noun:

• centre of a prefecture; heart of a prefecture

noun:

• growth; development
• stretching (one's body, e.g. when waking up)
• (ability to) spread (of paint, cream, etc.)
• elongation; extension; carry (e.g. of sound); sustain

noun:

• the eight kinds of suffering (birth, old age, disease, death, parting from loved ones, meeting disliked ones, not getting what one seeks, pains of the five skandha) - Buddhism term

expression / noun:

• red string of fate; in Chinese-Japanese folklore, fated lovers were said to be joined by an unseen red string, tied around one little finger of each

expression / adjective:

• mere shadow of one's former self; having no trace left (of former glories, talent, looks, etc.); unrecognizable (as the person one used to be); unrecognisable - idiom

noun:

• humble samurai who served as a body guard on foot ➜ 徒侍
• bodyguards in service of the shogun who would walk ahead of him on an outing (Edo period) ➜ 徒士組【かちぐみ】

godan ~る verb / transitive:

• to wring (towel, rag); to squeeze - esp. 絞る
• to squeeze (fruit to extract juice); to press; to extract; to milk; to express milk - esp. 搾る
• to rack (one's brains); to strain (one's voice)
• to extort; to exploit
• to chew out; to reprimand severely; to rake over the coals; to give a sound scolding; to tell someone off; to scold; to rebuke - often passive voice ➜ 油を絞る
• to drill into; to train
• to narrow down (one's focus); to whittle down
• to gather up (curtain, etc.); to tighten (drawstring)
• to stop down (lens)
• to turn down (e.g. radio)
• to bend (bow); to draw
• to hold down; to constrict; to immobilize - Sumo term

adjective:

• terrible; dreadful
• amazing (e.g. of strength); great (e.g. of skills); wonderful; terrific
• to a great extent; vast (in numbers)

~の noun / noun:

• not covered (e.g. of a sports opponent); unobserved; under the radar - From English "no mark"
• unmarked (e.g. of a product); unlabelled

noun:

• compound ideograph formation (one of the six kanji classifications); making kanji up of meaningful parts (e.g. "mountain pass" is up + down + mountain) ➜ 会意文字

noun:

• proportional representation system in which votes are cast for a publicly available list of party members or for individual members of that list

noun:

• Japanese reading of a kanji (sometimes esp. in ref. to readings that do not correspond to the orig. Chinese meaning of the kanji)

noun:

• household of which half of the taxes were given to a designated person (ritsuryo system); vassal household allotted to a courtier ➜ 食封

expression / ~する verb (irregular):

• to make fun of; to look down on; to make light of
• to take a tea break; to rest

noun:

• (since) the beginning of the universe; (since) the dawn of time - four character idiom

temporal noun:

• since the creation (of the world); since the dawn of history - four character idiom

noun:

• political dynamics; dynamics of political forces; the balance of political power - four character idiom

godan ~く verb / transitive:

• to be jealous of; to be envious of; to envy ➜ 焼く【やく】

noun:

• mechanism of action (e.g. drug); mode of action; action mechanism - Medicine term

adverbial noun / temporal noun:

• last third of a month; 21st to the last day of a month

noun:

• voice; speech; sound of a voice
• sound (e.g. of a TV) ［おんせい］

noun / ~する noun:

• getting tired of; getting sick of; getting bored with; getting fed up with

noun:

• Chinese yam (variety of Dioscorea opposita)
• Japanese yam (variety of Dioscorea japonica)

noun:

• Budget Committee (of the Upper and Lower Houses of the Diet)
• budget committee

noun:

• bamboo dealer; person selling bamboo or articles made of bamboo
• house made of bamboo