cǎi
noun #4,791

Meanings

  1. 1 color; colorful
  2. 2 applause; prize

Examples

Cǎihóng chūlái le!
A rainbow appeared!
Tā zhòng le cǎipiào.
He won the lottery.
Jīngcǎi de biǎoyǎn.
A wonderful performance.

Tips

usage
is used in: 精彩 (wonderful/brilliant), 彩虹 (rainbow), 彩票 (lottery ticket), 色彩 (color), 喝彩 (to cheer/applaud). Contains (to pick) + (stripes of color).

Components

radical
shān
stripes; rays of light
Right three-stroke — the indexing radical, depicting brushes of color or rays of light. Same radical anchors a visual-pattern family: (shape), (shadow), (whiskers), (adorn). Three strokes drawn like brushed paint give its color-stripes meaning.
phonetic
cǎi
to pluck; to gather
Left supplies the sound directly (cǎi = cǎi, no drift) and a faint flavor of choosing/gathering — colors get picked out and chosen, much like fruit. The graph itself shows a hand reaching down into a tree. Same phonetic anchor as (vegetable) and (trample).

Stroke Order

cǎi