g2narat

Oh! I actually thought that my native tongue (Filipino/Tagalog) was pretty straightforward when it comes to yes or no. Our direct translation for yes is "oo", and for no, it's "hindi". However when you mentioned that in some languages it would depend on the specific question asked, I realized that we do have other words for yes or no. For example, when asking if someone has a pen, he/she could simply answer yes or no in English, but in Tagalog, the correct terms to use would be "meron" to say "yes" and "wala" to say "no" instead of oo/hindi.

I agree with Foolsgold. You can start with basic phrases and go from there. The basic thing to remember when speaking/writing in Tagalog is that you pronounce words the way they are spelled. That might sound pretty easy (and it is once you get the hang of it) but it can take a bit of getting used to when you're used to another language with a lot of pronunciation rules.

I still don't know what would be the proper translation for a question with "pang-ilan". I mean, if the question was "Pang-ilan ka sa magkakapatid?" I guess one could translate that to "What is your birth rank?" but that isn't really the same. Another translation would probably to just ask whether the person is the eldest, 2nd, 3rd etc. among his siblings. It's tricky things like this that makes me glad I'm not a translator.

Ooh that's a tough one. I've had to learn a few languages simultaneously but I always concentrated more on one. It's often because I get interested in a new language before I've really mastered the other one. For me, it's actually better if the languages are completely different rather than if they were similar. The reason is that I get confused with similar sounding languages and tend to mix the words up.

I can't really say. I was interested in languages for as long as I can remember actually. I remember being around 7 years old and having a playmate who only spoke Italian and I was thinking that it would be really cool if we could communicate in her language instead of doing our own signs and pointing. :wacky: I think it helped that we moved around a lot and I got exposed to different languages and found the differences and similarities of languages interesting.

Haha! Thanks for making me feel old! I was born in the 80's. Maybe that explains it? It was a required reading in a college subject. Can't recall the subject though, probably something like Filipino Literature.

Another Filipino word I find irritatingly impossible to translate is "pang-ilan". I mean, it's such an easy word if you think about it, but there is no direct translation to English. I don't even know how to describe it properly, the best I can do is that it's a question used to ask the ranking of something, for example when someone asks "pangilan ka sa magkakapatid" they are asking about your birth rank among your siblings (eldest, youngest, third child etc...)

Anyone here remember the book Dekada 70 by Lualhati Bautista? I remember this being a required reading when I was in college though I can't remember the subject it was required for. I just had a random thought about it so I decided to post here because I thought it would make a nice discussion about Filipino literature. Seems like we don't have that kind of discussion here yet.

Oh thank you for clarifying this! I didn't know that actually. I've always heard of the Filipino languages getting referred to as dialects. I think you can see from the replies on this thread that it's a pretty common misconception. I guess the correct title of this thread should be "Learning Tagalog when you're used to another Filipino language" then.

What I like about Tagalog is that it has quite a variety of idiomatic expressions. I find some of them funny and others perfect for their intended use. I'm miss some Filipino idiomatic expressions that used to be so common though. Idioms such as "namamangka sa dalawang ilog", "kabiyak ng dibdib", and "pag pumuti na ang uwak". They used to be so common, but I rarely hear them nowadays.

For me, it's still the children's books that leave the most impact. I don't know why. Each time I read The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint Exupery I cry like a baby. Another children's book that makes me emotional is Love You Forever by Robert Munsch. It's a bit weird because other books such as the Fault in Our Stars don't have the same effect on me.

You have a point! A mix of both is perfect! That anime sounds interesting! I think I'll have to look for it. Does it have a manga version by any chance? I usually prefer reading than watching horror because reading horror stories is much scarier for me.

Oh this explains why there seems to be a bit of a debate here as to how to interpret this expression. I didn't know that it was used differently in different parts of the world. I just thought the expression was so weird that people often misinterpreted it. Thanks for explaining!

I see more and more people using the word foods. Even spell-check doesn't correct it. To me, it sounds wrong, like saying stuffs to mean having a lot of stuff. I'm pretty sure stuffs is wrong, and I used to think it was like that with foods too, but I've been seeing it more and more lately and I'm wondering if it's become an acceptable word.

Yeah. I think it has a lot to do with the cultural/historical/geographical similarities. We have to ba careful with those similarities though. We have some words that are the same but mean different things. Our word for white means something completely different for the Nepalese. As for Indonesians, don't ask them to say their word for fart. What is innocent farting to them has a completely different meaning in Tagalog. :wacky: