Kaomoji

Hopefully your day is going much more ヽ(⌒∇⌒)ﾉ than (´；ω；`) or even ORZ! Maybe you’re so tired right now that you’ve completely lost the ability to convey your feelings in actual words and have resorted to sending messages entirely made up of the cute little smiley faces in your phone? Luckily, Japan has its own series of emoticons known as “kaomoji” and the best thing is you don’t even need to be able to speak Japanese to be able to understand them!

“Kaomoji” is made up of three Japanese characters - 顔文字, which literally means “face letter” though you might have heard of the similar word “emoji” 絵文字 which means “picture letter”. Both terms are used to mean the fun pictures you can create through using your regular computer keyboard which can help add a little feeling to your writing! Unlike Western emoticons like the classic smiley face :) you don’t have to turn your head on its side to read kaomoji either so they’re even good for your neck too.

There are hundreds of kaomoji for all different occasions, and fans have even made specific kaomoji for their favorite franchises like this one which means Captain Levi from Attack on Titan 눈‸눈, or this one for Eren (´༎ຶ۝༎ຶ)! Prefer Naruto? No problem (Ξ｀ｗ´Ξ)!

Of course, you’re free to make up your own kaomoji and use them with your friends too (like a secret code!) - that’s the great thing about kaomoji, it’s not like you have to apply to the kaomoji council or anything. So next time your emotions are so strong you can’t express them in words, turn to your good friend the all-powerful kaomoji-kun to become your very own internet translator and start feeling all ( ಸ‿ಸ) from behind your keyboard!