First time here. A couple questions...

[Jethro]

Toki!

I'm trying to translate 'A long time ago, the roof of the building had fallen in, and a large tree had grown in the sacristry'. At the moment, I have this:

Tenpo pini suli la lawa pi tomo li pakala. Kasi suli li kama tan tomo pi ilo sewi.

Which is fine, but it doesn't suggest that the tree is also old. Saying:

Tenpo pini suli la lawa pi tomo li pakala en kasi suli li kama tan tomo pi ilo sewi.

of course isn't allowed, but gives a more precise idea of meaning. And saying:

Tenpo pini suli la lawa pi tomo li pakala. Tenpo pini suli la kasi suli li kama tan tomo pi ilo sewi.

Is ridiculous and clunky.

Any suggestions?

I'm also wondering about this:

Sina wile moku kepeken jan Alfred anu lukin e sitelen tawa kepeken mi?

Should be 'Do you want to eat with Alfred, or watch a movie with me?'. I'm not sure if my use of 'anu' is correct here - I haven't seen it used to link whole predicates before, only noun phrases.

Also something about chaining 'la' phrases:

Ken la Tenpo suli kama la mi kama suli tan tomo pi kama wawa la sina moku kepeken mi?

Looking at the rules, each use of la on its own is valid, but I haven't seen anything about chaining them together.
(Sentence should be 'Maybe, in a while, if I go to the gym, you will want to eat with me?')

Any help would be much appreciated!

Thanks all!

[jan_Lope]

toki!

All official Toki Pona words are written in lower case - even at the beginning of the sentence.
After "pi" you have to write at least two words (a noun and an adjective or a pronoun and adjective).
The conjunction "en" connects nouns and pronouns only.
Maybe the verb "kasi" (to grow) is better than "kama".
You can use the transitive verb "lupa" (to pierce).

tenpo pini suli la lawa tomo li pakala. tenpo pini suli kin la kasi li kasi, lon tomo li lupa e lawa tomo.


I'm also wondering about this too Maybe it should be:

sina wile moku, lon poka jan "Alfred" anu lukin e sitelen tawa, lon poka mi?

Chaining "la" phrases are possible. But for me more than two "la" phrases are not good Toki Pona style.

ken la tenpo kama la ... is ofen use for "Maybe in the future ...".


Please see these lessons:
https://jan-lope.github.io/Toki_Pona_lessons_English/

For spell and grammar check you can use the Toki Pona Parser
https://jan-lope.github.io/Toki_Pona-Parser/

[janKipo]

Always a pleasant surprise to find myself agreeing with most of Lope’s remarks. Just a few modifications from community usage as opposed to Lope’s rather stringent requirements.
‘pi’ sets off any multi-word odifier, not just those composed o a noun+adjective (in partiular, prepositional phrases get ‘pi’ when serving as modifiers).
‘en can go just about anywhere, though not between sentences, oddly. Between predicates and direct objects it is usually not used, in favor of repeated ‘li’ and repeated ‘e’.
‘kasi’ “to grow” is not common; ‘kasi’ seems usually to mean “to plant”. ‘kama suli’ or even just ‘suli’ seems to be common for “grow”.
‘lupa’ is good, though it hasn’t been used much.
‘kepeken’ is “with” in the sense of “use as a tool”, so picture using Alfred to shovel in food, like a fork. The community is divided on the “with” of accompaniment. Some use ‘lon poka” but notice that ‘poka’ is a noun here, so what seems to be the object of the preposition is actually a modifier of ‘poka’ (the actual object of the preposition) so, ‘lon poka pi jan “Alfred”’ (community doesn’t use the foreign quotes much, either). The rest of the community uses ‘poka’ alone as a preposition, so ‘poka jan Alfred’
Chains of ‘la’s of any length are grammatical. They tend to group right (leftmost member modifies all the ones that follow). But too many of them is bad style (just where the line comes dends on the situation, but usually there is a better way to deal with something that takes, say, four or more). In your case, I don’t see a good dodge, except to be a bit more assertive than the two tentative markers at the beginning.

[Jethro]

Thank you both! I'm glad to find my mistakes quickly. I'm surprised to be encountering elements of contention so soon. It seems I'll be missing my 'fluent in a week' target though...

Thanks for the tip on capitals - I'm surprised I hadn't noticed already!

You can use the transitive verb "lupa" (to pierce).

tenpo pini suli la lawa tomo li pakala. tenpo pini suli kin la kasi li kasi, lon tomo li lupa e lawa tomo.

Is 'lupa' being used to clarify that the roof has fallen in? Also, it looks like you've used 'lon' to link two sentences together - I'm interested to see that that's allowed with the 'en' rule.

Jan Kipo, so would you say my use of 'pi' was correct for 'lawa pi tomo'? Or is 'lawa tomo' better?
Also thanks for all the counter-clarifications too


Doing a little more digging it seems my use of anu wasn't a problem at all. I'd be interested to know why the chaining sentences with 'en' rule exists though - it seems it could save breath over reintroducing the context in a second sentence. Is it because it can be mistaken for linking immediately preceding and following nouns? But even then, I can see the same problem occurring for other prepositions...

Use of 'poka' is good to know - certainly makes more sense than what I was doing. I reckon I'll stick to the short option, unless there's a reason not to you haven't mentioned...

You two have been super-helpful, thanks for all the help!

[jan_Lope]

Is 'lupa' being used to clarify that the roof has fallen in?

"lupa e" is here an transitive verb: to pierce, to stab, to perforate
(The old tree pierced the roof.)

Also, it looks like you've used 'lon' to link two sentences together

No, "lon" is a preposition here. It means "be (located) in/at/on". The comma before stops phrases and it make clear here can only be a preposition.

The separator "pi" is used for building compound nouns. After "pi" has to be at least two words until to the next separator.

Doing a little more digging it seems my use of anu wasn't a problem at all. I'd be interested to know why the chaining sentences with 'en' rule exists though - it seems it could save breath over reintroducing the context in a second sentence. Is it because it can be mistaken for linking immediately preceding and following nouns? But even then, I can see the same problem occurring for other prepositions...

You build an alternative-question with the conjunction "anu" this was right.

You can use this lessons and dictionary:
https://jan-lope.github.io/Toki_Pona_lessons_English/

For spelling, grammar Check and ambiguity check of Toki Pona Sentences you can use the Toki pona Parser:
https://jan-lope.github.io/Toki_Pona-Parser/

pona!

[janKipo]

Sorry I missed the ‘pi tomo’ (wrong as Lope says).
‘anu’ sems exempt from all the restrictions there are on ‘en’. I don’t know why; all the practical reasons seem to apply to ‘anu’ as well (I tend to ignore the restrictions on ‘en’ except the one between sentences, but even that gets an occasional nudge.)
Generally, Lope has hit all the points.

[Jethro]

I think I see it now: 'kasi li kasi, lon tomo' is one predicate, linked by the following 'li'. Is this correct?

I was reading it as: '...kasi li kasi [end of phrase, new subject] lon tomo li lupa e lawa tomo.', which certainly seems wrong now.

Thanks for all the help! I can already feel I'm going to love finding more rules to break - watch this space

[jan_Lope]

toki!

I think I see it now: 'kasi li kasi, lon tomo' is one predicate, linked by the following 'li'. Is this correct?

The separator li is a grammatical word that separates the subject phrase from the predicate phrase. The predicate marker li is only used when the subject is not mi or sina. After the separator li begins a predicate phrase. In the

tenpo pini suli kin la kasi li kasi, lon tomo li lupa e lawa tomo.

In this sentence there are two predicate phrases:
- kasi, lon tomo (intransitive verb + prepositional object)
- lupa e lawa tomo (transitive verb + direct object)

BTW:

kasi as an transitive verb (with e after it) means: to plant, to grow

Please distinguish between the terms verb and predicate. The predicate is a core element in a sentence and is the statement of the sentence. In most languages, a predicate is formed by a verb, but this is not mandatory in all languages. In Toki Pona the predicate is not necessarily formed by a verb. The difference between verb and predicate is that verb designates a word part and predicate designates a grammatical function. A predicate and possible objects form a predicate phrase.

One of the first principles you'll need to learn about Toki Pona is that there is no form of the verb 'to be' like there is in English. That's why the verb slot can be empty and after mi or sina can follow also a noun or adjective.

Regular sentences can also be formed in other languages without a verb appearing in them. Examples are Russian and Arabic. A noun then functions as a predicate noun or an adjective serves as predicate adjective. But this noun or adjective does not become a verb.

An empty verb slot cannot, however, form a predicate phrase on its own. A noun or adjective must follow. That is, directly after mi or sina the sentence cannot be finished yet.

[janTepanNetaPelin]

Hi Jethro,

a few remarks about this thread:

The particle pi is used to divide a second noun group that describe a first noun group.

-- (from the official Toki Pona book by Sonja Lang (the creator of the language))

pi separates a noun from another noun that has an adjective

-- (from Pije's lessons, that depict a Toki Pona 'version' before the release of the official book)

Also, there is no comma before a preposition, and there is no consensus that "lupa" means "to pierce". (It's worth trying it out though, yet there is no consensus, and there is no "the verb 'lupa'".) The official dictionary says: "NOUN door, hole, orifice, window", so there is no definition for "lupa" as a verb.

[jan_Lope]

Also, there is no comma before a preposition, and there is no consensus that "lupa" means "to pierce". (It's worth trying it out though, yet there is no consensus, and there is no "the verb 'lupa'".) The official dictionary says: "NOUN door, hole, orifice, window", so there is no definition for "lupa" as a verb.

toki!

Is there a logical reason why you can't put optional commas before preposition?

Is there a logical reason why the transitive verb lupa should not exist?