Check the state of the variables with the following command:
mysql> mysql> mysql> SHOW VARIABLES LIKE 'character_set\_%'; +--------------------------+--------+ | Variable_name | Value | +--------------------------+--------+ | character_set_client | latin1 | | character_set_connection | latin1 | | character_set_database | latin1 | | character_set_filesystem | binary | | character_set_results | latin1 | | character_set_server | latin1 | | character_set_system | utf8 | +--------------------------+--------+ 7 rows in set (0.00 sec) mysql>