Chinese Characters for Music and Medicine

[emattson]

Here's an interesting tidbit I learned while visiting Boston's Chinatown during one of their Moon festivals. A man running a booth selling concert tickets told me that the Chinese characters for musical, also translated as laugh, is very similar to medicine. The only difference is the Chinese symbol for plants (probably herbs) is placed on the top. They do appreciate the healing power of music.

You can verify this by using Google translate from English to traditional Chinese.

[Seizan]

Perhaps this is the Chinese way of saying "Laughter is the best medicine"?"

[gmattson]

Interesting Eric. . .

Wonder how those 2 lines were chosen to change the definition of the character. Wonder if the horizontal "cross-like" image has its own meaning, or only is an addition that changes another character/s it is attached to?

[emattson]

Interesting Erik. . .

Wonder how those 2 lines were chosen to change the definition of the character. Wonder if the horizontal "cross-like" image has its own meaning, or only is an addition that changes another character/s it is attached to?

Played around with Google translate. Leaf, seed (as a noun, germinate, bud), flower, petal, and herb are translated into a series of traditional Chinese characters containing the two horizontal "cross-like" images. The funny part is "root" doesn't use that character even though it is used in medicine.