Q: what other, uncommon words might I encounter?

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This course teaches 131 words. These words are used by at least 60% of Toki Pona speakers. 120 of them were used in 󱤪󱥕 lipu pu — ‘Toki Pona: The Language of Good’ by jan Sonja, which came out in 2014. A few more words became common in community speech. You can think of these words as core or common vocabulary, which lets you talk about anything.

Below is a list of words that are less commonly used, but still in use by some — by at least about 10% of Toki Pona speakers. They exist for several reasons:

• Some of them were created early on, for early drafts of Toki Pona. They are redundant in today’s speech, but some people are interested in this kind of “digital archaeology”!
• Some of them are attempts to fill seeming ‘gaps’ in the language, to make it function better. Let’s discuss why these attempts didn’t sway most proficient speakers!
• Some of them are in-jokes. Let’s explain their history!

Contents

• 󱦅 lanpan
• 󱦂 meso
• 󱥺 oko
• 󱦃 epiku
• 󱦦 su
• 󱦢 majuna
• 󱥿 jasima
• linluwi
• 󱥂󱥝 nimisin
• 󱤄 ali
• 󱦄 kokosila
• usawi
• wuwojiti
• kiki, puwa
• 󱦡 apeja
• powe
• omekapo
• isipin
• te, to
• yupekosi
• san, po
• kamalawala, wasoweli
• kapesi, unu

lanpan

󱦅 lanpan was created in 2017. Its use has remained reasonably stable since then, though still a lot of people report not using it. Its appeal probably comes from wanting an opposition between put (󱥌 pana) and take. The more established way to say “take” is kama jo or ‘to begin to have’.

Over time, it has slowly drifted from meaning ‘to take’ (its original purpose) to instead mean ‘to steal’, so you might think of it as a more specific kind of kama jo.

󱦅 lanpan has enabled the central pun of jan Temili’s lanpan pan, a translation of Jay Foreman’s ‘Stealing Food’.

meso

󱦂 meso was created by jan Olipija in 2020. jan Olipija wanted to be able to describe being ‘hard of hearing’ as neither hearing nor deaf, without emotional connotations. 󱤠󱥈 kute pakala or 󱤠󱤨 kute lili may be unthoughtful, and 󱤠󱤏 kute insa may be misunderstood, for example, as talking about the inner ear.

However, most people using 󱦂 meso today are unaware of its origins, and use it as a generic translation for ‘in-between, middle, average’. For that purpose, 󱤏 insa usually works just fine. 󱤾󱤂 nasa ala or 󱤨 lili might also work for you. Sentences such as these are usually more insightful than 󱦂 meso:

oko

󱥺 oko was one of the early words created for the language, but in her 2014 publication, jan Sonja presented 󱥺 oko and 󱤮 lukin as synonyms. Early Toki Pona wasn’t quite as creative with nouns converting into verbs and the other way round, so as people got better at the language, it became more obvious that 󱤮 lukin, when used a noun, can simply replace 󱥺 oko entirely, so a separate word for ‘eye’ is no longer needed.

epiku

󱦃 epiku was created in 2019, and reached its peak popularity in 2020. It’s most frequently used as an interjection. It’s technically from French, but everyone understands its popularity is directly related to English.

We saw 󱦃 epiku and similar English-derived interjections quite a bit in 2020-2022. As more people became proficient, they began to play around more with common words in these roles instead. Interjections like 󱥵 wawa! became more commonly used, and made these uncommon word interjections obsolete. You can see more examples in lesson 18.

su

󱦦 su refers to the third book by jan Sonja after 󱤪󱥕 lipu pu and 󱤪󱦈 lipu ku. It was published in 2023. Our polling says fewer people use the word 󱦦 su than the words 󱥕 pu and 󱦈 ku. Why is that? The exact cause-and-effect is hard to trace, but here are some observations:

• Our polling is quite recent (within a year after the release of the book), and more books in the series are coming. 󱦦 su could move into the ‘common’ section some time in the future.
• While 󱥕 pu and 󱦈 ku are books about Toki Pona, 󱦦 su is a book in Toki Pona.
• Some people are eager to talk about words and grammar that is or isn’t present in jan Sonja’s works. People like to list the 󱥂󱥕 nimi pu and the 󱥂󱦈 nimi ku. If 󱦦 su is primarily a book, 󱥕 pu and the 󱦈 ku are also a style.

Food for thought: is there a practical difference between thinking of su as a regular word, vs thinking of su as a proper name?

majuna

󱦢 majuna was one of the early words created for the language, but it was not included by jan Sonja in her 2014 publication. It saw a resurgence in 2017, as the early ma pona Discord was keen on early rejected words. Since then, you would see it from time to time. In 2024 its self-reported use jumped up — maybe due to the publication of 󱤪󱦦 lipu su, where jan Sonja uses 󱦢 majuna.

We can talk about oldness with common words:

jasima

jasima was created in 2018. It was probably created to fill some ‘gap’ for the meaning of ‘opposite’. Toki Pona has a preposition sama ‘same as’, but no dedicated preposition meaning ‘opposite to’.

This meaning was very confusing, and so in practice, the word has slowly morphed into something about mirrors. Of course, Toki Pona has many ways to talk about opposition, reflection, and mirrors:

linluwi

linluwi gained popularity in 2020, and has remained relatively stable since then.

The Internet is complicated. It is so important to us, and yet it means something different to everyone. Is it a connection? A collection of devices? A collection of documents? A metaphorical place? The word linluwi gives us a way not to think about it. It is a shortcut that avoids what Toki Pona is best at: breaking down complex ideas into the parts that are important to you.

I enjoy this example of jan Sonja talking about a WiFi network. It is baffling that a home appliance can’t operate on its own, isolated from other devices. kulupu ilo is a great way to say exactly as much as the reader needs to hear, and no more.

Of course, your wording is likely going to be different in another situation! Perhaps it’s important whether the connection is wired or wireless. Or that youre talking to people you know, or just reading posts from people you don’t. Or that you’re not seeing people’s faces, just their texts. Take the time to think of what ‘the Internet’ really means to you, and to your situation!

nimisin

The Toki Pona community has a complicated relationship with Toki Pona words.

1. Some words were created by jan Sonja, others by the community.
2. Some words were created in Toki Pona’s infancy, others in the late 2010s-early 2020s.
3. Some words appear in jan Sonja’s books, others don’t.
4. Some words were created to make the language work better, others to be funny.
5. Some words are genuinely widely used, others are only remembered because they are written down.

To many beginners, this is overwhelming. A shortcut arose organically, without anyone trying hard to make one. Many people, especially learners, started to refer to any word as a nimisin if its community-created, or new, or a joke, or unused, or not featured in the books.

It’s a tempting, simple model, but I don’t think it solves the complexity, it just hides it. 󱥾 tonsi is widely used, but was created in 2019. 󱦀 kijetesantakalu was created as a joke, but some people today use it in earnest. mulapisu was made by jan Sonja, but as a one-off joke in a Discord conversation almost no one remembers today. Which of them are nimisin? None of them? All of them? Nobody knows, because the word isn’t meant to be clear.

If you’re a learner, “used or unused” is the most important thing! For this purpose, we’ve created four categories: “core words”, “common words”, “uncommon words”, “obscure words”. This course only teaches core and common words, and right now you’re reading about uncommon and obscure words.

ali

󱤄 ali is an alternate pronunciation and spelling of 󱤄 ale. The meaning is the same. It was created early on, because some early Toki Pona speakers were uncomfortable with 󱤄 ale being so similar to 󱤂 ala. Since then, 󱤄 ale has been the default or first entry since 2001, including in all official websites and books.

Between 2001 and 2017, both pronunciations were about equally frequent. Starting around 2017, 󱤄 ale started slowly overtaking 󱤄 ali in use. Nowadays, 󱤄 ale is used about 10 times as much as 󱤄 ali.

kokosila

󱥬󱥔󱥨 toki pona taso describes a situation where people agree to talk to each other only in Toki Pona. This usually happens within a Discord channel or an event. 󱥬󱥔󱥨 toki pona taso helps people develop their Toki Pona skills by giving them a reason to speak the language instead of falling back on a different common tongue, like English.

󱦄 kokosila is a recent joke describing a phenomenon in Esperanto: to ‘krokodili’ is to speak among Esperantists in a language besides Esperanto. The most frequent use of 󱦄 kokosila is to call other speakers to get back on the same language we’re here to learn and speak: 󱥄󱦄󱤂 o kokosila ala!. Of course, we can easily do that with just core words:

usawi

usawi was created in 2019 to refer to magic or technology so complex it’s indistinguishable from magic. The technology-related meaning never took off, so today people understand usawi as just magic and everything related to it. Toki Pona can talk about magic using words such as 󱥵 wawa, 󱤾 nasa, and 󱤘 ken:

The word usawi influenced the name of a prominent Toki Pona musician, jan Usawi.

Food for thought: in a world where magic definitely exists, is magic seen as strange, or is it just another ability or strength a person may have?

wuwojiti

wuwojiti is a mnemonic — a memorisation tool to help you remember that the syllables wu, wo, ji, ti do not exist in Toki Pona. It doesn’t really mean anything by itself, other than calling your attention to those syllables.

texture words

kiki and puwa were created in 2020-2021, and refer to how things feel to the touch. They sound much like bouba and kiki, nonsense words created to test sound symbolism across the world’s languages. kiki is directly inspired by bouba and kiki, while puwa is more of a happy coincidence.

Toki Pona can describe sharpness and fluffiness in full sentences. It helps to describe what your skin or hands feels:

apeja

󱦡 apeja was made as ‘an experimental idea in a forum post’ in 2009. In 2016-2020, it was one of the more popular words on this list, and was one of the first words to receive a sitelen pona glyph by the community. Since 2021, it slowly faded to obscurity.

It has got a nice sound and an angsty meaning, so it’s frequently appeared in songs, like jan Lija’s apeja li mi (cover by jan Usawi) or o lape by kala pona Tonyu.

In casual conversation, pilin anpa adequately describes apeja.

powe

󱦣 powe was made at some point in the 2000s. It shares a similar story with 󱦡 apeja: early experiment, received a sitelen pona glyph by the community, declined since 2021. We can express that something is ‘false’ or ‘unreal’ using core words:

omekapo

omekapo was created in 2020 in reference to a 2019 Toki Pona meetup in Texas, where jan Sonja signed a copy of lipu pu belonging to jan Maliku, and wrote: ‘o moku e kala pona.’ The event took place at a sushi restaurant, so she was wishing jan Maliku to enjoy their food. The community enjoyed this story, and it became an in-joke way to say ‘goodbye’. It was common knowledge in 2020, but quickly went obscure afterwards.

The common ways to say ‘goodbye’ include:

isipin

isipin was created in 2020. Usually people start using it because they don’t know how to say ‘to think’. Toki Pona has several ways to talk about thoughts. You can use different ones, depending on your intentions:

󱥬󱤏 toki insa is taught in the foreword of the 2014 book.

quotation words

󱦞 te and 󱦟 to were created in 2020. At first, they were created to distinguish talking about something and saying something. Of course, we can draw this distinction with core words, too:

Over the years, 󱦞 te and 󱦟 to largely disappeared as words, but people continue to use them frequently when typing in sitelen pona. They act as a convenient shortcut to type a CJK-style corner bracket:

yupekosi

yupekosi is a joke about making new words.

number words

Over the years, some people have felt discomfort from the Toki Pona number system(s). Some people would design systems that more closely matched those they’re familiar with, particularly Indo-European and Sinitic numerals, which have one root word for each word from 1 to 10.

These experiments left behind two obscure words: san ‘three’ and po ‘four’ — amusingly, from two different proposals. They have appeared in jan Usawi’s likujo. The word san has influenced the Toki Pona name of mun Kekan San, a fellow teacher and prominent Toki Pona speaker.

In the end, none of those systems gained much popularity. We can easily express numbers from 1 to 10 with core words, and there are well-established ways to talk about larger numbers.

portmanteaus

These two words are interesting because they share pretty much the same creation story. They are shortenings or portmanteaus of existing Toki Pona words, created within a specific story — jan Wesu’s jan pi kamalawala and akesi kon Nalasuni’s Caves of Qud mod. Outside these stories, of course, you can just describe them with a sentence or two.

kamalawala occasionally crops up in political conversations, because people enjoy discussing anarchism, and songs, because it is fun to say.

colour words

Toki Pona has five colour words: 󱥲 walo, 󱥏 pimeja, 󱤫 loje, 󱤒 jelo, 󱤣 laso. Two other ones, kapesi and unu, gained popularity in 2021, but slowly declined back to obscurity since then.

Using common words, you can achieve specific hues and shades like brown or purple by mixing colour words together (loje laso, jelo pimeja, or other combinations). Often, you don’t even need that level of specificity, and just one colour word will be a sufficient description. You can also talk about the colour associated to a real object, like kule ma.

Courses usually teach 󱤫 loje as ‘red, reddish’, which includes ‘magenta’ as a reddish hue. Over time, community acceptance of magenta as a 󱤫 loje has varied a bit. When asked whether they would call magenta 󱤫 loje, only a third of respondents answered yes in 2021, but a sizeable majority in 2024. This likely mirrors a quick adoption and quick decline of unu.

kapesi has appeared in a song by kala pona Tonyu.