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The Little Prince By Antoine De Saint-Exupéry Is Now Available In Chabacano!

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While Le Petit Prince (The Little Prince) written by Antoine De Saint-Exupéry in 1943 now has over 300 translations in different languages worldwide and is now considered the world’s most translated book (not counting religious works), there have been surprisingly only two translations of his book in the Philippines (Filipino and Bicol). El Diutay Principe is only the third edition featuring a Philippine language. The Little Prince is a classic French novella about a pilot who gets stranded in the desert after a plane crash and encounters a little fellow who asks him to draw a sheep for him. Through the course of their meeting, the pilot rediscovers the true meaning of life and what people should value the most. When I came across the book in 2013, I found that I could relate very well to the negative image given to “growing up” in the book. When the idea to translate the book into my mother tongue was presented to me, I didn’t think twice. I thought, ‘a lot of people my
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Forming Nouns out of Verbs in Chabacano

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In English, the word cooking can be used as a noun (e.g. how is your cooking, I love his cooking), and of course as a verb (e.g. I am cooking at home, I am cooking pasta). There are not a lot of –ing verbs that can be used as a noun in English though. You can’t say 'I like your playing' (as in I like how you played) or your 'walking is weird' (as in you walk weird). But here are other –ing verbs turned into nouns in English and how one can use them as a noun:

Acting
His acting is good.

Writing
His writing is legible

Singing
Your singing makes me cry

Reasoning
My reasoning is correct.

Staring
Staring is impolite

In Chabacano, we can also easily form nouns out of -ing verbs. This is especially useful when describing (the quality) how an action was done. Here is a list of nouns that comes from -ing verb:

Cocinada (from cocina)
Hacida (from hace)
Lavada (from lava)
Quemada (from quema)
Usada (from usa)
Conversada (from conversa)
Ponida (from pone)
Hablada (from habla)
Entendida (from entende)
Mirada (from mira)

While it would sound weird for some –ing verbs to be turned into nouns in English, most of the Chabacano verbs can be made into nouns.

Here are some examples on how we can use these nouns turned into verbs in Chabacano:

When asking how you are in something (whether you’re good at doing something or not).

Chabacano: Que tal tu cocinada?
English: How is your cooking?

Chabacano: Bueno ba mi cantada?
English: Is my singing good?

Another way to use this is when we ask someone to do something well.

Chabacano: Hace enbuenamente con el escribida tuyo.
English: Make your writing legible. *Literally, make your writing well.

Chabacano: Hace enbuenamente tu cocinada.
English: Literally, it means: make your cooking well.

Here are other sample sentences using the Chabacano verbs turned into nouns found in the list above. Please note that some English translations are literal translations.

Chabacano: Amo ba mio hacida?
English: Did I do it correctly? *Literally, is my doing/ making correct?

Chabacano: Que hora el quemada de basura aqui?
English: What time is the garbage burned here *Literally, what time is the burning of garbage here?

Cultural note: In some rural areas, where there are no garbage trucks collecting garbage, people would dump their garbage in an area and there would be a schedule when the garbage will be burned. It is sort of a community activity.

Chabacano: Malo man tu mirada?
English: Literally, it means: why is your looking bad?
*This is like asking: why are you looking at me like that (in a bad way)

Chabacano: Amo ba el mio entendida?
English: Is my understanding correct? (Did I understand correctly?)

Chabacano: Ansina el ponida o.
English: This is how you put/place it. *Literally: This is the way of putting/placing it.

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