How to understand combined characters (kanji) more easily?


A lot of Japanese restaurants, mangas and just paragraphs of texts in general
(or not in general, used basically anywhere) use combined characters to make
things appear shorter.

And I can’t understand them. I’m just now starting to practice Japanese. I
can’t even memorize all of katakana let alone Dakudon so that might be why but
can someone help me find an easier way to understand the combined symbols?

Combined symbols like: “私” from “わたし” (I/I am) and “鷹” from “たか” (Hawk/A hawk)




The combined characters you are referring to are called "Kanji." It's a system
of writing, like hiragana and katakana, but they use Chinese characters. Most
kanji are made of different parts.

For example, the character "私{わたし}" is made of the grain radical (禾) on the
left and "厶" on the right. It's helpful to remember these characters like so,
along with their meanings and pronunciation.

Another example, the character "鷹{たか}" is made of the parts "广", "亻", "隹", and
"鳥". Its radical is the bird radical (鳥).

[Jisho.org](https://jisho.org/) is a great resource for this.

