"Here, it is Chinese. Wei ji. The top part is danger & bottom is opportunity. Two characters, one word "crisis"..."Many non-Chinese speakers have used this misleading "danger+opportunity=crisis" reference in their speech, including Condoleezza Rice. My good friend Mark Swofford at Pinyin.info has posted an essay by Victor H. Mair about this misperception.
An analysis at a California laboratory shows no significant difference between used and unused pads.
Tian: 付 in Chinese means "to give/pay". To me, this tattoo 付恋 means "pay(paid) love". What do you think?
Alan: This combination 付恋 is not found in Japanese, so it has no fixed meaning.
I can't think of an instance in Japanese where 付 or 付ける has the meaning of "to give/pay" but it certainly does have lots of meanings. A lot of them have to with adding something, fixing or attaching something to something else. There is one sense where 付け means a "tab" or "bill" at a bar or the like, so it has more of the sense of running up or adding to a bill rather than paying it.
The phrase -付き as a suffix means "with" in the sense of something that comes with something else like an apartment that comes with a garage or a lunch set with coffee.
Perhaps the creator of this tattoo wanted 付恋 to mean "with love" but the character order is wrong for Japanese. This would also not be the normal way to write "with love" anyway, because it would be more like 愛を込めて as a set phrase for this.
Well, I guess it could be interpreted as something like giving love in addition to something else. A "freebie" perhaps? Giving a little love on the side? I don't know.
Tian: The owner of this tattoo is a librarian, and you know the rumors about how naughty those librarians... ;)
Alan: Oh, yeah? You don't say... I thought those librarians were a pretty straitlaced, bookish sort. You'll have to tell me some of those rumors...
