Lesson 11: Making words you don't have§
This is the skill that makes a small vocabulary enough. Four markers turn an action into a noun:
| no + verb | the one who does it | no tofo teacher, no wungu leader |
| ge + verb | the thing done or made | ge iko news ("what's told") |
| du + verb | the thing used for it | du nawi something to eat with |
| pu + verb | the place for it | pu wopo bedroom ("place for sleeping") |
The base can be a whole verb phrase: no isi se guyi "traveller" ("one who goes from home"). It runs to the end of its phrase, so put a comma before a verb that follows it.
For the person an action is done to, there's ewo man gun tofo student ("person who is taught"). To link to a noun, use pi or a verb: pu pi mabo an office ("place of paper"), no obu se yaye an alien ("one who comes from the sky").
For opposites, mu plus a word gives "not X" (mu upe "not good"), and many words also have an opposite word of their own (yomo "bad").
Ready-made compounds, such as du sunbu "computer" ("thing for counting"), are in the compounds list.
Things the whole world names the same way are borrowed in their international form, without en: foto photo, imeyilu email, intalunetu internet, dola dollar, kilamita kilometre.
Computer words are everyday words: search ditun, delete nuton, share peton, copy gayen, add ginni, download dunu, install yaga, turn on/off benbi/tapi.
For anything else, describe it. Don't know "spider"? Say noso meli pi bendo feli "small animal of many legs". Describing is a normal part of speaking it.