Kamakawi Word of the Day

mono

• (n.) canoe
• (v.) to go by canoe

A male mono ei poiu a…
“And now I’m going to canoe away…”

Notes: Something like, “And now I’m taking my ball and going home.” It’s the first week of the fantasy football playoffs, and I’m not in them. I finished with a 7-7 record, behind even the terrible division winner who finished with an 8-6 record. Total bummer. On the other hand, in my friend’s league, which I’ve been helping out in, we finished with a 12-1-1 record and got a bye in the first round in a three tier playoff system. We’ve been relying on the Jets’ defense, but picked up the Broncos’ D at the last minute, so I think we should be good.

Today’s iku is another that’s based off mo, which is one of my favorites. All the iku based off mo turned out to be pretty good, in my opinion (that one and nu). And to me, it kind of looks like a canoe (or somehow the triangle reminds me of rowing a canoe). If I ever have a canoe, I’ll probably paint this on there. Or on an oar. Maybe both…

itai

• (v.) to flee
• (n.) flight, fleeing
• (adj.) fleeing

Itai ia!
“Run away!”

Notes: A few days ago, I posted a word whose iku was a bit of a mystery to me. Turns out that iku (whose meaning is “slow”) was based on this one. Now to explain this iku…

As I see it, I think this iku is simply iconic. The “ground” determinative is being used literally, and the little “F” figure there is, I think, a dude running away (along the ground). That’s the best explanation I can come up with. Sometimes after I was, like, three or four hours into a glyph-making session, I just started coming up with stuff, and after awhile, like a syntax student looking at semi-grammatical sentences, everything starts to look acceptable.

It certainly does fit the pattern of Kamakawi iku that use the “ground” determinative well, though. Looks just like one of those. And so it is!

iunu

• (v.) to be slow
• (adj.) slow
• (adv.) slowly

Ale iunu, ale iunu…
“Go slow, go slow…”

Notes: This one’s a quote from a Fela Kuti song “Go Slow” (great one).

This iku is a bit of a mystery to me. We have the “ground” determinative there and also the “bad” line determinative, and that’s obvious enough. That “F” shape, though, has me puzzled… Could be something going fast (maybe a bird), and then the “bad” line determinative tells you it’s not that—i.e. it’s not fast, but slow.

OH! Ha, ha. Actually, it’s built off another glyph. So this one is both an ikuleyaka and an iku’ume. We haven’t seen that word yet, but now that I know it exists, I’ll be sure to put it up. I think it’s pretty good, the relationship; it makes sense.

aeiu

• (v.) to enter, to go into
• (prep.) into

Aeiu ia, talima!
“Enter, human!”

Notes: HAPPY CATURDAY!!!

Here’s another shot of Keli enjoying the tower she got from her auntie Sylvia Sotomayor:

She loves the top, loves the middle (which is where she is in this picture), loves the little ball toy, loves the rope-wrapped pole—just loves every little bit of it! Christmas came early for her this year.

My hope is that familiarity with this new piece of cat furniture will soften her to the other one we got for her that she won’t touch. We’ll see…

na’u

• (v.) to be far from
• (adj.) far
• (prep.) far from

Na’u uei iu ileleya.
“We are far from home.”

Notes: I just installed the latest OS for the iPhone. Look at all this crazy stuff! Clouds, automatic syncing, free text messaging… We’re getting closer and closer to Star Trek: The Next Generation. And me, I like it! Makes my life easier.

Today’s post is special. With na’u, I now have three hundred and sixty-five foma: One for each day of the year. I’m nowhere near to being done with the foma of Kamakawi (figure I’ve got about two hundred to go), but if I wanted to, I could produce a Kamakawi Word of the Day daily desk calendar with nothing but foma (and, now that I think about it, I probably could’ve done so long ago if it was one of those calendars that rolls Saturday and Sunday into a single day…). Pretty cool.

Regarding today’s iku, it’s actually built off of hu: the little na is built off the horizontal line (the brow) that sits in the middle of the hu head. It might’ve been pronounced huna, but that glyph has an ikuleyaka for its iku, so this one was free for na’u.

olomoko

• (v.) to walk with (someone)
• (n.) used to describe the settling of a disagreement (or used to mean “the settling of a disagreement”)

Kava olomoko i’i.
“Fire walk with me.”

Notes: Just acame across the coolest thing for Twin Peaks fans (and that should be all y’all, nahmean?). For those who weren’t following the internet back then, someone produced an NES-style side-scrolling game version of The Great Gatsby which is an absolute riot (I highly recommend it!). To me, that was the crowning achievement of faux-retro literary gaming, but today’s revelation is definitely worth of note.

An…entity referred to as jak locke has released (apparently awhile back, so excuse me if you’ve seen this before) an Atari-style game called Black Lodge 2600. You take control of Dale Cooper as he tries to escape the Black Lodge with his life and his identity. It’s everything you’d hope it should be. I haven’t gotten too far, but hopefully one day I’ll make it out.

I dusted off the ol’ Kamakawi applicative (derivation? inflection? a little from column A, a little from column B…?) to create today’s word. In Kamakawi, I have a very clear idea of how you’d use the nominal form, but I can’t seem to define it very well in English (possibly [or probably] because I have a massive headache). Hopefully that’s enough to give you the idea, though.

peka’u'u

• (n.) homeland

Kiko nemei ei ie peka’u'u li’i.
“Today I leave my homeland.”

Notes: I’m currently sitting in the John Wayne Airport (not at my actual gate, since there—and nowhere else—the outlets aren’t working) getting ready to fly to the wilds of eastern North Dakota. I won’t be there long, though, as I’ll immediately head over to western Minnesota for the 2011 Faith, Reason & World Affairs Symposium to spread the good word about conlanging. It should be fun, provided it isn’t going to be as cold as the Weather Channel seems to think it’s going to be (no room for a jacket). Plenty nice in the airport, presently.

We’ll see if I can keep up with the word of the day posts. If anything, I should only miss a day—two at the most. I’ve got other things to do with the computer right now, though, so I’m going to attend to those. Happy day to one and all!

layo

• (v.) to crawl
• (n.) crawling
• (adj.) crawling

Male layo ei…
“I’m gonna crawl…”

Notes: From the Led Zeppelin song of the same name. Great song.

I thought I’d do layo today since I did a derivation of its reduplicated form earlier. I figure crawling is one of those intrinsically human things. It’s something all humans do, at one point in their lives. I would be really surprised to see a language with a non-basic word for crawl.

(Though, of course, the reduplicated form is much more commonly used in Kamakawi.)

ivei

• (n.) jump

Ivei feya!
“Nice jump!”

Notes: HAPPY CATURDAY!!!

Keli has this thing we got her that has a little ball that lights in a circular track with a scratching pad in the middle. She loves this thing. It’s enjoyed quite a bit of use since we bought it. But even more than playing with it on its own, what she loves more than anything is when part of the track is covered up. We used to do this with stray sheets of paper (we’d just put them right over the track). This time, Erin shaded half of it with the draping for our chair. Here are the results:

Ha! What a cat! Did you notice that little waggle she gives when she’s ready to pounce? That’s how you know she’s ready.

To see whence this word derives, go to fei, where you’ll see a picture of Keli in her youth (she was quite the scrawny cat!).

ueke

• (v.) to carry

He pataki: A male ueke ia i ipe ivila!
“Boy: You’re gonna carry that weight!”

Notes: From the famous Beatles’ song.

Hey, speaking of the Beatles, and their mantra “love” (it’s the word), recognize that ol’ iku up there? It’s a rather familiar one (or at least to me). It happens to be an ikunoala for eli (and that shouldn’t be too hard to see, given the word’s phonology), but it does rather look like someone carrying something, and so with a stroke, it become the iku for ueke.