荒れ地 (arechi: wasteland) being wild + land
彼は荒れ地を美しい庭に変えた。
Kare wa arechi o utsukushii niwa ni kaeta.
He transformed a piece of wasteland into a beautiful garden.彼 (kare: he)
美しい (utsukushii: beautiful, lovely)
庭 (niwa: garden)
変 (ka(eru): to change, transform)その庭園は荒れ地に変わりつつある。
Sono teien wa arechi ni kawaritsutsu aru.
The garden is turning into a wilderness.庭園 (teien: garden; park) garden + garden, park
Here we see 庭 in its on-yomi form (TEI), whereas the kun-yomi niwa popped up in the previous sentence.
変わりつつある (kawaritsutsu aru: is changing)
変 (ka(waru): to change)
We saw this kanji in the previous sentence in the transitive verb kaeru. Kawaru is the intransitive form. And kawari is the adverbial form of this verb.
-つつある (-tsutsu aru: suffix for an in-progress action)
If you own A Dictionary of Intermediate Japanese Grammar, you’ll find information about this grammatical concept starting on page 542.
