才(サイ)

才

Meaning: genius, “years old,” unit of length (about 12 inches)

Components: technically this is a version of 手 (hand), but I will treat it as a stand alone kanji here since it doesn’t have much to do with hands.

My Hack: Imagine the first 2 strokes are a person with arms outstretched. The last stroke looks like the person is carrying a sword, so you could say, “he must be a genius to be carrying a sword at 10 years old.” (I used 10 since that is similar to the first 2 strokes.)

You could also use “genius” in the sarcastic way (i.e. total doofus), and imagine the same person walking away with a giant piece of toilet paper stuck to their body.

Photo by deltaMike

Photo by deltaMike