The Chinese word "加蓬" (Jiāpéng) for the country "Gabon" is formed through phonetic transcription, a common method for translating foreign proper nouns into Chinese. The characters were chosen not for their literal meanings ("加" meaning *add* and "蓬" meaning *fluffy* or *weed*) but specifically for their combined pronunciation, which closely approximates the sound of "Gabon" as heard in European languages. This practice, known as *transliteration*, results in a character pair that serves primarily as a sound-based label for the country, effectively creating a new lexical unit in Chinese.