翻番
fān fān · HSK 7
to double
⏫⏫ fān fān = flip flip — flip your score once, it doubles
翻 means to flip or turn over. Say it twice and you get the idea of flipping the count again — each flip doubles what you had. A FAN flipping pages: one flip, twice as many pages exposed.
翻 — 番 (turn/sequence) + 羽 (feathers)
A semantic-phonetic compound. 羽 (feathers) gives the meaning, evoking a bird flipping or fluttering its wings, while 番 supplies the sound. From this 'flip over' sense it extended to 'turn over,' 'overturn,' and later 'translate' — that is, turning words from one language into another.
番 — 釆 (animal tracks) on top + 田 (field) below
Originally a pictograph showing animal paw prints (釆) in a field (田), depicting tracks left by beasts. The early meaning related to taking turns or sequences, as tracks come one after another. It later extended to 'foreign' or 'barbarian,' and is now used as a measure word for occurrences or to mean 'number/turn.'