meaning
damaged, broken, botched, harmed, messed up; mistake
see also
semantic space · lipamanka
pakala describes destruction. pakala is often not intended, for example a mistake. The thing being destroyed were your expectations. Sometimes, when people's expectations are destroyed, they say "pakala" by itself to describe said destruction, similar to the way explatives work in other languages. This isn't something special that pakala does, but pakala is used this way because the situations we swear in are often situations where we've made mistakes, or when something has been destroyed. pakala can also be intentional, such as smash therapy or intentional use of explosions. pakala can also describe harm. If something cut my skin, I might use pakala to describe that. In fact, pakala merges the ideas of harm and destruction. In English, these concepts are given seperate words, but in toki pona, they aren't.
ku translations
broken100, destruction100, mistake82, damage81, damn79, burst75, goddamn75, ruin75, accident73, destroy71, error67, heck67, hurt67, crash65, injure65, fail64, harm64, break63, failure57, fault57, injury55, flaw53, crack52, collapse50, snap48, fuck47, fucking42, trouble40, rip38, crush33, explode33, wound33, violate30, offense29, strike29, boom27, crap27
pu verbatim
ADJEKTIVO fuŝita, rompita, damaĝita, difektita
usage
core · 100% usage
found in pu
coined pre-pu
origin
Tok Pisin · bagarap ‘accident’
angla · bugger up
coined by jan Sonja
sitelen pona
pakalapictogram of a cracked object
sitelen sitelen
sitelen jelo
💥
sitelen Emosi
💥
ucsur
U+F1948