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% toki pona page 4 - verbs and objects % /dev/urandom % march 2020
The vocabulary for this page:
| word | meaning | derived from |
|---|---|---|
| e | (specifies an object) | unknown origin |
| ijo | thing, object | Esperanto "io" (something) |
| ilo | tool, machine, device | Esperanto "ilo" (tool) |
| lipu | book, document, paper | Finnish "lippu" (flag, banner) |
| lukin | eye, to look, to see, to seek to | Tok Pisin "lukim" (see, look at) |
| olin | love, compassion, affection | Serbo-Croatian "volim" (I love) |
| pali | to do, to work, to make, labor | Esperanto "fari" (do, make) |
| pana | to give, to send, to emit | Finnish "panna" (put, set, place) |
| telo | water, fluid, to water, to clean | Acadian French "de l'eau" (water) |
| tomo | home, room, structure | Esperanto "domo" (house) |
To add a verb to the sentence, use the following structure:
[noun] li [verb]
For example,
mije li pali. - A man is working. / A man works.
Both the noun and the verb can have adjectives added after it.
jan wawa li pali pona. - A strong person is working well.
%info% Verbs don't have any tense information in them. A way to specify time will be explained in a later page.
To add an object -- the thing that the verb applies to -- use the particle "e" for a following structure:
[subject] li [verb] e [object]
jan wawa li pali e tomo. - A strong person is (building/working on) a house.
Objects can also have adjectives added to them.
jan pali li pana e moku pona. - A worker gives out good food.
Here are some sentences:
jan pona mi li pona e ilo lukin. - My friend is (improving/fixing) a looking instrument (glasses, binoculars, microscope, etc.).
mi telo e moku. - I clean the food.
mi olin e meli mi. - I love my wife.
Since the word "lukin" itself describes the act of seeing someone, rather than their appearance, complimenting someone on the latter would usually be expressed as:
sina pona lukin. - You look good (are "good visually").
Exercises
Now, try to figure out the meaning of these sentences.
- jan lili li pana e telo lukin.
- ona li lukin e lipu.
- soweli ike li utala e meli.
- jan utala li moku e kili suli.
- soweli lili li moku e telo.
- mi telo e ijo suli.
And try to translate the following sentences into toki pona.
- She loves every person.
- The bathroom (house of water) is good.
- I hand out documents.
- An evil warrior is looking at your house.
- My instrument is working well.
%spoiler%
- A child is crying (emitting eye water).
- (He/she/they) look at a document.
- The bad animal is attacking a woman.
- The warrior is eating a big (fruit/vegetable/mushroom).
- Little animals are drinking water.
- I am (watering/cleaning) something big.
%spoiler%
- ona li olin e jan ale.
- tomo telo li pona.
- mi pana e lipu.
- jan utala ike li lukin e tomo sina.
- ilo mi li pali pona.