早

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early

On-Yomi: ソウ、サッ — Kun-Yomi: はや.い、はや、はや-、はや.まる、はや.める、さ-

Elements:

early, sunflower, sun, day, ten, needle

Heisig story:

This kanji is actually a picture of the first flower of the day, which we shall, in defiance of botanical science, call the sunflower, since it begins with the element for sun and is held upon a stem with leaves (the pictographic representation of the final two strokes). This time, however, we shall ignore the pictograph and imagine sunflowers with needles for stems, which can be plucked and used to darn your socks. The sense of early is easily remembered if one thinks of the sunflower as the early riser in the garden, because the sun, showing favoritism towards its namesake, shines on it before all the others (see frame 10).

Heisig comment:

* As a primitive element, this kanji takes the meaning of sunflower, which was used to make the abstract key word early more graphic.

Koohii stories:

1) [sutebun] 2-7-2007(290): The sun up is early, well before ten.

2) [Christine_Tham] 21-7-2007(34): An early sun-flower looks like a miniature sun perched on a needlelike stems.

3) [Biserka] 24-1-2009(32): EARLY, is when you have to start your day before 10..

4) [Katerine] 7-5-2009(16): The sun rises early - before ten.

5) [bshug] 28-9-2009(7): Sun flower blossom early.

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