Translating music

Creativity: Poetry, music, comics, etc.
Kreado: Poezio, muziko, bildrakontoj, ktp.
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jan Seni
Posts: 7
Joined: Thu Mar 12, 2020 2:01 pm

Translating music

Post by jan Seni »

I liked song "Auslander" by Rammstein so much, so I tried to tokipon-ize a part of it :D (I know the song is not about something 'pona', but let's give it a go. And also, this time I don't pay attention to the rhythm, just to the general meaning.)

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mi tawa mute. ni li pona tawa mi.
mi tawa weka. mi tawa weka ala.
mi pilin tomo lon ma ali.
toki mi li toki pi jan ali.

mi pali e pona tawa jan.
ken toki mi li ike ala
li ilo kipisi pi utala toki.
mi li utala e jan pi ante unpa.

mi mije ala pi tenpo pimeja wan.
tenpo lili taso la mi lon ma ni.
suno li kalama pona ala lon tenpo ni:
mi weka pini.
mi tawa sike.

mi jan pi ma ante!
(olin mi o! suwi mi o!)
jan pi ma ante!
(meli o, toki! o pana e nasin tawa mi!)

mi jan pi ma ante!
(olin mi o! mi olin e sina!)
jan pi ma ante!
(jan lili o kama! ali li ni!)

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English version of the song (I took it as the original, because I don't speak German)

(Verse 1)
I travel a lot, I like to travel
Far and near (and near and far)
I'm at home everywhere
My language: international

I like to please everyone
Yeah, my vocabulary isn't bad
A sharp sword in the battle of words
With the other gender

(Bridge)
I'm not a man for one night
I stay, at most, one, two hours
Before the sun is laughing again
I'm already gone
And continue my rounds

(Chorus)
I'm a foreigner
Mi amore, mon chéri
Foreigner
Ciao, ragazza, take a chance on me

I'm a foreigner
Mon amour, Ya lublu tebya
A foreigner (foreigner)
Come on, baby, c'est la vie
Last edited by jan Seni on Sat Mar 14, 2020 6:16 am, edited 2 times in total.
janKipo
Posts: 3064
Joined: Fri Oct 09, 2009 2:20 pm

Re: Translating music

Post by janKipo »

If you like it, it’s pona.
‘mi tawa weka en weka ala’.. ‘en’ can’t be used most places English “and” can be and, in particukllar, not here, joining two modifiers or two predicates. The latter reading is easiet to follow: it has to be (at first glance) a fused predicate ‘’mi tawaw weka li tawa weka ala’.. But because there is no ‘li’ to introduce the second predicate, it has to be just two sentence: ‘mi tawa weka. mi tawa weka ala.’.
‘pilin tomo’ may be ok, but feels at least odd,
Prob something closer to ‘ken toki mi li ike ala li ilo kipisi pi utala toki.’
I never thought of ‘unpa’ as meaning “gender” but it make sense.
Maybe ‘tenpo lili taso la’ to drive home the point.
‘mi weka ali’?
Again, can’t make compound predicates with ‘mi’ as subject, so ‘mi weka pinii. mi tawa sike’.
Not sure how to read ‘pana e nasin’
as usual, the struture of 'jan lili o kama’is confusedI: t seems to be an imperative, but isn’t officially. ‘jan lili o, o kama’ is safer.
jan Seni
Posts: 7
Joined: Thu Mar 12, 2020 2:01 pm

Re: Translating music

Post by jan Seni »

janKipo wrote:‘mi tawa weka en weka ala’.. ‘en’ can’t be used most places English “and” can be and, in particukllar, not here, joining two modifiers or two predicates. The latter reading is easiet to follow: it has to be (at first glance) a fused predicate ‘’mi tawaw weka li tawa weka ala’.. But because there is no ‘li’ to introduce the second predicate, it has to be just two sentence: ‘mi tawa weka. mi tawa weka ala.’.
Hm, that's right, I've forgotten about specifics of 'en'.
janKipo wrote:Prob something closer to ‘ken toki mi li ike ala li ilo kipisi pi utala toki.’
janKipo wrote:Maybe ‘tenpo lili taso la’ to drive home the point.
Oh, good ideas!
janKipo wrote:‘mi weka ali’?
Won't it mean something like 'I leave (from) everywhere'?
janKipo wrote:Again, can’t make compound predicates with ‘mi’ as subject, so ‘mi weka pinii. mi tawa sike’.
janKipo wrote:as usual, the struture of 'jan lili o kama’is confusedI: t seems to be an imperative, but isn’t officially. ‘jan lili o, o kama’ is safer.
A strange thing, but I kinda remember seeing these structures in the TP learning book... Especially vocative+imperative with one 'o', that definitely was presented.
janKipo wrote:Not sure how to read ‘pana e nasin’
Hm, it was supposed to mean "give me a way" > "give a chance on (/to) me". But maybe there's a better way to render it. Maybe 'pana e ken', for instance :p
janKipo
Posts: 3064
Joined: Fri Oct 09, 2009 2:20 pm

Re: Translating music

Post by janKipo »

janKipo wrote:
‘mi weka ali’?

Won't it mean something like 'I leave (from) everywhere'?
NNo, ‘ali’ is jst an adverb here, so it means ‘“go away completely””, That is probably what ‘weka pini’ is mant to mean but ‘pini’s invoveent in tenses makes for confusions with “went away’ and the like.

I just stuck up (again) the history of NP o Pred. The old abbreviated Vocative + Imperative has been apporpriated for an optative, but the old examples and exercises are still used, making for a sad confusion. To keep up to date, I think the full ‘NP o, o Pred’ form is needed, althouugh.pu never actually says so (and seems unaware of any problems here at all, which suggests poor proofreading or a total tine ear to English).

“Give me a way” isn’t bad, juat not very clear as to intent, a way to what?
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