Hey everyone,

I'm finding the "column/going/line" primitive (the left part of the "行" kanji) too abstract to remember easily, but I couldn't find anything useful in the stories...

Has anyone found a different primitive meaning to substitute that works well?

been there the other day. There's been a story about Mr. T. holding a dish or alike. Though in the end, I just went with going and column. Depending where it fit better.

[ファブリス]

Imagine one of these. You can even make them into a character.. imagination has no limits. Or maybe by extension Greece, the colyseum .. I would not advise Mr.T + something else, because that is bound to create confusion in the long run. Mr T + something = two primitives which should be one, hence the column, otherwise Heisig could have done the same.

Hm, I see -- thanks! Perhaps I'll dig up memories from my Latin lessons then and use "Ancient Rome" as a context for the column stories.

I always imagine it as a column of soldiers marching. Seems to work.

For what it's worth, I use 'train' as the left hand primitive. Why? Well - it's related to the 'going' keyword and it's easy to make up stories with (after all, we are learning Japanese). Simple as that.

[Katsuo]

Japanese call it 行人偏 "going-person-radical". Column of soldiers (or ants) might work well. Personally, being familiar with London, I used "Nelson's column", and by extension Nelson himself when it fitted the story better.

ファブリス’s suggestion (column as in ancient Greece etc.) could work well, just note that Heisig later suggests the Acropolis as an image for 阝 (starting from no. 1294), so obviously you can only use it for one or the other.

I like anry0005's idea of "train". That's a very versatile image for making stories. It's related both to Heisig's meaning (a column of coaches) and also to the Japanese (lots of "going-people" in the train). There are no other train-related radicals or kanji elsewhere in the book (closest in meaning is no. 1984, "station"); the only drawback I can think of is that you may have to make all your own stories.

I use the movie "300" Spartans as the visual image for that primitive, but I can see how Romans Centurions are just as useful.

i (and a few others) used comic book hero The Flash for that primitive:

http://noi7.bluestatedigital.com/page/-/...flash2.jpg

Oh well... I seem to end up with a random mixture of "Lance Armstrong", "Greek column", and at least one "train".

It's not consistent, but perhaps it'll still work without consistency. This way at least I have good stories.

Katsuo Wrote:Japanese call it 行人偏 "going-person-radical".

Yeah but that names comes from the fact that it is written like にんべん with an extra line, and not because it has to do with people.

Train is a good suggestion