Sunday, February 3, 2008

The Most Important Things That You Need To Know Before Getting Japanese Kanji Symbols For Kanji Tattoo Designs


Pictured: FAG Motors in Kanagawa, an example of what can happen when you don`t know what you are writing in another language. Let`s be careful out there! Photo courtesy
of Chris Zanella

The Most Important Things That You Need To Know Before Getting Japanese Kanji Symbols For Kanji Tattoo Designs

by: Jun Yamamoto


The Most Important Things That You Need To Know Before Getting Japanese Kanji Symbols For Kanji Tattoo Designs

Today, thousands of people from western countries such as USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and from most of European countries have already some Japanese Kanji symbols tattooed into their skin. In other interesting cases, the Japanese Kanji symbols are often placed on cards, cars, motorcycles, and other personal things to express their uniqueness. Most of those people are eager to find a way of having one, or information about the Japanese Kanji symbols.

For those who have considered themselves more unique than others, or who want to stand out from the crowd, having a tattoo designed with the Japanese Kanji symbols seems to be one of the best solutions for them, because of the fact that the Japanese Kanji symbols have three distinctive features; form, sound, and meaning. Kanji is a set of ideographic alphabets which represents concepts and ideas, by which you can easily put your thoughts and ideas in the Kanji symbols used. This is why Kanji tattoos have gotten so popular among unique people all over the world.

With a Kanji tattoo, you can express how unique and special you are considering these features of Kanji symbols mentioned above. When having your name, a word or phrase translated into Kanji symbols, therefore, it is extremely important to choose accurate and appropriate ones that convey the meaning you wish to express with the Kanji tattoo.

Why am I saying this here? Because I have seen so many people who unfortunately have wrongly-put Kanji symbols tattooed, or have them tattooed upside down in their skin! I really want you to avoid this kind of situation. Also, beware of picking wrong Kanji symbols scattered across the Web, and some of the Japanese name generators that you can access for free, which may only cost you in the end.

In order for you to avoid this situation, I would strongly recommend consulting with a native speaker of Japanese who has a solid knowledge of the Japanese Kanji system. Based on my research on this subject, Your-Name-In-Japanese.com would be the best solution to this. Mr. Ken Suzuki, the operator of this site, is a native speaker of Japanese, and has been a reliable Japanese translator for many years. In case you decided to create a Kanji tattoo on your own, it is always safer for you have a Japanese translator check the Kanji symbols you are going to use, or consult a reliable resource like “The Image Dictionary of 500 Japanese Symbols for Creative People.”

Either way, just be sure to have the Kanji symbols that you are going to use for your tattoo checked by a professional Japanese translator.

Jun Yamamoto

About The Author
Jun Yamamoto is a professional translator (from English to Japanese) for many years, and is based in Tokyo, Japan. For more information about the article, please visit http://Your-Name-In-Japanese.com.