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I am wondering what these emoji mean. Like, why would they create these ones specifically? I'm trying to think of a translation for ココ, but all I can think of is "cocoa" or a shortened long word, but that wouldn't make any sense.

Here are the emoji in question: and :

koko and sa emoji image

Also, is there a "proper" way to use these emoji?

一二三
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Kevin Evans
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2 Answers2

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is for サービス, as in receiving something for free. However, I've seen several other sources say this means "service charge", which is the complete opposite of free. So I'm not positive if it's one or the other, or possibly either depending on the context.

is just for ここ (here). Here's a list of some other common ones.

istrasci
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3

The English version of the latest Unicode CLDR annotations file (en.xml) lists "official" short name and keywords for all emoji, including and , in XML format:

<annotation cp="">“here” | Japanese | Japanese “here” button | katakana | ココ</annotation>
<annotation cp="" type="tts">Japanese “here” button</annotation>
<annotation cp="">“service charge” | Japanese | Japanese “service charge” button | katakana | サ</annotation>
<annotation cp="" type="tts">Japanese “service charge” button</annotation>

So, “service charge” appears to be indeed a correct interpretation for . This is confirmed by the Japanese version: サービス料 (ja.xml) 

<annotation cp="">ここ | ココ | ココのマーク</annotation>
<annotation cp="" type="tts">ココのマーク</annotation>
<annotation cp="">サ | サービス料 | サのマーク</annotation>
<annotation cp="" type="tts">サのマーク</annotation>

HTH,