水準
すいじゅん · suijun · JLPT N3 · noun
degree
💧📏 水準 = water + level: the standard a water level sets
水 (sui) is water and 準 (jun) means standard or to conform. Builders used still water to find a true flat line, so the water-level became the word for any level or standard, as in 生活水準, standard of living.
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.