3. 10 MOST BEAUTIFUL WORDS OF THE KAPAMPANGAN LANGUAGE

1. RUGU, unique Kapampangan adverb of compassion or relief. It is the Tagalog “Kawawa naman” and “Sa wakas” with 50 more shades of sympathy and you can insert it anywhere in the sentence or even as a stand-alone word, as in Ninanu ne rugu y Pedro? (“Whatever happened to poor Pedro?”) or Mekisawa na ka pala rugu (“I heard you got married already”) or Sinambut ne regu king lotto y Juan (“Juan has won the lotto at last”) or simply Rugo! or Ay rugo! or Rugu naman! (“Oh my!”). I feel good when I say it and feel even better when I hear it, because it softens hard emotions like fear (“Dios ku rugo!”) and anger (“Nananu ka rugu!”).

2. LUID, a noun that means “conservation, prolongation” as in Lumuid ing pamangan (“The food will last”), Maluid ing dutung (“The lumber is good”), and Lumuid ka sa bie (“May you live long”). Today we often say Luid ka! or simply Luid! as a greeting and a wish to mean “May you live long!” or “Long life to you!” (the equivalent of the Tagalog “Mabuhay!”).

3. SUKU, noun, “full term, peak” as in Sinuku yang lulut ing bunga (“The fruit is fully ripe”) and Sinuku ne ing danum (“The tide has reached its peak”). But it also means “indeterminate end, the end that nobody knows when, not even the one who coined the term” as in Manaya ku anggang king suku (“I will wait forever”). When you put luid and suku together as in Lumuid ka anggang suku, you will get “Live till a ripe old age.” The name of the Kapampangan mythical god Sinukuan must have meant “eternal” or “ageless” instead of “surrendered to.” Old documents, in fact, name him as Suku not Sinukuan.

4. TUA, noun, “age, antiquity, maturity, coming of age.” All the good and positive nuances and meanings that the word connotes are found in this simple Kapampangan word, from matua (“old”) to makatua (“the venerable old folks”) to tutua (“maturing”) to ketuan (“attributes of an old man, excelling in age”) to magmatua (“one who plays the role of village elder, to whom everyone pays attention and without whom nothing is decided”). The Tagalog equivalent is tanda, which pales in comparison to the richness of the Kapampangan tua—a word many Kapampangan families have adopted as their surnames.

5. NE, an all-purpose interjection that has no counterpart in other Philippine languages and no equivalent in English but is found in other world languages like Catalan, Czech, German, and Japanese. It is different from the adverb ne (“already”) as in Minta ne keni (“He already came here”). The interjection ne is the Kapampangan equivalent of “okay” or “all right” and is used only for emphasis or reiteration, as in Ika na mu, ne? (“You be the one, okay?”) and is different from the Tagalog “di ba?” (“is it not?” which is “alé?” in Kapampangan). Kapampangans relish using it because it is a term of endearment and instant recognition. Amazing how a single syllable can turn strangers into friends; you hear ne in a crowd and you know there's a Kapampangan in the room!

6. KAPUTUL, noun, “sibling,” which has more emotional content and is more Kapampangan-sounding than its synonym kapatad. Both terms come from two roots with the same meaning (patad and putul, “cut”) which implies two persons cut from the same bloodline or an imagined family rope. Kaka, the word used to address an older sibling, and the shorter Ka, which is used to address a comrade-in-arms, came from the first syllable of kapatad. I am just intrigued by the fact that while patad’s Tagalog equivalent is patid (hence, kapatid), there is no putul in Kapampangan—so how did the Tagalog putul end up in the Kapampangan kaputul?

7. BATALA, noun that refers to the kingfisher, that elusive blue bird of the swamps and marshes of Pampanga. Kapampangans consider the bird sacred and its rare appearances as apparitions. Magbatala ku or Magmanuk ku means to take the augury of the bird, either as an omen of ill fortune or a harbinger of good news. The word’s ancient Sanskrit and Malay roots had meanings ranging from “noble” to “god” which is why batala eventually became Bathala.

8. DAYAT, noun, “irrigated rice fields, ready for seeding.” Ancient Pampanga had vast areas of irrigated rice fields that looked like a large lake or sea, which is why our ancestors had to use the qualifying term dayat malat (“salty irrigated fields”) to refer to the actual sea. The Tagalogs who had borrowed the term, however, dropped malat and corrupted dayat into dagat. Some scholars think that the agricultural town Arayat got its name from the word dayat (d and r are interchangeable in Kapampangan, as in dugo and rugo).

9. LUALU, noun, a remarkable Kapampangan word that means “defending the defenseless, championing the unprotected and the destitute,” which reveals the kind of cultural values we used to have. The reason this word has disappeared from our vocabulary is we have stopped doing such acts of charity and chivalry. As far as I know, there is no similar word in other Philippine languages.

10. ALAYA, noun, “the dawn,” sometimes used as the directional term paralaya (“the east”) which is the opposite of paroba (“the west”), and the mountain sacred to Kapampangans, Bunduk Alaya (Mount Arayat), “mountain where the sun dwells or rises,” similar to the old Sanskrit term himalaya (hima, “snow” + alaya, “dwelling”). Paralaya also means “to go upstream” and paroba “to go downstream,” based on our ancestors' perspective, i.e., from the riverbank communities in Macabebe they paddled their boats on Pampanga River in the direction of Mt. Arayat, located upstream.

Author: Robby Tantingco.
Originally posted on his FB page.