健在

けんざい · kenzai · JLPT N1 · na-adj

well

健 (healthy) + 在 (be present): still around and in good health

Often used for living people, as in 祖父は健在だ (my grandfather is still well). 在 means existing or being present, so the word combines health with still being here.

在 — earth 土 + phonetic 才
Originally a phono-semantic compound: 土 (earth) gives the meaning of a place or location, while 才 supplies the sound. It came to mean 'to be present/located at,' and now also serves as a grammatical marker for ongoing actions, like 'in the middle of doing.'

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