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p8nda BETA
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华

華
huá / huà
adjective #3,908

Meanings

  1. 1 China; Chinese (in compounds)
  2. 2 magnificent; splendid
  3. 3 prosperous; flourishing

Examples

HSK 5
这家酒店很豪华。
Zhè jiā jiǔdiàn hěn háohuá.
This hotel is very luxurious.
HSK 7-9
中华文化博大精深。
Zhōnghuá wénhuà bódàjīngshēn.
Chinese culture is vast and profound.
HSK 7-9
华人遍布全世界。
Huárén biànbù quán shìjiè.
Ethnic Chinese live all over the world.

Tips

usage
huá pulls two main threads. (1) China-as-civilization: 中华 (cultural China), 华人 (ethnic Chinese), 华语 (Chinese language), 华侨 (overseas Chinese). (2) Splendid / magnificent: 豪华 (luxurious), 华丽 (gorgeous), 繁华 (bustling), 才华 (talent). Both threads share the original sense of 'flowering' - China as the central efflorescence, and beauty/talent as a flowering of the person.
mistakes
Two readings. huá is the everyday one (this entry). Switch to 华 (see the huà entry) only for the surname Huà and Mount Hua: 华山 in Shaanxi, the legendary physician 华佗, the mathematician 华罗庚. A small reminder: People's Republic of China = 中华人民共和国 uses Huá.

Components

radical
十 shí
ten (here a graphic residue)
Bottom radical 十 in 华 is a graphic stand-in inherited from the simplification, not the literal 'ten'. The original 華 had a complex grass-and-hanging stack at the bottom; the 1956 reform clipped it to a simple 十-shaped vertical-plus-horizontal silhouette. As indexing radical, 十 serves as the lookup key without carrying a 'ten' meaning here.
phonetic
化 huà
to change; transform
Top phonetic 化 supplies the sound - huà shifted to huá by tone change only. Heavily simplified from traditional 華, which depicted flowers blossoming on a tree - the modern 化-on-top is a stylised replacement that preserves the sound while shedding the floral image.

Stroke Order

华 huá