ほど
hodo
Holding a ruler up to it: ほど
The picture You hold a measuring stick next to something and point at a mark: "up to here". The mark can be rough, it can be the very end of the stick, or it can be where you compare someone else. ほど points at a notch and measures the degree; くらい draws a loose circle near that notch and waves the exactness away.
Where the picture shows up in ほど
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roughly this mark
一時間ほどお待ちいただけますか。
ichi-jikan hodo o-machi itadakemasu ka
Could I ask you to wait about an hour?
The ruler held against the hour mark on a clock, a fingertip tapping loosely around that spot.
Stiffer than くらい, which makes it the safe choice with customers at work.
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the far end of the stick
死ぬほど疲れました。
shinu hodo tsukaremashita
I'm dead tired — as tired as it gets.
A fingertip pressed against the topmost notch of the stick, with no notch left above it.
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the mark you compare to
彼ほど親切な人はいません。
kare hodo shinsetsu na hito wa imasen
Nobody reaches his mark for kindness — he's the kindest there is.
People lined up to be measured, and not one head rises past the mark he stands at.
~ほど…ない is how Japanese builds a superlative.
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two marks rising together
考えれば考えるほど分からなくなります。
kangaereba kangaeru hodo wakaranaku narimasu
The more I think about it, the less I understand.
Two rulers stood side by side: push the mark up on one and the mark on the other climbs with it.
Conditional verb + the same verb + ほど: two scales climbing side by side.
All of it in one picture
Watch where the ruler goes and the four become one picture. Tap loosely around the one-hour mark and you get “about an hour”; press the very top notch and you get “dead tired”; stand the stick beside someone else and you get “nobody reaches his mark”. The last one uses two rulers at once, so raising one raises the other. Whenever ほど shows up, read it as: something is being measured, and this is how far it goes.