The year 2018 is coming to an [end / finish] . For some people it was a great year, and for other people it wasn't so [grate / great] . In Japan, an organization conducted a survey [to / for] ask people for the word they thought best [description / described] 2018. The winner of this survey [were / was] the word "disaster". The kanji (Chinese character) that Japanese people chose means "disaster or [misfortune / fortune] ". The organization said people chose the kanji for disaster because of the many [naturally / natural] disasters to hit Japan in 2018. Japan was hit [by / at] deadly typhoons, earthquakes, heavy rains that [cause / caused] widespread destruction, and a killer heatwave. Hundreds of people lost their lives in [them / these] disasters and many roads and homes were destroyed.
The organization is [calling / called] the Japan Kanji Aptitude Testing Foundation. It has [conducted / conducting] a "word of the year" survey [annual / annually] since 1995. This year, it received [suggestive / suggestions] from 193,214 people. The second most [popularly / popular] kanji was the character for "peace". Last year, "north" was the [winner / winning] . This was because of increasing tensions over North Korea's nuclear tests. The rest of the world was also hit [off / by] devastating natural disasters, including wildfires, hurricanes and tsunami. Wars also [raged / enraged] across the world, especially in Syria and Yemen. There was also a lot of suffering because of immigration - people trying to [movement / move] to other countries to find a new life. People hope the next kanji will [being / be] "happiness".
