I think this is the right way to go about it no matter the word. Translations are inherently just “whatever the closest concept is in <insert language here>”, which is both context-dependent and inherently (likely) flawed, so ascribing cultural significance to a translation can be tricky.
Recently, I like 最低 (the lowest, can be used to show displeasure). Similarly to how「死ね！」is a lot more blunt than a lot of English insults but doesn’t really sound weird, I like how「最低だ！」is literally just “That’s/you’re the lowest!” but still feels natural.
One of the words that popped up while doing shiritori puzzles is 無駄話 (むだばなし), it just sounds neat.
ねずみ (mouse) is a good word. So cute! Such a good onomatopoeia!
I have a few:
感動 - that emotional feeling you get when you say “I was moved.”
木漏れ日 - sunlight filtering through trees
竜巻 - tornado. The kanji literally means dragon spiral.
幽霊 - ghost. I just really like the way this compound looks.
作り方 (つくりかた) meaning “way/method of making”
It’s just really fun to say quickly haha
I just remembered a word that fits this thread, 啄木鳥 (きつつき) woodpecker.
The reading comes from 木+突く/啄く(to peck)
The kanji are literally peck-tree-bird too (sadly in the opposite order compared to the reading)
Somehow I can just hear the pecking from the word itself.
Remind me of 向日葵 which is also curiously reversed. Ateji from Chinese maybe?
I also know 食火鶏 (ひくいどり)
Well, technically 火食鳥 is also valid (and much more reasonable)
That’s also my guess. Still strange, though, considering the Chinese word is probably unrelated (in fact, I just checked wikipedia and this one is completely different). Maybe they were trying to copy Chinese grammar or something?
What a coincidence, I just learned this word today in Kusuriya 2 
!! You know when a certain character couldn’t contain themselves and decide to bang their head repeatedly against the wall/pillar 
I don’t remember that scene, but it’s very much like a certain character.
向日葵 is entirely related, the reason it “doesn’t match up” with the order of the kanji is that the Japanese word is really 日回り. But the meaning is obvious enough if you know words like 日向, which is also a sort of back-formation from Old Japanese for “the sun’s side/direction”.
I meant to say I checked 食火鶏, which seems to be 南方鶴鴕 in Chinese. It’s possible that some Japanese monk made up the word based on the way he would expect it to be in Chinese, though.
As of today, I have a new favorite japanese word. And that is 無茶 (むちゃ) Absurd.
It used to be 首になる because the idea of “getting necked” meaning “to get fired” was hillarious to me.
But with 無茶 meaning absrud, I just think that’s on another level. I can really imagine a japanese person saying like “NO TEA? ABSURD!” cracks me up.
As somebody who now needs reading glasses 老眼 for farsightedness made me smile. Yes, sadly I do have elderly eyeballs.
Thought I’d revive this thread since I still find picking out individual words/vocab to be a lot of fun and haven’t seen (I don’t Think) a similar place to do so 
So, some recent favorites:
- 濡れ衣（ぬれぎぬ）- False accusations
Literally “wet clothes;” this is the only one (to my knowledge) that is WK vocab, sadly. I also love that this can be used as 濡れ衣を着（き）せる to make “to frame, to falsely accuse”… or “to make wear wet clothes.” - 小鼻（こばな）をうごめかす - To put on a triumphant air
Literally “to wriggle one’s nostrils.” That 小鼻 means nostril is fun in itself. - 摩天楼（まてんろう） - Skyscraper
This one’s an English calque – “scrape” + “heavens” + “watchtower.” The use of the fairly rare N1 character 楼 and the fact that this happens to be the title of a recent favorite song of mine have made me take a liking to it. - 蘇る (よみがえる) - To come back to life, to be restored
I’m generally a fan of words where you can kind of pick out the etymology separately from the kanji rendering. Here it’s 黄泉（よみ）in reference to Yomi, the Shintō underworld, and 帰る（かえる）meaning “to return home.” Hence “returning from the underworld.” - 溯る（さかのぼる）- To go upstream, to go back (e.g. in time, to something’s origin)
Similar to the previous one. 逆（さか）for “against” and 上る（のぼる）, which here means “to go upstream.” - 瞼（まぶた）- Eyelid
One final hidden-etymology one. 目（ま）“eye” + rendaku’d 蓋（ふた）“lid.” It’s the same as in English! …Just in disguise. You don’t see the ま reading for 目 too often, but it also sneaks up in 瞬く（またたく）- to wink… i.e. to clap (叩く、たたく）your eyes (目、ま）and 眩い（まばゆい）- dazzling, which can also be written 目映い, among others.
A couple of these are a little arcane, but I’d love to hear if anyone else has recent favorites, be they much less or much more obscure than these ^-^
If you enjoy digging through etymology in the same way I do, I highly recommend checking out 語源由来辞典!