01-27-2008, 12:34 AM
Well it may look like twelve strokes but in fact it's 10! Look at the rooftop under the three short vertical strokes: it is written with just two strokes, the horizontal one ending with a downward brush curve. As for the lowest part of the character, that again is made of only two strokes, the one on the right being made of a horizontal stroke that then bends down and crosses the left to right diagonal stroke.
Did you know that Chinese characters were arranged in the dictionary by the number of strokes? The original sign for AI (love) had more strokes than that, but in the People's Republic of China they simplified it. I believe in Hong Kong and in Taiwan they still use the old characters which were not simplified. From my dictionary it looks as if the more complex character for AI has thirteen strokes as it includes the sign for the heart, which has been simplified to become just one horizontal stroke under the rooftop. Let me see if I can find you the sign for the HEART (xin);
and here it is!!
![[Image: heart.gif]](http://z.about.com/d/chineseculture/1/0/v/7/heart.gif)
Did you know that Chinese characters were arranged in the dictionary by the number of strokes? The original sign for AI (love) had more strokes than that, but in the People's Republic of China they simplified it. I believe in Hong Kong and in Taiwan they still use the old characters which were not simplified. From my dictionary it looks as if the more complex character for AI has thirteen strokes as it includes the sign for the heart, which has been simplified to become just one horizontal stroke under the rooftop. Let me see if I can find you the sign for the HEART (xin);
and here it is!!
See? That is 4 strokes. 
mile:
mile: ![[-]](https://gayspeak.com/images/duende_v3_local/collapse.png)
