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Placeholder names

by Oŝo-Jabe, November 16, 2009

Messages: 7

Language: English

Oŝo-Jabe (User's profile) November 16, 2009, 7:58:06 PM

What are the common placeholder names for things on the tips of your tongue in Esperanto? Words like: thingamabob, watchamacallit, whats-his-face. I've seen S-ro Ajnulo for John Doe, but is it even more generally usable? Is -um used for these?

Miland (User's profile) November 16, 2009, 8:10:28 PM

IMO there are many possibilities here. Not finding a word or name at the spur of the moment, we might use mi ne scias or mi forgesis la vorton/lian nomon. For a non-specific object we might use la aĵo or la afero.

Ailanto (User's profile) November 21, 2009, 12:25:06 AM

I've seen umo in several dictionaries. Including the one at lernu!

jchthys (User's profile) November 21, 2009, 8:36:27 PM

I've seen the word zozo mentioned before.

Otherwise, aĵo (for an object) and umo (for a concept) are good and probably more understandable.

ceigered (User's profile) November 22, 2009, 11:03:42 AM

In Australian English we'd just say "whoop whoop" for a place we don't know the name of, e.g. "Out the back o' whoop whoop"

I guess using similar logic you could construct a word, e.g. "loĝoloko" lango.gif

(lit. "living place", so it's generic in meaning too lango.gif)

Ah, morgaŭ ni iros al loĝoloko... aŭ kiu ajn nomo ĝi havas.

Miland (User's profile) November 22, 2009, 12:53:28 PM

ceigered:Ah, morgaŭ ni iros al loĝoloko... aŭ kiu ajn nomo ĝi havas.
La loko, 'the place' or la ejo, 'the place for something' might be useful when we've forgotten the name. But other suffixes could also be used as placeholders generally - la ujo, la ilo, la ulo, etc.

ceigered (User's profile) November 22, 2009, 5:13:23 PM

But ejo doesn't sound foreign or comedic enough lango.gif

(Maybe Australians are the only ones who feel the need to make that random place they've conveniently renamed "whoop whoop" mid-conversation sound funny)

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