Friday, July 2, 2021

Interesting Chinese or Kanji Words 漢字 : Complex Chinese Character "Biang" (62 strokes)

The Simplest Character in Mandarin is ("一" Yi) meaning One, and maybe the next most complex Chinese Character as below pronounced as "Biáng". The word is said to first appear as describing a type of Noodle called "Biáng Biáng Mian". And the word "Biáng" may have come from the sound of the process of how the thick, wide noodle was prepared. (There is a shop in PJ that is managed by Chinese from China that offers this noodle!)
Biangbiang noodles, alternatively known as 油潑扯麵 (油泼扯面) "Youpo Chemian" in Chinese, are a type of noodle popular in the cuisine of 中國陝西省 China's Shaanxi Province. The noodles, touted as one of the "陝西八大奇觀 Eight strange wonders of Shaanxi". The traditional Shaanxi noodle made of wheat flour, is hand rolled into wide and thick strands.



  
The Character "Biáng" is made up of "62 strokes (繁体) based on my counting (but maybe it could be 58 to 62 depending on who is counting)! But the word "Biáng" doesn’t exist in Modern Standard Mandarin which only serves to increase the mystery surrounding the character.


There are 62 strokes of the word "Biang".
The Complex word contain within it the character for

roof (宀) (拼音:Mián) (3 strokes) 3
eight (八) (拼音:Bā) (2 strokes) 5
speak (言) (拼音:Yán) (7 strokes) 12
fine silk (糸) (拼音:Bā) (12 strokes 
糸 Twice) 24
grow (長) (拼音:Mi) (16 strokes 
長 Twice) 40
horse (馬) (拼音:Zhǎng) (10 strokes) 50
heart (心) (拼音:Xīn) (4 strokes) 54
moon (月) (拼音:Yuè) (4 strokes) 58
knife (刂) (拼音:Dāo) (2 strokes) 60
walking (辶) (拼音:Chuò) (2 strokes) 62

文字考证 (Baidu)
The following 歌谣 (Ballad) probably describes the hardships of two old couple pushing their 麻糖 (Hemp Sugar ) cart towards the market in the city of 咸阳 (Xian Yang).

(一)点戳上天 (是卖面人的草帽) ,黄河两头弯(宀)
(八)字大张口,(言)官朝上走。
你一扭(幺),我一扭(幺) 
(是指车夫推车走路时左右扭动以保持独轮车平衡),一下扭了六点六()()
左一长(長),右一长(長) (是指车帮上顺搭的长面袋子), 中间夹了个马(馬)大王 (“马大王”的“马”字和字顶头的“穴”字分别代表了男,女)
(心)字底,(月)字旁,拴钩(刂)搭挂麻糖 (指的是车旁挂的麻花)
推着(辶)车车走咸阳。