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 ...
A few months ago, I was contacted by a group who was trying to come up with some educational materials on Chabacano. Part of the project was translating some sentences into Chabacano. The project was already done but they wanted it to be checked by another Chabacano speaker. One of the things that got my attention was the word appointment which was translated as caminada . The word appointment that we are talking about here refers to the appointment that you make with a dentist or a doctor. Even in Tagalog, we just use the English word and I don't think there is a Tagalog equivalent for this word. The Chabacano word caminada does mean 'a date' but it only refers to informal dates such as a date with your friends. Here are some examples using this word: Chabacano: Tiene yo caminada mañana con mio mga amigo. English: I’ll go out tomorrow with my friends. Chabacano: Que hora el caminada tuyo luego? English: What time are you going out later? As you can see, the wo...