The Sound of Culture

Being born and raised in Metro Manila, Philippines, I learned three languages: Tagalog, Filipino and English. Oftentimes even fellow Filipinos, confuse Tagalog with Filipino. Simply put, Tagalog is the language the people who lived by the Pasig river. Hence, the word "taga" which means from, and  "ilog" means river. That said, Tagalog may also be considered an older and deeper version of Filipino, since Filipino is the adaptation of all languages (even Spanish) in the country. Furthermore, Filipino has also borrowed words from Spanish such as ~kuwarenta, kotse, niyebe, ~ and the like.

My experience in language could be related to music. Not because I listened to a lot of songs but rather how I interpret all the languages I know. Filipino has a certain sound that makes it different from Tagalog. Filipino tends to sound more polished and modernized while Tagalog has a feeling of nostalgia and culture to it. English on the other hand sounds like a gem. Speaking, listening and reading in English has the right mix of polished and nostalgia. If I were to compare the three with sounds, Tagalog would be like the sounds of chickens in the morning which are loud, rough and distinct. Filipino would be like the sound of the bass because it is more refined and the bass makes me feel my own heart beat. English, however, sounds like the whispers of the winds. The whistling noise the wind makes are not as loud as Filipino and Tagalog, it is not refined the way Filipino is nor rough like Tagalog, but it is calming and just right.

Growing up, I have always had difficulty with spelling this is mostly because in Filipino there is a saying: "Kung anong bigkas, siyang baybay." Which literally means, how you speak is how you spell. This made spelling English words difficult because words like colonel would register to me as kernel which is different but also funny. It is funny because I was so comfortable and used to the sound of my culture that English did not feel as seamless and easy. That was until I attended private schools wherein they implemented the speaking only-in-English-rule. This honed my English skill but also made me develop an accent. I do not know if it is common knowledge in other countries but there is a thing called Filipino accent and Conyo accent. Filipino accent would be pronouncing comfortable as _kom-por-ta-bol _instead of _komf-ta-ble. _Conyo accent on the other hand is having a foreign accent to Filipino words when you code-switch. An example of this is saying "I'm so nagigigil na." (it roughly translates to: I am getting really irritated now) Code-switching while retaining the English accent is the rough definition of Conyo.  If you were from a private school the format of starting speaking in English and ending with the Filipino language while retaining the English accent is a common thing. 

The accents, tones and words of the three languages I know are just music to my ears. They all have distinct tones and sounds and when I hear other people speaking a certain language it sounds like noise or gibberish because in a literal sense, language is just sound that we collectively use, speak and recognize. This realization was when I watched videos of Korean Idols trying to speak in English and other languages. People have a distinct sound that differs from every country which really puts things in perspective: people in every country and every single island have differences which they hold dear to keep their identity. That is why I love about language. It is the sound of culture.