Re: OT: onomatopoiesis

In a message dated 6/19/01 4:38:24 PM, frterminus@YAHOO.COM writes:

<<   Q. quoro- 'choke' should become por, according to
the rules, but instead became chor, because the velar
ch /x/ sounds more like a choking sound. >>

    There are lots in my first language.  Sarasa is the weather verb for "to
rain", and I made it so because that's what rain sounds like to me.  Same for
"to cough", which is xakaka (or xakaqa; I don't remember).  What are some
others...?  I think I made the word ?a?a?a mean "to gasp for air", other than
its original meaning, which is to use the letter/sound [?] (glottal stop).
But I have tons of others.  And puns or jokes, too (I remember this came up
awhile back).  For instance, I can't stand alcohol, so I gave it its original
Arabic, qAHIl, where [H] is a voiceless, phyryngeal fricative.  Same with
cofee, where I just made it as difficult to pronounce as possible: NeqIG,
where [g] is a voiced, velar fricative.  A friend of mine named Eliza really
likes the band the Cure, so I made the verb for "to cure" after her name:
?alaza.  I use lots of people's names, since most have basically three
consonant sounds in them (or dominant consonant sounds), and Megdevi is based
on triconsonantal roots.  I love Jon Bon Jovi, so the word for "great" is
"dZabidZ"...  Et cetera.

-David