森
もり
hepburn mori
forest, woods
Part of speech · noun
Pattern visualization
Examples
- 森の中を散歩します。I take a walk in the forest.
- 深い森には熊がいます。There are bears in the deep forest.
Collocations
森 (mori, forest)森林 (shinrin, forest — formal)森林浴 (shinrinyoku, forest bathing)深い森 (fukai mori, deep forest)木 (ki, tree)
Mnemonic
森 mori — three 木 (tree) kanji stacked: a visual "lots of trees = forest". A textbook 会意 (ideogrammatic) character. Pair: 林 (hayashi, small grove, two 木) vs 森 (large forest, three 木) — kanji literally visualizing quantity. 森林浴 (shinrinyoku, "forest bathing") was coined by Japan's Forest Agency in 1982, branding immersion in forest air as a health practice. The word created an entire environment-wellness vocabulary market and was re-exported into English as "forest bathing" and the Korean samnimyok.
Quick check
Visual and semantic split between 林 and 森?