Wednesday, July 18, 2007

Boring. Bored. Bore.

The evolution of Taglish grammar. It's one of the topics we were talking about over eggpie and Coke last night--on my sister's 20th birthday.

We're trying hard to figure out why, of all the English words, Filipinos are having difficulty using the root word "bore" (as in boredom) in a common Taglish conversation. Sample.
Person 1: Bakit aalis na tayo?
Person 2: Naboboring ako eh.

This is incorrect with the fact that "boring" is either an adjective, or a verb in present tense. In Tagalog, using the first syllable twice suggests that it is in present tense so there isn't a need for the -ing at the end of the word. Other word samples: excite/exciting - naeexcite (not naeexciting)
Person 1: Kamusta yung party na inattendan mo?
Person 2: Nabored ako eh.

Though this sounds less incorrect, it still is. "Na" before a word denotes past tense. So why the past tense form for the bore word? Other word samples: try/tried - natry (not natried)

Why? Someone tell me why? What's with the bore/bored/boring word that makes it confusing? I usually encounter people saying these grammatically incorrect Taglish phrases. Bakit kaya? We can't figure this out.

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