Whimsical takes on Chinese characters

To most people, Chinese characters may seem like random combinations of strokes and radicals. But to Lena, a 20-year-old politics major from Northern Virginia, United States, each one tells its own story.

In her eyes, the character "ren", meaning "person", resembles the muzzle of a cat, "ceng", meaning "once", looks like an angry robot, and the traditional form of "wu", meaning "vain", reminds her of a sheep.

One day, she spent just 30 minutes sketching "wu" — her first attempt at drawing a Chinese character — and posted it on Xiaohongshu (RedNote).To her surprise, the simple doodle went viral, receiving 40,000 likes overnight.