活 huó to live; alive; living
Made up of [氵 shuǐ water radical 85, 舌 shé tongue radical 135]Made with 9 strokes.
Can be thought of as water on the tongue being essential for life
Related characters
Also uses 氵 shuǐ component: 波 bō (wave) 法 fǎ (law) ; 港 gǎng (harbor) ; 海 hǎi (sea) ; 汗 hàn (perspiration) ; 汉 hàn (chinese) ; 河 hé (river) ; 洪 hóng (flood) ; 湖 hú (lake) ; 济 jì (to cross a river) ; 江 jiāng (river) ; 津 jīn (ferry crossing) ; 酒 jiǔ (wine) ; 满 mǎn (to fill) ; 没 méi (have not) ; 泡 pào (bubble) ; 汽 qì (steam) ; 浅 qiǎn (shallow) ; 清 qīng (clear) ; 涉 shè (to wade) ; 洗 xǐ (to wash) ; 演 yǎn (to develop) ; 渔 yú (fishing) ; 泽 zé (pool) ; 治 zhì (to rule) ; 洲 zhōu (region)
Also uses 舌 shé component: 话 huà (speech) 乱 luàn (in confusion or disorder) ; 舍 shè (residence)
Different tone
火 huǒ (fire) ; 灬 huǒ (fire (as radical)) ; 或 huò (maybe)Pronunciation
Sound file kindly provided by shtooka.net ➚ under a Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike License
Proverbs
干活不由东累死也无功 gàn huó bú yóu dōng lèi sǐ yě wú gōng Only work on what is needed to be done你死我活 nǐ sǐ wǒ huó To fight to the bitter end
生活有爱幸福,为爱生活愚蠢 shēng huó yǒu ài xìngfú, wèi ài shēng huó yú chǔn Love is not the most important thing
死马当活马医 sǐ mǎ dāng huó mǎ yī Persevering when it is already too late. A lost cause
生吞活剥 shēng tūn huó bāo To unthinkingly take on board someone's opinion. Uncritical application. Copying someone else's actions. The story is of Zhang Huaiqing of the Tang dynasty who plagiarized other poet's work by mechanically adding a few characters here and there. The resultant poems were gibberish.