Lets pronounce stuff (￣▽￣)
Tagalog is easy to pronounce, almost all of the words are read exactly as it they are written.
It might get confusing though, you will notice that there are a lot of the letter "a" in the language, for example there’s a well known Elevator scene:
Person 1: (runs to elevator) Bababa ba?
Person 2: (nods) Bababa.
what happened? Well I can simply break it down just for you:
Bababa (Going down)
Baba (Down)
Ba? (Is it?)
Do you think its nakakapagpabagabag? (Worrisome)
Its OK! You'll get used to it, besides, to efficiently learn a language you must start from the very beginning (we could read children's books if we have to!)
Lets start by letting you get used to the sounds, try saying these out loud:
A E I O U BA BE BI BO BU DA DE DI DO DU GA GE GI GO GU HA HE HI HO HU LA LE LI LO LU MA ME MI MO MU NA NE NI NO NU NGA NGE NGI NGO NGU PA PE PI PO PU RA RE RI RO RU SA SE SI SO SU TA TE TI TO TU WA WE WI WO WU YA YE YI YO YU
A= pronounced as the a in Apple
E= pronounced as the e in Elephant
I= pronounced as the I in Igloo
O= pronounced as the o in Orange (none of that “oh” or “owe” just straight up O(range)
U= pronounced as the u in Uber ( similar to “oo” sound in a cows “Moo”) (or “oof” xD)
Now you might be asking, what the heck is the “NGA” parts? well it makes the same sound from the following ingles (english) words:
“Sing Along” “Thingamabob”
notice how there is no super hard emphasis on the G (ex. Chimichanga)?
The “Ng” on its own is pronounced the same way as the NG in:
“Walking” “Drawing” “Learning”
I will use the word “Walking” for now, and add the vowels at the end try saying the following words (remember the nga sound in Sing Along):
Walkinga
Walkinge
Walkingi
Walkingo
Walkingu
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Here are some sample sentence:
“Ano gagawin natin ngayon? (What are we doing today)
“Nge, peke pala yung nabili ko” (nge! I accidentally bought a fake one!)
“Masakit ngipin ko” (My teeth/tooth hurts)
“Mabango mga bulaklak” (The Flowers smell good)
“May Talumpati ata ang Pangulo mamaya (The President might have a speech later)
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Slang time d(°∀°d) as always DONT use in formal situations:
“Ngeh” or “Ngek”
it does not mean anything. rather, it is an interjection. its an expression to when something that surprises you (but in a sarcastic way) similar to “Lol what?” or “seriously?” “is that for real?” it has a “seriously? thats so dumb!” tone to it. (depends on what region you are in the Philippines)
ex.
“Ngeh, pano nangyari yun?” (”wha? how did that even happen?”)
“Ngek, mali yung sagot ko..” (”My answer was wrong.”.)
“Nganga”
technically it means an “open mouth”. when a person is speechless, either you ended up “nganga” or they ended up “nganga”, or you both ended up “nganga”, in this case you’re both “Tunganga”
“Tunganga”
Dazed / Spaced out
“Ahhh”
this is easy, its just the tagalog version of “oooh”. like “oooh I get it!” in tagalog its an a sound, “Ahhh gets ko na!”
“Tungak!”
the word “Tanga” is a rude way to say idiot / Dumba** (though some close friends use it anyway, you know how friends are). The word “Tungak” Is a less rude of saying it. kind of like “Oh you idiot haha!” (still not saying that you should use this formally though, I mean you are still calling someone an idiot)
“Ewan (ko)” / “Malay (ko)”
a slang for “I dont know” ( its very unprofessional) its pretty much equivalent to “How the heck would I know?” in fact, you say it in the same tone.
“Ehhh”
compared to “ahh” this isnt as positive, its like, when someone asks you to do your chores but your too lazy just go “eeeeh”. pretty much equivalent to “uuuugh” you could add “Ayoko” at the end to make it
“Eeehh, Ayoko!” (“Ugghhgh I dont want to!”)
“Eh”
some people usually add this at the end like an accent, usually those people are sarcastic. its also similar to “well...” for example
“Hindi ko naman alam eh!” (“Well its not like I knew about it!”)
“Ohh diba”
equivalent would be “Hah! see what I did?” you know those hah! in your face or I told you so moments where you prove someone wrong? say this to all the non-believers,
“Oh diba! sabi ko sayo eh!” (”Hah! I told you so!”)
“Geh”
not to be confused with the meme, although..they are pronounced the same;; its equivalent to “whatever”.
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