mi wile sona e ijo pi mute lili! (Several small questions)

Language learning: How to speak Toki Pona, translation problems, advice, memory aids, tools and methods to learn Toki Pona and other languages faster
Lingva lernado: Kiel paroli Tokiponon, tradukproblemoj, konsiloj, memoraj helpiloj, iloj kaj metodoj por pli rapide lerni Tokiponon kaj aliajn lingvojn
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jan Pinsen
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mi wile sona e ijo pi mute lili! (Several small questions)

Post by jan Pinsen »

I would like to know a few things!

toki!
Hello!

mi sona ala e ijo pi mute lili. pana lukin la:
I don't understand a few things. For example:

- seme li kalama toki pi ni: ijo ala ijo? mi pilin e ni: tenpo mute la, nimi "ala" li lon monsi nimi pi lon ala. tan ni la, mi pilin e ni: kalama toki li sama "ijo ala, ijo". ni li pona anu seme?
What is the prosody of "X ala X"? Since the word "ala" usually follows the thing that isn't or isn't there or isn't done, I feel like the prosody should be like "X ala, X". Is that right?
- jan ken toki e nimi ni pi toki Inli kepeken nasin seme kepeken toki pona: "sorry", "thanks" ("pona"?), "you're welcome/no problem", "please"?
How can one say these English words in Toki Pona: "sorry", "thanks" ("pona"?), "you're welcome/no problem", "please"?
- jan ken toki e nimi ni kepeken nasin seme kepeken toki pona: ona li toki e mute pi ijo tu?
How can one use comparatives in Toki Pona?
- jan ken toki e nimi ni kepeken nasin seme kepeken toki pona: ona li toki e ni: ni li ike: mute li suli kin? nimi ni li "too" lon toki Inli.
How can one say express something is excessive in Toki Pona? Like with the word "too" in English.
janKipo
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Re: mi wile sona e ijo pi mute lili! (Several small questions)

Post by janKipo »

I kinda like 'pana lukin' for "for example". I'm sure I'll think of a bunch of objection eventually (it's what I do), but it is a notion that we have a use for.

'x ala x'. mi mute li kalama e toki pona lon tenpo lili. tan ni la mi mute li sona ala kalama e kulupu nimi. mi la nimi x tu li kalama sama. nimi 'ala' li kalama lili.
(We don't speak tp a lot so we don't know how phrases sound. My personal guess is that the two xs are sounded the same and the 'ala' a little less.)

"thanks" pona, "sorry" (bumps, etc) mi pakala, "you're welcome" pona, "please" o pana e pona. In fact most of these are not used much at all and others would give other lists. The Daoist roots of tp are not friendly to conventional (read "insincere") exchanges of this sort". mutual appreciation is assumed (it says here).

x is bigger than y. x li suli mute. y li suli lili. there is no direct expression of comparisons.

Well, "enough" is 'pona' so "too much" would be 'ike' and "too little" 'pona ala'. but, in fact, I've not seen any techniques employed for these questions, so thanks for raising them.
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jan Pinsen
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Re: mi wile sona e ijo pi mute lili! (Several small questions)

Post by jan Pinsen »

I did not come up with "pana lukin la" myself; I found it in one of the Memrise courses I used to learn the vocabulary and some stock phrases.

pilin ni li pona tawa mi. kepeken nasin ni la, nimi "ala" li lon x pi nanpa wan li lon x pi nanpa tu. mi lukin toki e nimi tu wan ni sama kulupu wan.
I like that thought. That way, the word "ala" goes with both x's equally. I'm going to try to pronounce the three words as a single group.

pona tan ni: sina pana e sona tawa mi.
Thanks for teaching me. (Although you mentioned such phrases are unconventional. I must admit I know little of the philosophical background of the language.)

toki pona li pona mute tawa mi!
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Re: mi wile sona e ijo pi mute lili! (Several small questions)

Post by janKipo »

no 'pi' with 'nanpa', just like numbers..
There has been little tp conversation. We are a web community. So civilities have not bee much developed. I have never had occasion to apologize or ask for salt in tp. There is another another whole area to explore, possibly even before we translate a book. For the civilities mentioned, it seems that 'pona' promenade minor variation works for all but apologies, which is just 'ike mi'
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jan Pinsen
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Re: mi wile sona e ijo pi mute lili! (Several small questions)

Post by jan Pinsen »

Ah, right, thanks—I was unsure about that one, because I saw it used with "pi" on the website I linked earlier, and without on the Memrise courses I mentioned earlier. I thought perhaps without "pi", "ijo nanpa tu" would be something like "two number-things" or "two numbered things".

mi jan sama ni: tenpo mute la, ona li wile mute toki e nimi lili ni: ona li pana e pilin pona tawa jan ante.
I'm the kind of person who often tends to use a lot of those civilities. It might be tricky for me to suppress that aspect of myself, but at least for the time being, I can try.

I guess depending on the context, you can use "mi pakala" or "pakala mi" or "mi ike" or "ike mi" to say "sorry", right? They all sound slightly different, but probably work at least somewhat, it seems to me. It's like "I made a mistake", "my mistake", "I did wrongly/poorly", "my bad", respectively, probably.
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Re: mi wile sona e ijo pi mute lili! (Several small questions)

Post by janKipo »

The change, or final decision, about 'pi nanpa' is relatively recent, so there are several cases of the older form around. The new form could indeed mean the things you suggest, but probably don't. Context is important in tp.
jan pi sama ni ('jan sama ni" is "this kinsman")
pi expect that, should more face to face interactions take place in tp, we will develop beyond 'toki' and 'pona' an 'mi tawa'' and ,tawa pona'. But not so far and not from some inner drive. The apologies work about as you suggest and are all about equally effective.
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jan Pinsen
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Re: mi wile sona e ijo pi mute lili! (Several small questions)

Post by jan Pinsen »

Interesting about the "jan sama ni" phrase—I thought "sama" worked the way I saw it there, but either I read wrongly before or some other people were just using it wrongly themselves, then. It makes sense, though; if it worked without "pi" like I used it, that would have meant another special case.

What do you mean by "not from some inner drive"? An inner drive of our characters, as in some of us wanting to express more civilities?
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Re: mi wile sona e ijo pi mute lili! (Several small questions)

Post by janKipo »

Changes will probably come because some of us well brought up boojies will feel that tp is impolite, even rude, so we will try to introduce some ameliorating conventions, which are so much essier than genuine or even habitual regard for others, which is the underlying motivation in much of tp. tp per se doesn,t need these because the problem "solved" is not there.
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jan Pinsen
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Re: mi wile sona e ijo pi mute lili! (Several small questions)

Post by jan Pinsen »

I see your point. Personally, I would be fine either way; as I said, I tend to like the conventional civilities, but I also kind of like the implicit/genuine regard for others that you described, or as you also put it, assumed mutual appreciation. I guess we'll all just have our own input in it and then see how it goes like that.
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