12. Variations in Chinese characters

There are sometimes regional variations on the actual strokes of a character. Different places may have their own preferred ways to write a character. For example, the following character is written slightly different in Hong Kong and Taiwan.

Also, people from the same place may write a character differently, depending on their habit or style. But don’t worry! The differences usually won’t be too big. You should still be able to recognize a character even if it looks a bit different.