Jan was the one who introduced me to text messaging ("texting"?). Coming from a corporate culture in the software industry, I'm more an email person. But text messaging is apparently very common in Europe as well.
I love the English language, and I am an editor at heart. I notice misspellings everywhere (except in my own work, of course), and I cringe when I see them. So, at first, I was appalled by Jan's atrocious "spelling" in his text messages, particularly since his undergrad major was English. But then, I figured it's kinda hard to push those small buttons. Besides, I have to give him credit for being a very fast button-pusher. (I'm reluctant to use the word "typist" in this case, since it's not a keyboard. "Keypaddist"?) I, on the other hand, stayed with the T9 mode and spelled out each word in its entirety. So, naturally, I am very slow in responding.
Then I came to the Philippines, and my spelling sensitivities have been blaring alarms each time I received a text message, which is a hundred times more often than I got in the US.
In English, people tend to go by phonetics, or pretty close to it.
Gud am! R u ok 4 dinner 2moro?
Good morning! Are you okay for dinner tomorrow?
F u hav d tym, w8 4 me.
If you have the time, wait for me.
In Tagalog, it gets worse, since Tagalog words tend to be longer and tends to repeat parts of the word, if not the entire word.
Pbalik2 n kmi, wl p ring halo2.
Pabalikbalik na kami, wala pa ring halo-halo.
We keep returning, still no halo-halo.
Also, consonants in the Tagalog alphabet are pronounced as though followed by the short letter a. So, the alphabet is "a", "ba", "ka", "da", and so on. (All "a" sounds are short.) So, the "a" after the consonant is often dropped.
Nagbbkskli lng ako.
Nagbabakasakali lang ako.
I was just hoping.
Sometimes, only the consonants remain.
Pwd k n b?
Puwede ka na ba?
Are you allowed/available yet?
Often, only the root word is used, if the tense can be inferred from the context.
Punta n kyo d2.
Pumunta na kayo dito.
Come here.
There are only 21 letters in the Filipino alphabet, so the "unused" letters in the Roman alphabet (i.e.: "c" and "j") are used in place of diphthongs, or syllables that sound like the English letter.
Cge, punta n kmi jan.
Sige, papunta na kami diyan.
Okay, we are going there. (We are on our way.)
Even before text messaging became a fact of life, Filipinos already shorten words. "Hindi" (no, not) becomes "di". "Mayroon" (there is/are) becomes "meron".
It gets further complicated by the fact that Filipinos mix English and Tagalog words. So, depending on the context:
- "s" can mean "is" (English) or "sa" (Tagalog, indicates a place)
- "d" can mean "the" (English) or "[hin]di" (Tagalog)
- "c" can mean "see" (English) or "si" (Tagalog, indicates a person)
What is the street na papunta sa banko? Di ko maalala.
What is the street to go to the bank? I don't remember.
Cguro c Ann2 ung 2mwag. C u 2moro.
Siguro si Ann-Ann yung tumawag. See you tomorrow.
Maybe Ann-Ann is the one who called. See you tomorrow.
I was about to lose my sanity when I realized that the abbreviations are a necessity. Text messages have a limit of 160 characters per message. If it goes over that, you pay for two messages.
And you save time as well. It takes four button presses to get to the letter "s". And anybody who watches Wheel of Fortune knows that "s" is one of the most commonly used letters in English. Unfortunately, we would just have to deal with this inefficient keypad design, like we deal with the QWERTY keyboard.
Well, after more than a month at this, I'm getting fairly fluent in this new language/dialect/code/whatever. I'm still not as fast as Jan in entering messages, but I can read fairly fast now.
Cge, un n lng. C u l8r.
Sige, iyon na lang. See you later.
Okay, that's it. See you later.
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