So… trying to get back to my family in Manila before Christmas,
waiting on new passport to arrive in the Australia consulate, Hong Kong.
In the meantime, I thought I should get some basics down in Tagalog, of which I know only a few words.
In my defense, I speak, read and write fluent Japanese and can speak a
little Mandarin. Tagalog, unfortunately, suffers from the same study
difficulties as does Cantonese, in that so many people speak English as a
first language in Philippines as in Hong Kong.
Let’s start out with trying to think of all the few words I’ve
remembered so far in Tagalog over the years of having Filipino friends
and in recently going to PI:
mahal – love
I was confident I knew this meant love, as my Filipino buddy had told
me the important words mahal kita in case I ever dated a Filipina
(secret!), which I believed meant “I love you”, but at least mahal was
love I was sure… I also met a Pinoy in Japan who had named his son Mahal
and told me again the meaning…
mahal kita – I love you?
So, then I thought this one translated to “I love you” or such, but was a very long time ago I was taught it, so Googled it and urbandictionary.com confirmed it as “I love you”.
Cool, two words so far – superstar! Ok, so looking at the above
phrase, knowing mahal is love, what does the kita mean? According to
tagaloglang.com, it means “I to you” (e.g. papaliguan kita – I will give
you a bath)
Anything else I remember in my vast tagalogabulary? Sure:
magkano – How much? (price)
I had to lookup the spelling on this one, but I remembered the
roundabout pronunciation.. I’d overheard friends saying this a few times
and asked about it. Stuck in my memory due to this…
tita – Auntie (endearment)
OK, again, learnt this one from my Filipino buddy and he had told me
it meant auntie, which knowing what I did of Filipino culture, assumed
anyone female who took care of you, not necessarily blood. Looking
online, seems it is the literal translation of aunt, but also a term of
endearment for an (older than oneself) lady. The magical Google also
showed me the mail/uncle version would be tito, doing that funky o vs a
Spanish thing to word endings..
ate – older sister
I think I may have learnt this one while in Shenhen, China, from our
first pinay DH (domestic helper), but my memory is fuzzy, could have
been later in Hong Kong… In Hong Kong, seeing more Filipinas everyday,
they often refer to their seniors/girlfriends as ate. Now, I have a
nanny for my kids in Manila, whose name is Girlie. We call her “Ate
girlie” to mean big sister
kuya – older brother
This one I remembered from my brief time in Manila so far. Ate Girlie had taught my kids that this is what we call guys.
Pinoy – Filipino
OK, so I have some ignorance on this one, but generally knew it meant
Filipino and was used by Filipinos themselves. So, in Googling, I’m
told there is no “F” in Filipino (which I’m also being told is a
combination of Tagalog, Spanish and English)… So should really call PI
people Pilipino rather than Filipino? It is less formal than Pilipino
and can also swing both ways, with pinoy working the male/female
meanings and pinay exclusively meaning female Pilipina.
sige – OK
I’m not hundred percent on this, but think it means OK/sure. I always
heard PI people use it on the telephone or in sentences which sounded
like they were saying OK in response to something…
gising – awake
I learnt this one from being treated to a great Pampanga dish called gising gising.
mabuhay – welcome / long live
This is on a lot of the tourism media when you arrive in the PI. It
seems to be also used as a patriotic cry, but I may be way off there..
Anyway, that’s about all of my limited words learnt in
Pilipino/Tagalog until now and I’ll make an effort to actually learn to
speak like a local as I’ll be spending more time in PI from now and am
looking forward to experiencing the culture more.
Let me know if you have recommendations for the next most important words/phrases I should learn next