Chinese Tattoos

Chinese tattoos including authentic characters and symbols are beautiful designs carrying a deep personal meaning. Due to the complex nature of Chinese writing, it's extremely easy to end up with a permanent embarrassment unless you take a few basic precautions. Therefore, in order to help you avoid these Chinese tattoo disasters, I would like to point out some mistakes for you to look out for:

Not Knowing What They Mean
This might sound unbelievable, but you'd be amazed at the number of people walking around who don't know the meaning of their Chinese tattoo. Tattoo can be a form of self expression. You will be disappointed if you don't know what your design means. Therefore, if you plan to get a Chinese character tattoo, make sure that you know what it means before the treatment begins.

Mistranslation
Chinese writing is complex and carries many subtle meanings. It's extremely easy to end up with something unexpected written all over your skin. Here is an example. In English, the word “free” has two meaning. It can mean “freedom” which is the meaning that most people wanted. It can also mean “free of charge”. The Chinese writing is totally difference. If you end up with the words "free of charge" tattooed on your skin, you will discover this mistake it cost you almost $1,000 to get the tattoo removed. This is only a slightly extreme example, but it shows you the mistakes that can happen and the amount of embarrassment that they can cause.

Misalignment
It is another meaningless embarrassment. Chinese characters become meaningless if you apply them upside down or back to front. But this mistake is often made. Once they lose track of which way round the designs should be used, it's just luck whether your design is applied correctly.

Too common
Most tattoo studios offer hundreds of Chinese symbol designs for you to choose from. Unfortunately, many of these designs have been wrongly translated or meaningless. And even if the design that you choose is correct, there will be thousands of people around the world with the same design.
If you want a Chinese writing tattoo that enhances your individuality and expression, it's important to avoid these standard designs. You better get a native Chinese speaker to create a custom design which will express your own personal values.