lesson one: sounds

toki pona has 14 letters, 9 consonants and 5 vowels.

consonants

Notice that j is not prononuced like the letter J in english, but rather the letter Y.

vowels

That’s all the sounds in toki pona! writing them is very simple: you never use capital letters, with one exception: writing unofficial words.

unofficial words

Sometimes, people loan words into toki pona, primarily names. These words are always capitalised when you write them.

for example,

mi tan ma Mesiko

means

i am from Mexico

Notice how Mesiko is capitalised: this is because it’s not a word found in toki pona dictionaries, but rather a word from another language.