Pass The Quilt

I grew up like many in the neighborhood being chased by grandma, otherwise known to me as apong , who frequently did so menacing a slipper while my both my parents worked.  When I was a kid I never really thought about the dynamics of culture and language.  I never gave it any real thought that she was speaking Ilocano, and I was returning English.  I sort of knew why, but I didn’t know if there was anything to it.  I never gave a tiny thought about language until about senior year of high school when Tagalog became a foreign language taught, and some students had some cultural realization about preserving the Filipino Language.  That’s when some thought it important to form a club to celebrate recapture our Tagalog roots and language.  Our was really belonged to just some, but it didn’t keep them from feeling more culturally empowered than others. 

All I to say is that Ilocano is a language of its own.  It’s not a dialect.  It’s not like the difference is some sort of accent and slang.  Otherwise I’d understand many things like I understand when I’m at a friend’s house whoseparents speak Ilocano.  As Carl Galvez Rubino makes a comparison in his Language dictionary, Ilocano, “The dissertation of Cecilio Lopez (1928) addressed the question and responded that the differences can be compared to those of Spanish and German, two members of the Indo-European language family, but coming from separate subfamilies.(pg 8)”

It became a thorn in my side when later on, more frequently I came upon elder Filipinos I didn’t know who spoke to me in Tagalog and I don’t know a damn thing their saying.  I tried to politely say I didn’t understand.  Then the next thing I see is a head shaking, and a disappointing look like I’ve sold out.  Worse yet is when an elder made a comment to my friend (who also is of Ilocano language background) that he was a vanishing Filipino and he oughta be ashamed. 

It’s funny because now because I’ve landed in a work location in the US where the population is Filipinos fresh from the Filipinos and Tagalog is spoken all around me.  Some think I’ve got to recognize some words.  But I could only recognize a few, and not enough to string anything meaningful together.  It feels like no matter what you say, to the eyes of others you just forgot the language, and in so many words sold out.  It’s like useless and unfounded shame.

Hey, I’ve resolved to learn Tagalog for myself.  It’s gonna be difficult and like learning from scratch.  At my age, it’s not as easy.  My Grandma didn’t understand a lick of Tagalog and she was actually in the Philippines.  So, I won’t make attempts to defend the indefensible.

Now that I think about it, whose pushing back and fighting to preserve the Ilocano language?  I was in the Philippines in 2003 and my uncles and aunties were telling me they talk to the kids in Ilocano and they return in Tagalog.  They say it’s because they teach in Tagalog and also must learn to write in English.  The generational gap could be widening with the consolidation of language.  What could this all mean?  I was in Scotland and Ireland in 2006, and I heard from various locals that each had launched
referendums in education teach basic Gaelic because only 15% of the populations out there even understood the language, much less spoke it.  It was on the brink of disappearing within a generation or two.