(pronoun) this; these / (bound form) this; the (followed by a noun) / (bound form) this; these (followed by a classifier) (in this sense, commonly pr. [zhei4], esp. in Beijing)
这
=
文
+
辶
:
James II of England (zh) is carrying a heavy book (文) in the elevator's bathroom (e4). This (这) book is so heavy that his gladiator sandals (辶) are sinking deep into the sand.
是
=
旦
+
龰
:
Mnemonic symbol: a skull, from "to be or not to be".
Sherlock Holmes (sh) starts his day in the space station's bathroom (Ø4) with a mug of coffee (旦). Holding a skull (mnemonic symbol for 是) in his hands, he asks himself "to be, or not to be" (是). He wonders if he can make the skull come back to life using lots of coffee, and injects coffee from his mug into the skull using a syringe (龰).
是
=
日
+
下
+
人
:
Mnemonic symbol: a skull, from "to be or not to be".
Sherlock Holmes (sh) watches the Neanderthal Man (人) trying to climb to the sun (日) on a ladder (下) in the space station's bathroom (Ø4). Sherlock is afraid that he'll open the window, so he puts on a big skull (是) and scares him off.
卡
=
上
+
卜
:
Protesting against capitalism in the ashram (a3), Karl Marx (k) attaches everyone's credit cards (卡) to balloons (上) to send them up (上) and away. He uses a voodoo staff (卜) to summon winds to carry the balloons away.
尔
=
⺈
+
小
:
Mnemonic symbol derived from the components: a peace dove. Albert Einstein (Ø) wants to send a message of peace to earth from the space station's living room (Ø3). He wanted to give a dove (尔) a daisy (小) so that it can bring it to earth, but the dove is late! Albert has no choice but to give it to a passing crane (⺈) instead. Thus, the crane flies to earth with the daisy in his beak, just like a peace dove.