Left and Right

[Jan Tomen]

I like the open / pini approach.

For the north/south problem, North has bears and south has penguins. Ma soweli / ma waso could work. After all, "artic" means, literally, "land of bears" from its greek root.

Other option is considering north as the magnetic pole, the way compasses point to, as the default direction. So tawa nasin, towars the way would be north and "nasin ante", simply the other way, south


I live in southern Spain
Mi lon ma Epanja pi nasin ante

[janKipo]

Chinese compasses point south, so about one quarter of the world is messed up by that choice. But more practically, "North" and"South" are not up for discussion. 'lete' and 'seli' have been in the language since the beginning and are enshrined in countless texts and textbooks and word list. They are not going to change in the near future. Just think of them as arbitrary, rather than thinking too much about other
meanings of the words.

[Jan Tomen]

That makes sense. Thanks!

[janU]

In yin and yang,
Yin means right, shade, inside, moon, female.
Yang means left, brightness, outside, sun, male.

Sun and moon are very common representations for yin and yang. So how about using poka mun for right and poka suno for left?

Even though this is from a specific culture, what would be universal other than asymmetrical body parts and the fact that most people are right handed?



For north south east and west you could try saying the top direction, bottom, right, left. North is often associated with being up, south is associated with being down, and so on.

[janKipo]

tp is written from left to right, so “left” is ‘poka open’ and “right is ‘poka pini’. Something from tp culture, not borrowed from someone else, like a mapping convention.
On the other hand, we are boreocentric about “north” (‘lete’) and “south” (‘seli’). “east” and “west” are from the sun, which kindly rises on the same side everywhere “east” is ‘open/kama/ sewi suno’ and west is the opposite, ‘pini/tawa/anpa suno’.
But you knew all that.