污水
wūshuǐ · HSK 5
sewage
🚱 污 = dirty + 水 = water; dirty water = sewage
污 (wū) means dirty or polluted; 水 (shuǐ) means water. Together they literally read as polluted water, covering slops, sewage, and wastewater. The 氵radical on the left of 污 also signals a water-related word.
水 — pictograph of flowing water
水 is a pictograph depicting a stream of flowing water, with the central line representing the main current and the side strokes showing splashing droplets or ripples. In oracle bone script it was drawn even more clearly as a wavy vertical line with branches. It retains its original meaning of 'water' and also serves as a radical, often appearing in the compressed form 氵.