Japan chooses 'gold' as kanji of the year in nod to Olympics glory - and slush fund politics

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/dec/13/japan-kanji-of-the-year-gold-olympics-ldp-scandal

Japan chooses ‘gold’ as kanji of the year in nod to Olympics glory – and slush fund politics

The character, chosen by public vote, has won in previous Olympic years but also reflects public anger at a damaging financial scandal inside the ruling Liberal Democratic party

Guardian international staff
Thu 12 Dec 2024 23.02 EST

The kanji character kin – which can mean gold or money – has been chosen as Japan’s word of the year to reflect the country’s medal sweep at the Paris Olympics and a damaging financial scandal inside the ruling party.

The single character, which can also be read as kane (money), was unveiled this week at Kiyomizu-dera, a Buddhist temple in Kyoto, whose head priest, Seihan Mori, reproduced it with a huge brush on a white washi paper canvas.

The character that best captured the zeitgeist attracted 12,148 votes out of 221,971 cast, according to the Japan Kanji Aptitude Testing Foundation, which has organised the annual contest since 1995.

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