は (ha) – Hiragana

Pronunciation

– Pronounced as the Japanese ‘ha’. Imagine someone laughing, going ‘ha ha ha!’

About

は, in hiragana, or ハ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, each of which represent one mora. They are also used as a grammatical particle (in such cases, they denote ‘wa’, including in the greeting konnichiwa) and serve as the topic marker of the sentence. は originates from 波 and ハ from 八.

Mnemonics

Mnemonic 1: You may recall the Hiragana Mnemonic for ‘ke’ as being someone that is speaking with an Asian accent laughing at someone standing on their head. The person is still standing on their head, however this time the observer has actually sat down (hence the crossed legs at the bottom) and is finding it even more unbelievably funny. In fact, the person has broken out into hysterical laughter – ‘ha ha ha!’

Mnemonic 2: ‘Hammer’ – You’ve heard of a hammerhead shark. This is a hammer-tail shark. It is using its ‘hammer’ to bang in a nail.