BIANG BIANG BIANG BIANG BIANG BIANG!

Without even intending to, or realizing how it happened, I memorized the single most useless and complex character in the Chinese language yesterday before going to Marin.
It only has ONE semi-legitimate use. It is composed of nearly sixty strokes. It does not have a dictionary entry, and no actual meaning.

There is no unicode for it yet, although there may be at some point in the future. Consequently it cannot be entered into blogtext.

It is a Shaanxi invention; a type of noodle.
The question is "why?"


From Wikipedia:

The character for biáng in calligraphic regular script.

The character for biáng in a Song font.

Made up of 58 strokes, the Chinese character for "biáng" is one of the most complex Chinese characters in contemporary usage, although the character is not found in modern dictionaries or even in the Kangxi dictionary.

The character is composed of 言 (speak; 7 strokes) in the middle flanked by 幺 (tiny; 2×3 strokes) on both sides. Below it, 馬 (horse; 10 strokes) is similarly flanked by 長 (grow; 2×8 strokes). This central block itself is surrounded by 月 (moon; 4 strokes) to the left, 心 (heart; 4 strokes) below, 刂 (knife; 2 strokes) on the right, and 八 (eight; 2 strokes) above. These in turn are surrounded by a second layer of characters, namely 宀 (roof; 3 strokes) on the top and 辶 (walk; 4 strokes) curving around the left and bottom.

End cite.


Minor corrections: 月 is actually the left-side stand-in for 肉, meaning meat. One version substitutes 糸 for 幺, another version omits 心。

The correct stroke order is as follows: first 宀 divided by 八, underneath which left to right 月 then 幺 on top of 長 followed by 言 above 馬， then then 幺 on top of 長 again, ending with knife (刂), underneath which the heart (心), the whole enveloped by 辶。


Naturally, the residents of Shaanxi disagree with that, preferring instead some absurd sequence that only makes sense to them.
They've got noodles for brains.



AFTERWORD

Dinner last night was a quickly prepared noodly snack. Pork and vegetables with rice-sticks, pan-fried, with hot sauce, curry paste, ginger, chili sauce, soy sauce, sugar, and vinegar.

It was not biang biang mian.

Probably much better.




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