This is a followup to lesson 10 of the official Fynotek course.
You probably know about numbers, but probably not one of the biggest contexts in which numbers are useful: keeping track of time. Let’s change that now!
Note: All numbers on this page are in seximal (base 6) if in Fynotek, and decimal (base 10) if in English.
Time is extremely easy: just say “[hour] kynsi [minute]”! Here are some details:
To say the time, you can use “fuho”, like this:
fuho us kynsi fo.
It is 3:02.
You can, of course, use other words, such as forms of mawak, instead of “fuho”.
To say when you will do something, you can use in or ak/ka:
pii in fopo ay kynsi.
ak fopo ay kynsi ka pii.
I ate at 13:00/1:00 PM (21:00 in seximal).
Abbreviating time is done with “[hour]K[minute]” (or “[hour]k[minute]”). When abbreviating, keep the 0 if there are no minutes.
Examples:
fuho 21K0.
It is 13:00 (or 1:00 PM).
fuho 3k2.
It is 3:02.
Fynotek defines two calendar systems: the Gregorian calendar (what most of us use) and the native Fynotek calendar.
Today, the vocab will be in the lesson, since we need it to talk about dates.
jeaj: day
ñytuh: moon, month (native calendar)
tfaa: circle, circular, cycle, year (native calendar), of or relating to the Fynotek native calendar
Note that the words for “moon” and “cycle” are also the words for “month” and “year” in this system. This is due to the fact that this calendar is entirely based on the moon, as we will see.
Also note that the word for year, tfaa, can also be used as a modifier to describe the calendar system itself.
There are two erasm kynsi fynotekñy (time of no Fynotek) and kynsifynotek (time of Fynotek). The first day of kynsifynotek is Fynotek’s creation date, which is January 5, 2021. Any day before that is in kynsi fynotekñy. Just like BCE dates in the Gregorian calendar, years count backwards in kynsi fynotekñy, so the year before January 5 2021 is year 1 in kynsi fynotekñy.
Each year (tfaa) has five months (ñytuh), with each month alternating between having 29 or 30 days. Here is the number of days in the first few months:
month 1: 29 days
month 2: 30 days
month 3: 29 days
month 4: 30 days
month 5: 29 days
month 6: 30 days
etc.
Note that since each year has 5 months, month 6 is the first month of the second year.
Fynotek’s calendar aligns to the cycles of the moon, and to keep it in sync, every fourth year is a leap year, with its second month getting an extra day:
year 4 month 1: 30 days
year 4 month 2: 30 days
year 4 month 3: 30 days
year 4 month 4: 29 days
year 4 month 5: 30 days
Each month has four weeks. If a month has 29 days, the weeks go as follows:
week 1: 7 days
week 2: 7 days
week 3: 7 days
week 4: 8 days
If a month has 30 days, they go like this:
week 1: 7 days
week 2: 8 days
week 3: 7 days
week 4: 8 days
A full date in Fynotek consists of five parts, in this order:
Any of these can be dropped to express less specific dates (e.g. expressing only a month instead of a specific day in that month), or if context allows for the date to still be identifiable. When being formal, though, you need all of these (except the era, which is optional).
Here is how you express each part of the date:
For example, January 1 2022 is the 8th day of the 3rd month (and the 1st day of its week) of the 3rd year in kynsifynotek, so it is aypo forea ayjeaj usñytuh ustfaa kynsifynotek.
If necessary, you can use tfaa as a detached modifier after a partial date to indicate that you’re using the Fynotek calendar system and not the Gregorian system. However, only do this when necessary—if your date contains a month, year, or era, the words in your date already specify the calendar system. It can also be clear from context that you are using the Fynotek system, and in that case, do not do this.
For a set of dates in the Fynotek calendar along with their corresponding Gregorian dates, see this table.
When we interact with the rest of the world, we can use the Gregorian calendar: 12 months in a year, 7 days in a week, you know the drill. Here is the vocabulary used to express Gregorian dates:
jeaj: day
ñytejen: month (Gregorian calendar)
ejen: sun, sunny, year (Gregorian calendar), of or relating to the Gregorian calendar
Similar to how the word tfaa means “cycle” and refers to a year in the Fynotek calendar, ejen means “sun” and refers to a year in the Gregorian calendar (which is based on the sun). And, like tfaa, ejen can be used to talk about things related to the Gregorian calendar. This is why the word for a Gregorian month is a combination of the word for a Fynotek month (ñytuh) and ejen.
Dates are expressed similarly to how the Fynotek calendar expresses them, except for these things:
Some other things to keep in mind:
As an example, “March 15 2020” can be written in full as fopo usrea aypo ayjeaj usñytejen aypoña uspopura fopura nosejen kynsijuon.
Use the same forms to express dates as you would times. Here are some examples:
fopo usrea aypo ayjeaj usñytejen aypoña uspopura fopura nosejen kynsijuon fuho.
It is March 15 2020.
mawik in usñytejen.
I arrived in March.
In either calendar system, abbreviations are made by writing the day-of-month, day-of-week, month, and year as numbers (in seximal, of course), in that order, and separated by dots. None of these can be omitted! For example, the abbreviation for March 15 2020 is 23.7.3.13203.
Optionally, you can abbreviate the era as well. In the Fynotek calendar, kynsi fynotekñy is KÑ, and kynsifynotek is KF. In the Gregorian calendar, kynsimjuw is KM, and kynsijuon is KJ (capitalization is optional, as always). These abbreviations go after the date, and can be used even if you wrote the rest of the date out in full. For example, the date aypo forea ayjeaj usñytuh ustfaa kynsifynotek can be abbreviated as 12.1.3.3 KF.
If you do not specify the era in a date abbreviation (which specifies the calendar system already), you can optionally specify what calendar system you are using by placing the word tfaa after a Fynotek date, or the word ejen after a Gregorian date. However, when reading these dates, do not pronounce the tfaa or ejen after the date, since the other words spoken in the date will already determine what calendar system is being used!
For example, “33.2.2.5 tfaa” is read as “uspo usrea fojeaj foñytuh purtfaa”, with the extra “tfaa” in the abbreviation not being pronounced.
Only use ejen and tfaa in an abbreviation if you’re not already specifying the calendar system with the era! And remember that things can often be made clear with context—you rarely will need to talk about the year 13203 in the Fynotek calendar, for example.
Now that we know how to express times, let’s talk about how to make use of them by saying when or for how long something happens!
Firstly, let’s go over duration-related vocab:
mjulis: second
ukhin: minute
ewje: hour
jeaj: day
atoren: week (native calendar)
atorejen: week (Gregorian calendar)
ñytuh: month (native calendar)
ñytejen: month (Gregorian calendar)
tfaa: year (native calendar)
ejen: year (Gregorian calendar)
kynsi: time
To express how long something happens for, simply use in (or ak/ka) and the duration of the activity. Remember to add ak if necessary! For example:
himti in ewjeakaypo fo.
I worked for eight hours.
nawpio ka kynsiula ak.
He slept for a long time.
To express the duration until something happens, we will use ordinals. For example, instead of saying “this will happen in two weeks”, you say “this will happen in the second new week”, or “juon mawoko in atorenfoun forea”. Here are some more examples:
ak jeajfoun usrea mawoko ka ampo.
When the third new day arrives, I will go.
I will go in 3 days.
To express how long ago something was, just use mjuw instead of foun:
hiro ka ewjemjuw ayrea ak.
She spoke during the first old hour. She spoke an hour ago.
Wow! That was a lot to take in. On the plus side, though, your knowledge of dates and times is fully comprehensive! Congratulations. All the vocab was in the lesson today, so no more vocab here!