Re: Vocab #5

>    Brought to you by C (for coffee), the distinction between
> perfective and
> habitual past tenses, and intensive adjectives.
I have labored over this translation exercise for several days now. This is
the first translation i have done for Minyeva besides making up random
sentences for myself. I had to invent a bunch of stuff to handle certain
constructions... translation should get easier in the future though :)

First a note on the design goals for Minyeva... they have kind of wavered
over the years. Some of you might remember Malat, the previous name for this
language. That was intended to be a logical language. I have strayed away
from that original design goal. It could now be best described as a personal
language. It's not really an artlang because it will have no culture, and it
won't have irregularities like natural languages. It will be a regular
language, actually following some auxlang goals, but it definitely isn't an
auxlang. It is admittedly a western-centric language.

My ultimate goal could be considered somewhat strange and/or cultish: I plan
to marry someone willing to learn this language, then we will speak it to
our kids, thus creating native speakers in the language. Thus a future will
be secured for my language :)

Thus, most nounal forms will have direct correlations to english ones.
However, the verbal system will be rather unique & different, as that can
generally be culturally independent.

phonology:
-same as english: p,b,f,v,m,t,d,s,z,k,g,l,m,n,w,y
-same as spanish: a,e,i,o,u,r
-others: c = /S/, j = /Z/, q = /N/

----------
>    1. coffee / bitter drink / culturally distinctive drink
 = grefka.

>        I used to drink coffee.
kwa le lutivu    i   grefka.
PST I  drink.HAB PAT coffee

notes: the tense is marked for the whole sentence, and occurs at the
beginning as a separate word.

----------
>    2. tea / herbal tea
 = nwacki.

>         I drank the tea in one gulp.
kwa le luti  e    tciketi fwa i   nwacki te.
PST I  drink INST swallow one PAT tea----the
lit: I drank with one swallow the tea.

notes: I moved the articles/determiners/numbers to be after the nouns, like
adjectives. Also, the instrument case can be used with either concrete
objects or with actions.

----------
>    3. steep / brew
 = tseku (to soak)

>        She used to steep the tea for 10 minutes, but she steeped this cup
> for only 7 minutes.
kwa go  tsekuvu  i   nwacki te  a   kyo kope   nya,
PST she soak.HAB PAT tea----the TIM for minute ten,

tco go  tseku i   vetagotu kre  a   kyo kope   syo   fre.
but she soak  PAT ful.cup--this TIM for minute seven only.

notes: the root 'veta' is an interesting one that i invented. It basically
means "a(ny) container's unit contents". It can be used for quite a wide
range of things: cup-ful (of liquid), gas-tank-ful (of gas), can-ful (of
soda), trash-can-ful (of trash), kleenex-box-ful (of kleenex). So, one could
say "how much gas do you want?" and you could say "give me a 'veta'!"
(meaning "fill 'er up!"). Naturally this word is pretty context sensitive.

----------
>    4. pastry / biscuits / cookies
 = nyetu (a pastry)

>        She had pastry with her coffee once.
kwa go  pano      i   nyetu  da o  pye  grefka o  zo  a   fwalau.
PST she eat/drink PAT pastry-a  OF with coffee OF her TIM once

notes: the case 'o' means "of" by default, but a preposition can be put
after it to adjust its meaning. Alienable/inalienable posession is specified
in this way. 'zo' refers back to the original agent, so in this case it is
'her'.

>        She had pastry with her coffee every day.
kwa go  panovu  i   nyetu  da o  pye  grefka o  zo  a   veva zwe.
PST she eat.HAB PAT pastry-a  OF with coffee OF her TIM day  each.

notes: 'zwe' means "all taken individually", and 'tca' means "all taken
together". So, if the last word on this sentence were 'tca', it would mean
"she had one pastry total, eating part of it each day with her coffee".

----------
>    5. milk
 = zema

>        She doesn't take milk in her tea.
go  mye zya      kunivu  i   nwacki o  zo  u   zema
she not allowing add.HAB PAT tea    OF her FOC milk
lit: she doesn't allow milk to be added to her tea.

----------
>    6. bitter
 = pseka

>        The coffee was very bitter today.
kwa psekavi       grefka te  a   veva kre.
PST bitter.is.INT coffee-the TIM day  this.

notes: pseka is used as a verbal adjective here. '-vi' is intensive.

>        The coffee was bitter every day.
kwa psekavivu         grefka te  a   veva zwe.
PST bitter.is.INT.HAB coffee-the TIM day  each.

----------
>    7. sweet
 = leza

>        He likes his tea too strong and too sweet for us.
vole va u   lo   pseka     ju  leza     ju  nwacki o  zo
like he FOC that bitter.is-too sweet.is-too tea    of him

u   ca   sai  mao.
FOC inc. wrt. us.

lit: he likes that his tea is too sweet and too bitter, incidentally too
much for us.

notes: 'zo' refers back to the original agent, in this case 'he'. the
particle 'ca' is basically a remarking vs. determining particle, meaning it
is parenthetical. So, if it wasn't present, the sentence would mean "he
likes that his tea is too sweet and too strong for us.", basically
commenting on his sadistic personality. I'm still not sure about the
construction of my sentence though, and it might change later...

----------
>    8. wired / the feeling obtained after drinking 43 cups of coffee
 = dove (energetic)

>        That guy is wired! He drinks too much coffee.
dove     samlo pri!  va luti   i   grefka loi  ju.
wired.is man---that! he drinks PAT coffee much-too

----------
>    9. mellow / calm / soothing (of music)
 = qico

>         The music they play is too mellow for my taste.
qico    ju  u   sai  le ceva  te  o  lo   lunavu      tce
calm.is-too FOC wrt. me music-the OF THAT perform.HAB they
lit: it is too calim to me, the music that they play.

----------
>    10. street vendor / coffee house / tea bar / the culturally appropriate
> place to buy a cup of tea or coffee
 = kafigrefka (kafi = store/shop)

>         That street vendor always had the best tea, but then his
> wife left him.
kwa pyo    filevu   kafigrefkado       pri  u   nwacki o  lejamya,
PST always have.HAB coffee.store.owner-that FOC tea    OF good.est,

cao   zato  favinyo o  va  u   va.
until leave wife    of him FOC him.

notes: i was having issues translating 'but then' until i saw kala tunu's
translation which used "until". It works out better :) the suffix '-do'
means 'person associated with', akin to esperanto's '-ul'.

>    (note: in #10, it's a habitual past followed by a perfective)
>
>    [p.s. In honor of my becoming the manager of the grad student coffee
> house on campus. Yay!]
>
>    Aidan
I can't wait to labor over the next one :)

--
Garrett Jones
http://www.alkaline.org