手入れ
ていれ · teire · JLPT N2 · noun
repair
🔧 手 (hand) + 入れ (put in) = put your hands into it to maintain or repair
Hands-on upkeep of gardens, tools, or buildings. For example, 庭の手入れ means garden maintenance, so your hands are always in the work.
手 — pictograph of a hand with five fingers
手 is a pictograph showing an open hand with fingers and a wrist. Early bronze and oracle bone forms clearly depict five splayed fingers, which simplified over time into the modern shape. It keeps its original meaning of 'hand' and also serves as a radical in many characters related to hand actions.
入 — single pictograph, two slanting strokes
入 is a pictograph showing an arrowhead or pointed entrance, with two strokes converging downward to suggest something going inward. The original sense was 'to enter,' and it still carries that meaning today. It contrasts visually with 人 (person), where the strokes cross differently at the top.