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There are some words I know:

  1. kolego (kol-eg-o) as in "-Kial ĝirafo neniam estas sola? -Ĉar ĝi
    havas kolegon."
  2. laŭtema (laŭ-tema aŭ laŭt-em-a)
  3. trafike (e-vorto devenas el trafiko aŭ tra-fike) as in Claude Piron's sex crime fantasy "ĉu ŝi mortu trafike?"

Do you know any other pun words?

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10 Answers 10

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Here is a pretty long list of puns.

By the way, I don't agree with the author of that website that the existence of such ambiguities is a big problem. It just shows that Esperanto is a living language, and not just a theoretical construct made by Zamenhof. When people start using a language in real life, new words and constructions come up naturally, and some ambiguities are bound to arise.

Edit: I just happened to discover one more pun: dialekto ‘dialect’ or ‘divine sofa’.

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    I like the topical kukurbo: 'pumpkin' or 'city of cakes' :)
    – Oliver Mason
    Oct 28, 2016 at 9:36
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    It's more fun that way; the band Persone makes use of these puns and wordplays quite a bit, one example being the band name itself (person-e; per-son-e). If you want a language where every word can be parsed in only one way, that's what Lojban is for (well, one of the things it's for).
    – kristan
    Nov 4, 2016 at 1:44
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I think Esperanto has so many pun words that it’s impossible to list them all! :-) I keep discovering new puns all the time… Okay, a few more for your list:

  • kulmino: kulmino aŭ mino de kuloj :-)
  • elokventa: elokventa (eloquent) aŭ ”venanta el ok ventoj”
  • heroino: heroino (the drug) aŭ ina heroo
  • sentema: sen-tema aŭ sent-ema :-)
  • ĉiele: ĉielmaniere aŭ en la ĉielo ktp.
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    New puns keep entering Esperanto all the time – here’s a fresh example: Some programistoj have started to use the word apo for aplikaĵo (just like the English app, look for instance at the amikumu webpage ). Great! Now we can make lots of new puns:
    – Bjørn
    Oct 28, 2016 at 8:37
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    • apoteko : medicinvendejo aŭ teko por apoj…
    – Bjørn
    Oct 28, 2016 at 8:37
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    • apaĉo : ano de la apaĉa popolo aŭ malbona apo…
    – Bjørn
    Oct 28, 2016 at 8:38
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    ktp. Isn’t Esperanto a great living language? :-)
    – Bjørn
    Oct 28, 2016 at 8:39
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    One of the best, that hasn't been mentioned yet, is intimo/in-timo.
    – Paŭl Peeraerts
    Jun 7, 2017 at 15:06
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There is a limitless number of puns in Esperanto.

The reason is that we can introduce new roots in Esperanto (see the rule 15 of the Fundamento). So every new root that is long enough can be read as a combination of others old roots (see the rule 11). Also, every old root can be seen as a combination of newer roots. And almost everything in Esperanto is a root.

One exemple is vegetaran-o, which can be read as "v-eg-et-ar-an-o", which is a member of a group of small big Vs, which is maybe just the letter V.

"Do you know any othen pun words?" Yes, I know many, too many. There are some people in Twitter who often post bad puns.

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Krokodilo - Ilo per kio oni krokodas

Malajzio - La malo de Ajzio

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    Kio estas krokodi?
    – sshine
    Dec 9, 2016 at 3:17
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Finfine Finn' Finne deklamis: "Pro vi, ho nova vin', ni dek lamis."

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Banano - Banana or member of the bath?

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Gijom' Armide has a song Eĉ se ne amen in which he first sings nesentemo (lack of feeling) and later he sings ne sen temo (not without a theme); of course, in writing it is not identical because of the spaces, but it works in speaking or, as the case may be, in singing.

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"La stranga butiko" de R. Schwartz = last' ranga butiko (https://eo.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_stranga_butiko)

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Trovis mi la vorton gejsero, kiu pli ofte volas diri geyser ol diri gay serum.

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kasisto - tenanto de mono

kaŝisto - ankaŭ tenanto de mono

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