Travel in the Philippines
If you want to learn Tagalog, the easiest way to do so is to speak regularly with a Filipino who grew up with the language and ask him or her to translate words regularly for you. After that the memorization of words is up to you. Having someone to translate English words and phrases to Tagalog and vice-versa can be quite useful when learning the language.
I have a classmate who was born in and lived in an English speaking country. Her father is Filipino. She does not speak much Tagalog except for phrases such as "ang pangalan ko ay..." which in English means "my name is...." Despite her lack of fluency in Tagalog, it did not hinder us from communicating with each other because English is widely spoken in the Philippines.
During the first semester, the teacher said I should find a seat next to her. After class we chatted and she mentioned how much she wanted to learn Tagalog. She said that she would be living in the Philippines for quite a while. I volunteered to help her learn more Tagalog. We decided to meet once per week to practice and speak only in Tagalog.
On that first day we arranged to practice Tagalog, we started with a few basic words and practical phrases such as "what is your name?" The translation of this is "ano (what) ang pangalan (name) mo (your)." She already knew the response to this question which is "ang pangalan ko ay..." which again means "my name is......"
She asked me how to say "do you know how to cook?" in Tagalog. I replied that the translation of her question was "marunong ka ba kung paano magluto." The word for "know" is "marunong," and "how" is "paano." To say "cook" we can use "magluto."
She wanted me to translate the names of some of the common fruits and vegetables. I started off by saying that first of all the word for "common" is "karaniwan," while the word for "vegetables" is "gulay," and to say "fruits" the word for that is "prutas." I also mentioned the names of vegetables commonly found here in the Philippines; and these include: tomato, cassava, okra, and pumpkin. In Tagalog these are kamatis, kamoteng kahoy, okra, and kalabasa, respectively. As for fruits, I mentioned: watermelon, pineapple, soursop, and guava. These fruits in Tagalog are known as pakwan, pinya, guyabano, and bayabas respectively.
The Tagalog sessions we had really helped my classmate get started with learning Tagalog words. Meeting with a Filipino and learning the language from them is a good way to learn it. An alternative way of learning is via the Internet. You can use cyber space to help you learn the language. Using audio materials can also be a big help. Or better yet, take an educational trip to the Philippines to get accustomed to the language and culture.
