Anniversary

To express the idea of an anniversary, the answer can be adapted to any kind of time period. That means there is no single word for anniverary, the answer includes the length of the time period. To form such a word, the word jaj (day) is attached to the time period:

Maltz said there is a way (actually, several ways) to refer to an "anniversary," which he characterized as a specific day on which one recognizes or remembers an event that occurred a set amount of time ago on that same date. The "set amount of time" could be a year (what most people think of when they think of "anniversary"), but it could be another unit of time: a month or a week.

• DISjaj is "anniversary" measured in years
• jarjaj is "anniversary" measured in months (the three-month anniversary of starting a new job, say)
• Hoghjaj is "anniversary" measured in weeks (the two-week anniversary of the day someone quit smoking, perhaps)

A one-year anniversary would be DISjaj wa' or DISjaj wa'DIch (Maltz had no preference). And so on.

(Maltz says that he's heard expressions like tupjaj, which is presumably an anniversary measured in minutes – the 10-minute "anniversary" of someone not talking, maybe. He said this is a form of wordplay, not a "real" word, but people do say things like this.)

(Email to Lieven, preparing the translation of The Little Prince)

See also

• 25th Anniversary Special

References