香水
こうすい · kousui · JLPT N2 · noun
aroma
香 = fragrance + 水 = water: a fragrant water, which is perfume
香 (kou) means fragrance or sweet scent, and 水 (sui) means water. Together they name a scented liquid, so kousui is perfume.
香 — grain 禾 over sun 日 (originally 甘 'sweet')
Originally an ideograph showing grain (禾) over a vessel of sweet/savory taste (甘), depicting the aroma of cooked millet. Over time the lower 甘 was simplified to 日. The character broadened from 'fragrance of grain' to any pleasant smell, and by extension 'incense' and 'delicious'.
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.