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呜

嗚
wū
interjection #4,608

Meanings

  1. 1 woo (crying sound)
  2. 2 toot (whistle sound)
  3. 3 onomatopoeia for sobbing or whistling

Examples

HSK 1
呜呜呜，我不想去上学。
Wūwūwū, wǒ bù xiǎng qù shàngxué.
Waah, I don't want to go to school.
HSK 3
火车呜呜地开过来了。
Huǒchē wūwū de kāi guòlái le.
The train came tooting along.

Tips

usage
呜 is usually reduplicated as 呜呜 or 呜呜呜 to represent crying or the sound of a whistle/horn. Also appears in 呜呼 (alas, literary).

Components

radical
口 kǒu
mouth
Left mouth radical (Kangxi #30) - the open-mouth pictograph in compressed left-side form. Anchors 呜 in the family of speech and sound words alongside 唱 (sing), 吹 (blow), 喊 (shout), 哭 (cry), 嘘 (shush). Tells you at a glance this character names a sound coming out of a mouth.
phonetic
乌 wū
crow (phonetic)
Right phonetic 乌 - supplies the sound exactly (wū). Originally a pictograph of a crow, simplified from 烏. Faintly semantic too: 乌 alone is also onomatopoeic for a crow's caw, so 呜 reinforces the throaty 'wooo' weeping/whistling sound. Same phonetic in 钨 (tungsten), 邬 (surname). Common compounds: 呜咽 (sob), 呜呼 (alas).

Stroke Order

呜 wū