Study Chinese with Keats School. Today, we will introduce a Chinese character, which represents “happiness” in English.

In China, it is quite popular for people to get married during the Spring Festival or other traditional festivals in hopes that marriages will be blessed and joyful as the festivals. In China, getting married is known as “办喜事bàn xǐ shì” (holding a happy event). This is because getting married is a happy event in people’s lives. The upper part of its oracle bone script of the character “喜”depicts a drum, while the bottom part depicts a “口” (meaning “people”). As a whole, the character means “to feel happy upon hearing music”.

In other words, upon hearing the beating of drums, people start to laugh. Therefore, “喜” means “happy” or “joyful”. When getting married, people put up red “?” (double-喜) characters on the walls and windows of the bridal chamber. This is because the character “?” represents not only the newly-weds’ whishes for their own blissful love life and happy marriage, but also the best wishes of the newlyweds’ parents and friends.