Kamakawi Word of the Day

puliu

• (v.) to salivate
• (adj.) salivating
• (n.) saliva, spit, spittle

A puliu palaki oi’ia i’i a!
“You’re dog’s slobbering on me!”

Notes: Today’s iku looks like a few others (e.g. huna), but somehow it means “salivate”. I think it’s the little line under the mouth… It kind of looks like that. Doesn’t it?

I remember creating a whole bunch of these “veiled face” iku (where “a whole bunch” could very well mean three). To me, they almost look too realistic for the system (which is odd, since they’re composed of straight lines and nothing more), but I’ve stuck with them. Might as well celebrate them, I guess.

Update: Oh! I just realized that the three lines above the mouth are there because they come from the iku for lelea, which means “water”. Ha! Kind of gross.

fava

• (n.) dust
• (adj.) dusty
• (v.) to be dusty

A fava heka.
“The air is dusty.”

Notes: This is another one os those iku that I’m sure I had a good reason for, but whose raison d’être I can’t, at the moment, remember. It looks like it might have fa in there on top, but I can’t explain the extra lines. As for the “ground” determinative, that’s as it should be (or at least it makes sense to me [it's below the dust, see]). I’m sure the etymology will come to me some day.

fewa

• (n.) the non-white part of the eye (pupil and iris)

Au ele fewa o lea takeke leveya.
“His eyes are blue like the sea.”

Notes: In Kamakawi, you refer to the fewa’s color specifically, not just the eye (which is mata).

Today’s iku is, of course, the iku for i. As it looks like an eye from the side, the “identity” determinative is put beneath it for the word fewa.

or

loi

• (n.) square
• (adj.) square
• (v.) to be square

Loi lipo.
“The box is square.”

Notes: Ha, ha! You can say a box is “square” as opposed to “rectangular”; you don’t need to say “cubical”. (Referring to an old debate.)

Loi is one of those words that can be spelled in different ways depending on who’s doing it. The first iku is a combination of lo and oi. The second is simply a square with the “identity” determinative beneath it. The iku does enjoy use elsewhere, but it’s pretty clear when it means “square” and when it means “to quadruple”, I think.

una

• (adj.) gentle
• (n.) gentleness
• (v.) to be gentle

Una ia!
“Be gentle!”

Notes: This iku is a bit of a mystery. It contains neither u nor na, and almost kind of looks like fupu. I’m pretty sure the two words aren’t related (why would they be?), but I’m not sure just what I was thinking here… Of course, the “good” circle determinative is used, so it’s clear that this means something positive, but how the rest of it is supposed to relate to una I have no idea.

The thing is, looking at this, I know I had some specific idea in mind. But what was it?!

OH!

Oh, duh. And, yeah, that makes perfect sense.

Okay, never mind. This iku is built off the iku for kopu. It means “hand” and also “to feel” or “to touch”. By adding the “good” circle determinative, then, it means “good to touch” or “soft to the touch”—hence “gentle”. Makes perfect sense.

(By the way, if you go back and check out that post on kopu, I have since purchased my wife an Oven Squirrel.)

fili

• (v.) to put down, to let go of, to release, to let drop, to drop
• (adj.) dropped
• (adj.) dropping

Fili ia i ipe!
“Put that down!”

Notes: Today’s iku may look familiar. In fact, it’s a smallified (totally dig that word I just coinified) version of…wow. WOW. I seriously haven’t done kau yet?! And here I thought I was running out of iku…

Well, take my word for it: The top part is a miniature version of kau, which means “down” or “downwards”. It has the familiar “ground” determinative beneath it to give the sense that something is moving towards the ground. And there you have the iku for fili. Up next some time: the iku for kau…

eta

• (n.) fat (of an animal)
• (v.) to have lots of fat
• (adj.) having lots of fat, fatty (in the corporeal sense)

Oku meimei nukoa oku: eta kupae.
“There’s no meat left: only fat.”

Notes: Today’s word refers only to the substance “fat”; it’s not a descriptive adjective.

Describing this iku as an ikuleyaka is a bit convenient… It’s clear that the iku is based on the iku for nukoa, “meat”; what isn’t clear is what’s going on underneath. What it looks like to me is that the meat is roasting on a spit, and the fat is dripping off (hence the three lines, instead of the one). I’m not sure if this is what I intended, though, so calling it an ikuleyaka seems like a safe way to characterize the difference between it and nukoa.

Also, if you’d like to go back in time, now you can see how feta was built off of this iku.

hawe

• (n.) wishbone

Male i imi i ape o eya: hawe.
“There’ll be good luck for one of us: wishbone.”

Notes: I intended to link to the song I’m quoting above (“Wishbone” by Eleni Mandell), but it’s not on YouTube. This is insane. Eleni Mandell is probably the best thing to happen to LA music since Guns N’ Roses (not that the two sound anything alike), and no one seems to have noticed. Ticks me right off.

So forget today’s iku (which may look familiar): I command you to go to listen to some Eleni Mandell. One of my favorite songs from her early stuff is up (“Meant to Be in Love”), in addition to one of the standouts from my favorite album of hers, Snakebite. Many will have heard her cover of “I Love Paris” that was featured on a Carl’s Jr. commercial, but this one should have been equally as popular (from the same era). From her most recent album, this song is my absolute favorite—and easily one of the best she’s ever done.

I swear. People be crazy sometimes.

oko

• (n.) drum

Au noala oko!
“The drums are sounding!”

Notes: The frost if off the ground: Moving day is at hand.

It’s a new year, and it’s time for some news. I’ve done 731 words of Kamakawi so far, and it’s been fun. But this pace is absolutely exhausting (as evidenced by when this post and the last one went up in real time), and I can’t keep it up. There’s no way I’ll be able to put up every word of Kamakawi (there are several thousand, and I’m not even at a thousand yet), but I did vow to at least get all the foma up, and that I’ll do. Once I’ve got them all up, though, this blog will become the Kamakawi Word of the Every-So-Often-If-That (or something similar). I may drop in and do a word now and then, but there won’t be a word everyday.

That said, there’s got to be at least 200 foma left, and they don’t always fit with the caturday pictures, so there may yet be another full year of “daily” Kamakawi word posts. But I’m letting my many fan (no typo. I elea, Anatoni!) know that the end is coming. Probably some time after the new Mayan calendar begins, but it’s coming.

Thanks for following along or dropping in every now and then! It’s nice to have an online catalogue of all these glyphs, so they exist somewhere other than in my computer. Have a happy new year!

io

• (n.) dove

A hava ipe io iu fa li’i!
“That dove’s eating my seeds!”

Notes: Lousy doves! Always pecking away at all the seeds you worked so hard to sow! How would they feel if we went to their farms and pecked away at their seeds, huh?!

Okay, actually I got nothing against doves. They’re pretty cool birds. And I can’t imagine doves flying to a farm and eating the seeds lying on the ground…

The iku is an ikunoala, but it requires the “identity” determinative to get the “dove” meaning, so it’s classified as an ikuleyaka. For the other meaning, check tomorrow’s post.

Update: No, it’s not an ikunoala! I figured it out! For a detailed explanation, see tomorrow’s post. Spoiler alert: