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Re: rotokas; practical syllabarology; et alia

From:Herman Miller <hmiller@...>
Date:Thursday, June 17, 2004, 3:42
Roger Mills wrote:

>>vi papapakepa voririva ipavira "You bought the airplane in the mountains." > > (Assuming papapakepa = airplane, I wonder if it's based on the word for > 'butterfly')
Not quite: "butterfly" is "kokopuo". But "papapakepa" does seem to be the word for "airplane".
>>A lot of these seem like made up examples. It doesn't seem likely that >>anyone ever said "you bought the airplane in the mountains." > > > Perhaps more sensible than buying a boat in the mountains........
They do have an example "He bought the canoe with him up in the mountains": "rera opuruva vorireva rerava ipavira". At first I read it as "brought", but it's "bought" (which doesn't make much sense: what does it mean to buy a canoe with him?)