[tlhIngan Hol] cha’Hu’ Qujvam chongqu’ vIje’ta’...

Ed Bailey bellerophon.modeler at gmail.com
Mon Nov 21 19:52:54 PST 2016


mughwI' qavan! mu'meylIj vIlaDqa'mo' jIQuch!

not Pokemon vIQuj, 'a jIqan. De'wI' QujwIj wa'DIchvaD <pong> ponglu'.
cha'maH ben <Doom> vIQujpu'DI' jImevpu'.

'a <Pokemon>mo' bIQuchqu'bej 'e' vItIv. puq Quch Darur.

I will note a few problems, but some senior Klingonists should read your
message and respond.

Careful about OVS word order. I only noticed this problem in your sentence: reH
vImaSbogh Quj ’oH Pokémon’e’. {Quj} should come before {vImaSbogh}, since
it's the object. It wouldn't make sense as the object, which the prefix
establishes is first-person singular.

Also you seem to be using {-pu'} to indicate past tense, as in

ghIq qaStaHvIS jar law’, Qujmeyvam vIloSpu’. nI’pu’ ’ej Dalpu’! "Then while
many months were passing, I waited for the game. It was long and boring."

Sounds fine translated into English, but actually, while many months were
passing you were waiting. The action of waiting was completed after the
many months, not during them. So to go with {qaStaHvIS jar law'}, I'd use
{vIloStaH}, or better yet (though not necessary), {vIloSlI'}, since it's a
process leading to a definite conclusion. Similarly the verbs nI' and Dal
don't make as much sense with the perfective aspect. You may not even want
any aspect markers on them, since waiting is long and boring in general.

By the way, everyone uses these state verbs that have glosses starting with
"be" the way you have done here with {nI'} and {Dal}. What is the subject?
You didn't say, but it doesn't matter. It's implied to be the situation you
just described. To me, this answers the question, "If the pronoun {'e'} can
only be used for sentence-as-object (SAO), then how can I make the previous
sentence be a subject?" Easy, just stick a verb after the sentence! If what
you say makes sense, the listener is smart enough to figure out what you
intend the subject to be.

~mIp'av
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