I’d be remiss if I didn’t write something about the Olympics, so you get a cool kanji. Do you recognize it? You might’ve seen it if you watched Kosuke Kitajima take gold in the 100m and 200m breaststroke. In the upper right corner of the screen, most channels had this 「2冠 (にかん)」 Well, he won gold for both of those events in Athens, so you can guess the meaning from context – two in a row.

But the kanji itself has a different meaning. It’s also used in this compound – 王冠 (おうかん). It means crown, so literally he has two crowns in a row. Hmm, now that I think about it, I’m not sure that it has that “in a row” connotation, but it definitely means that he’s won two.

Kitajima’s feats have lead many to consider him perhaps the greatest breaststroker ever. *snicker*

This entry was posted on Friday, August 22nd, 2008 at 7:32 am and is filed under kanji, wordplay. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.