkim - 2012-01-02

Zgarbas Wrote:The first one is the Kanji for the emperor of Japan...do you want "a ｇod"? That's 神
The second one is indeed respect...sort of...It's the kind of respect as in "respectfully yours" at the end of a letter. What kind of respect are you aiming for? I think 敬慕 would fit with the rest
Fourth means carefulness。。。faithful as in religious? faithful as in devoted? faithful as in a loyal servant?
wealth, Karma and family are ok
Last one is, technically, a word for soldier...but only a low-ranking one. Kinda like "private", sort of. Go with 兵

It's good that you decided to have it checked!　But the word combo spells out a particularly regretful gangsta tattoo.

Thanks alot, I still have alot of time to plan for this tattoo, It's going to be around 7-9 kanji letters with a fox on the bottom. Definately a good idea to check in first I guess. I got most of these from a tattoo website which I just read on another post here is a bad idea. I was hoping for Japanese Kanji letters but I cannot tell the difference myself.

For the first one, I didn't want god but more of a high power I guess. Not religiously though.
For respect, these are just words that mean alot to me so I meant like respect in general. I demand respect from people who ask for respect from me.
Faithful was as in a guy who will not cheat on his girlfriend Faithful.

Thanks if you can fix or change the Kanji Smile

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - kolkim - 2012-01-02

I have made some revises, most of the origins coming from this website.
http://www.orientaloutpost.com/shufa.php?q=respect&type=calligraphy

How are these?
http://s795.photobucket.com/albums/yy237/kolkim/?action=view&current=TattoosRevised.png

And I was wondering which version of Karma, and Soldier (Or Shogun) I should use?
http://s795.photobucket.com/albums/yy237/kolkim/?action=view&current=TattoosRevised.png#!oZZ2QQcurrentZZhttp%3A%2F%2Fs795.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fyy237%2Fkolkim%2F%3Faction%3Dview%26current%3D22240.gif

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - dizmox - 2012-01-02

How would it look if you saw someone with "family, respect, wealth, faithful, general" in English tattooed on them? I don't think anyone would say it's cool...

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - zigmonty - 2012-01-02

err 自尊 means self-respect... not respect.

Otherwise, what dizmox said.

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - mezbup - 2012-01-02

The other day I saw a gut with a kanji tattoo 神 (god) and I was getting ready to laugh when underneath it I saw in English "god". My point is this guy wasn't just trying to be cool or thinking an exotic kanji tattoo would be nice but he had a message that he believed in and wanted to share with the world and was willing to write it on himself in English too. He's the only guy I've ever respected with a kanji tattoo.

If you can not honestly say you would be equally as thrilled to walk around with those sale words on you in English then you aren't in a position to put them there in kanji. Kanji is a double edged sword... Words in Japanese aren't the same as they are in chinese... You will not wind up getting quite the right nuance for at least one or two, if not all of the words.

Kanji tattoos are a bad idea. Though there are some which may work and even be cool, dare I say it... this is one of those excruciatingly bad ones I see from time to time.

If it's still around on the web check out hanzismatter. Or just google botched kanji tattoos or something to that effect.

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - amillerchip - 2012-01-02

Sounds like this guy's set on getting a kanji tattoo. Wink

The worst that can happen is you end up with the western equivalent of an Engrish t-shirt slogan etched into your skin. Big Grin

This was fun: http://youoffendmeyouoffendmyfamily.com/%E2%80%9Cfucking%E2%80%9D-t-shirt-causes-controversy-for-chinese-weatherwoman/

Evil_Dragon Wrote:Also, I'll just leave this here..

Indeed

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - istel - 2012-01-02

Not sure if it's a good idea but I could provide some inputs where the Chinese nuances is somewhat different to what was written in English on TS's file.

皇帝 = Emperor, literally King among kings. 帝 is normally almost never used alone by itself for Mandarin as it's usually joined to another noun to signify that someone is the top in a certain field. It does carry the nuance of supreme being I guess...

畏 carries more of a nuance for fear than respect in Mandarin.

卒 although it means soldier but the connotation is more like pawns or grunts. In other words, very dispensable.

If you really want kanjis for tattoos, I think keeping it to a single character with crazy number of strokes might be better. Those characters with more than 40 strokes on this page http://nihonshock.com/2009/10/crazy-kanji-highest-stroke-count/ would definitely awe any Japanese or Chinese speakers you meet as they most probably wouldn't know what is its actual meaning and you could educate them on it. All the best in finding a tattoo artist who can pull this off though.

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - kolkim - 2012-01-04

dizmox Wrote:How would it look if you saw someone with "family, respect, wealth, faithful, general" in English tattooed on them? I don't think anyone would say it's cool...

It's not about what you say, but how you say it.
For this I mean its not about what you write but how you write it.
I live in Canada in an area with a very small Asian population here, I doubt many can read Kanji and I'm pretty set on getting a Kanji tattoo. These posts are making me rethink which words to get and I will make a new design with better fitting words that aren't so random with eachother.

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - kolkim - 2012-01-04

istel Wrote:皇帝 = Emperor, literally King among kings. 帝 is normally almost never used alone by itself for Mandarin as it's usually joined to another noun to signify that someone is the top in a certain field. It does carry the nuance of supreme being I guess...

If 帝 alone means supreme, could I pair it with another word like this?

http://s795.photobucket.com/albums/yy237/kolkim/?action=view&current=Supremefox.png

Would that make sense?

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - Tzadeck - 2012-01-04

Why not consider getting these 7 characters?
馬鹿
間抜け
阿呆

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - zigmonty - 2012-01-04

Ah yes, the noble horse and deer. Symbols of strength and faith going back thousands of years. Back in the day, you weren't considered a true warrior unless you had that tattooed on your forehead.

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - Inny Jan - 2012-01-04

Tzadeck Wrote:Why not consider getting these 7 characters?
馬鹿
間抜け
阿呆

I think, the OP should click on this link...

http://translate.google.com/?hl=en&tab=wT#ja|en|%E9%A6%AC%E9%B9%BF%0A%E9%96%93%E6%8A%9C%E3%81%91%0A%E9%98%BF%E5%91%86

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - SomeCallMeChris - 2012-01-04

The picture you showed doesn't make any sense in the first place.
軍狐 doesn't mean anything, it's the character for 'military' and the character for 'fox' jammed together and that's all (and if 'army fox' seems like it means something in English - and that seems ambiguous at best to me - the problem is Japanese folklore has its own quite specific connotations for foxes.)

軍 -is- pronounced 'gun' and -is- the second half of 将軍 'shogun', which is basically a compound meaning 'leader of the army', or more naturally, 'General'.

帝 is not (in Japanese at least) a prefix for 'supreme' or any such. It's not really a prefix at all, although it shows up at the beginning of many 'imperial' words. It's tempting to call it the 'imperial' prefix, but I think it's more of a root word. I don't know about in Chinese, but in Japanese it is a character that really references the Emperor of Japan specifically (well, uses in fantasy literature for fictional empires notwithstanding).

You can't just jam any two characters together because an English word associated with them sounds good - if the characters are words by themselves then you now have two random words stuck next to each other with no grammatical context. If the characters together make a word, it will be the sheerest luck if that word means what you hope it means.

You need to decide also if you're writing in Japanese, Mandarin, or Cantonese if you hope to have any sort of meaning at all. Meanings have diverged in the three languages.

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - kolkim - 2012-01-04

SomeCallMeChris Wrote:The picture you showed doesn't make any sense in the first place.
軍狐 doesn't mean anything, it's the character for 'military' and the character for 'fox' jammed together and that's all (and if 'army fox' seems like it means something in English - and that seems ambiguous at best to me - the problem is Japanese folklore has its own quite specific connotations for foxes.)

軍 -is- pronounced 'gun' and -is- the second half of 将軍 'shogun', which is basically a compound meaning 'leader of the army', or more naturally, 'General'.

帝 is not (in Japanese at least) a prefix for 'supreme' or any such. It's not really a prefix at all, although it shows up at the beginning of many 'imperial' words. It's tempting to call it the 'imperial' prefix, but I think it's more of a root word. I don't know about in Chinese, but in Japanese it is a character that really references the Emperor of Japan specifically (well, uses in fantasy literature for fictional empires notwithstanding).

You can't just jam any two characters together because an English word associated with them sounds good - if the characters are words by themselves then you now have two random words stuck next to each other with no grammatical context. If the characters together make a word, it will be the sheerest luck if that word means what you hope it means.

You need to decide also if you're writing in Japanese, Mandarin, or Cantonese if you hope to have any sort of meaning at all. Meanings have diverged in the three languages.

Thanks alot, the guy before you confused me. Would Karma Fox work?

Are these the right Kanji symbols for a Tattoo? - Jarvik7 - 2012-01-04

That depends, what is a "karma fox"?

Karma (業) basically just means "work" and isn't in itself a spiritual word when it's not used in a spiritual context. If you just slap the kanji together it will mean "WORKFOX". Note: karma usually just means BAD karma. No karma is what Buddhists seek to achieve.

Also note that foxes are untrustworthy troublemakers in traditional Japanese culture (though Inari is one of the most important gods in Shinto among agricultural types, probably because if you don't placate her she'll ruin your crops).

So if someone gets that you mean karma and not work, you will end up having a tattoo that technically means someone who is untrustworthy and sins a lot.

It's also kind of awkward to mix a Buddhist concept (karma) with something that has strong Shinto connotations (foxes).

As others have said, think about if what you want tattood would sound equally cool in English. Putting it in kanji doesn't make it +5 awesome just because none of your friends can read it.

I will second the other posters who say use a set 4-character-phrase (yojijukugo) that has a meaning that aligns with your beliefs instead of a random assortment of kanji that aren't joined up and can be taken out of context. Ex: if you want to look like a tough guy get 弱肉強食 (literally: the strong eat the weak, or survival of the fittest).