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

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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Tiene Coche, Tiene Tricycle

In the Tagalog language, the manner in which we say 'I have/you have' and 'there is/are' is through the same word: mayroon.

In Chabacano, we use the word 'tiene'. For example, the sentence 'I have a cat' and 'there is a cat' are translated as 'tiene yo gato' and 'tiene gato'. 

In Spanish, the word used would have been tener (tengo) and hay, respectively.

Since following the Pinoy in Equatorial Guinea and Cinco Filipinos channel in Youtube, I have noticed several instances wherein the characters tend to speak Spanish using Tagalog grammar. Most of the time, their Spanish tends to sound like Chabacano. 

In this episode of Cinco Filipinos, the entire cast visits a church and at the 08:10 mark, Kuya Jose tells the African kids to be careful as they were crossing the street. He tells them, "Espera ha, tiene coche, tiene tricycle." If they were in Zamboanga city, people would think he was speaking in Chabacano.

The Pinoy in Equatorial Guinea channel follows the life of an overseas Filipino worker in Equatorial Guinea while the Cinco Filipinos channel is a spinoff channel.

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