Chinese calendar? (tenpo sike pi jan Sonko)

Tinkerers Anonymous: Some people can't help making changes to "fix" Toki Pona. This is a playground for their ideas.
Tokiponidistoj: Iuj homoj nepre volas fari ŝanĝojn por "ripari" Tokiponon. Jen ludejo por iliaj ideoj.
toto1980
Posts: 4
Joined: Thu Oct 01, 2009 12:14 pm

Re: Chinese calendar? (tenpo sike pi jan Sonko)

Post by toto1980 »

I wanted to say: "I've changed my feelings (thoughts) towards the word mani". I don't know. Perhaps "mi ante e pilin mi PI nimi "mani"" sounds better.
Last edited by toto1980 on Mon Dec 14, 2009 8:35 pm, edited 1 time in total.
janKipo
Posts: 3064
Joined: Fri Oct 09, 2009 2:20 pm

Re: Chinese calendar? (tenpo sike pi jan Sonko)

Post by janKipo »

Yes, 'pi' is vague enough to cover "about" (see the "toki pi' solution to "talk about"). I think the message got through OK, however, with your old form, it was just that the grammar was a problem of sorts. I think it is getting clearer about prep phrases with nouns, but I am an optimist.
janMato
Posts: 1545
Joined: Wed Dec 02, 2009 12:21 pm
Location: Takoma Park, MD
Contact:

Re: Chinese calendar? (tenpo sike pi jan Sonko)

Post by janMato »

I might be blind, but I didn't see anything about months here, except the suggestion about Indian months. I like the Chinese years--they don't start on Jan 1 do they?--and the Japanese days of the week-- probably no better or worse than using the eponyms of half forgotten Scandinavian gods.

Here is a draft based on birthstone months.

This draft needs work. In particular, using the color words is actually detrimental to clarity. plant colored--kule kasi--is more specific than kule laso.

January garnet-- mun pi kiwen pan loje. month of the red grain rock.
February amethyst-- mun pi kiwen loje laso. month of the purple rock.
March aquamarine-- mun pi kiwen pi telo laso. month of the water-blue rock.
April diamond-- mun pi kiwen pi kule ala (mun pi kiwen pi kule telo)
May emerald -- mun pi kule kasa
June moonstone-- mun pi kiwen mun or mun pi kiwen walo, pearl
July ruby-- mun pi kiwen loje. (mun kiwen pi kule pi telo sijelo loje)
August peridot-- mun pi kiwen laso (green rock) or mun pi kiwen jelo walo (light green)
September sapphire-- mun pi kule laso suli,
October opal -- mun pi kiwen pi kule ale or kiwen loje walo-- pink tourmaline
November topaz, citrine -- mun pi kiwen pi jan Topa (Topaz is an eponym) or mun pi kiwen jelo pimeja
December turquoise, blue topaz -- mun pi kiwen pi ma Tuki (Turquoise is derived from the French for Turkey)

Obviously October and April are too similar. There are several blue green rocks and worse, things like sapphire and ruby vary in color and are actually the same gemstone with different levels of impurity.

Science doesn't seem to help much-- (Mg, Fe)2SiO4 would take quite a bit of talking to convey in toki pona.

Suggestion for improvement?
Last edited by janMato on Fri Jan 22, 2010 6:42 pm, edited 6 times in total.
janKipo
Posts: 3064
Joined: Fri Oct 09, 2009 2:20 pm

Re: Chinese calendar? (tenpo sike pi jan Sonko)

Post by janKipo »

March 'laso' but then need something for green at peridot ('laso jelo' works and even jelo' itself, I think)
Not universal certainly and not very well justified at the best of times.
janTe
Posts: 50
Joined: Wed Nov 04, 2009 4:34 pm

Re: Chinese calendar? (tenpo sike pi jan Sonko)

Post by janTe »

Just a few possibilities:

* Aquamarine can be kiwen laso telo[/color], if that's not too literal.
* June can be pearl (I've seen that more than moon rock), which can be kiwen walo.
* July can also be onyx, which can be kiwen pimeja, so garnet can be kiwen loje. (Or maybe ruby can be kiwen loje and garnet can be kiwen loje pimeja?)
* Peridot is a very pale green, which I think should be reflected in its name. The Toki Pona dictionary says that "jelo" can mean a pale green, so maybe "kiwen jelo walo"?
* October can also be a pink tourmaline, kiwen loje walo.
* November should be kiwen jelo, since citrine is yellow, and topaz is usually yellow when used as a birthstone. But kiwen jelo is already used for peridot. Maybe November is kiwen jelo pimeja?
janMato
Posts: 1545
Joined: Wed Dec 02, 2009 12:21 pm
Location: Takoma Park, MD
Contact:

Re: Chinese calendar? (tenpo sike pi jan Sonko)

Post by janMato »

janTe wrote:Just a few possibilities:
* Aquamarine can be kiwen laso telo[/color], if that's not too literal.
I merged in most of your suggestions. I like "literal"-- I confuse the colors, especially the color pairs, laso loje vs loje laso, so water-colored, blood-colored, etc. much easier to read. Calques are okay to me if they're transparent. E.g. a calque of fleamarket--bad but a calque of snowman would be fine tp style, imho.

One would think there'd be more salient features of stones other than color.

pearl: kiwen lili pi kala poki. pebble of the boxed fish.

peridot on the other hand...it's green and it 's a gemstone and even google doesn't have much to say about it that couldn't be said about a wide variety of stones.
janKipo
Posts: 3064
Joined: Fri Oct 09, 2009 2:20 pm

Re: Chinese calendar? (tenpo sike pi jan Sonko)

Post by janKipo »

Yeah, 'esun pipi' is probably not too clear, but 'jan pi walo kiwen' is only ambiguous.
Of course, the really significant thing about stones is their composition, which we can't do at all, and perhaps their play on the Mohr scale, ditto.
But basically, this doesn't seem to be a part of culture that has a lot of interest to tp -- too Confucian or worse (though some Daoist do get pretty hot about some gemstones).
janMato
Posts: 1545
Joined: Wed Dec 02, 2009 12:21 pm
Location: Takoma Park, MD
Contact:

Re: Chinese calendar? (tenpo sike pi jan Sonko)

Post by janMato »

janKipo wrote:Yeah, 'esun pipi' is probably not too clear, but 'jan pi walo kiwen' is only ambiguous.
Of course, the really significant thing about stones is their composition, which we can't do at all, and perhaps their play on the Mohr scale, ditto.
But basically, this doesn't seem to be a part of culture that has a lot of interest to tp -- too Confucian or worse (though some Daoist do get pretty hot about some gemstones).
We have some geology-- ma, ko, kiwen, chemistry-- kiwen, telo, kon, seli, and physics words-- suno, ijo, tawa.
Rocks have a base word, where as stuff like "computer" or "subjunctive" takes at least 3.
Zo-ology is over favored. A natlang would have had a higher percentage of plant words.

Talc - kiwen pi nanpa wan pi nasin Mowa
Gypsum- kiwen pi nanpa tu pi nasin Mowa
Calcite - kiwen pi nanpa TW pi nasin Mowa
Flourite - kiwen pi nanpa TT pi nasin Mowa
Apatite - kiwen pi nanpa L pi nasin Mowa, or kiwen pi wile moku :-)
Orthoclase Feldspar - kiwen pi nanpa LW pi nasin Mowa
Quartz- kiwen pi nanpa LT pi nasin Mowa
Topaz- kiwen pi nanpa LTW pi nasin Mowa (November)
Corundum- kiwen pi nanpa LTT pi nasin Mowa
Diamond- kiwen pi nanpa LL pi nasin Mowa (December)

jan esun o mi wile e kiwen pi nanpa LW pi nasin Mowa tawa kulupu kiwen mi.
Clerk, I need a piece of Othroclase Feldspar for my rock collection.
janTe
Posts: 50
Joined: Wed Nov 04, 2009 4:34 pm

Re: Chinese calendar? (tenpo sike pi jan Sonko)

Post by janTe »

Tiger -- soweli alasa (predatory mammal?)
Or, unfortunately, "game animal" -- the modifier/modified relation is very ambiguous (or vague-- take your pick)
I was thinking about how I would disambiguate "hunting animal" from "hunted animal" if I needed to.

The best I could come up with is "soweli pi pana alasa" and "soweli pi anpa alasa". I'm aware that using "anpa" to indicate the recipient of the action is possibly an innovation. We say it in English (e.g. "That person is under investigation"), but I don't know if others would find it unintelligible.

Any better ideas?
janMato
Posts: 1545
Joined: Wed Dec 02, 2009 12:21 pm
Location: Takoma Park, MD
Contact:

Re: Chinese calendar? (tenpo sike pi jan Sonko)

Post by janMato »

janTe wrote:Any better ideas?
Tiger has precedent as: soweli linja wawa ... but I don't like this solution much either. It's "powerful cat"/"powerful wiskers"
viewtopic.php?f=33&t=572&start=10

soweli pi anpa alasa- animal of the hunting underspace. This is the cat that catches mice in the basement.

? soweli pi pana alasa- animal of the hunting gift
soweli pi pali alasa- animal of the hunting work

soweli pi wile alasa- predator
soweli pi lukin alasa- animal who intends to hunt.

soweli pi moku alasa- prey
soweli pi kama moku- animal who becomes food
Post Reply