Page 135 - Tagalog for Beginners: An Introduction to Filipino, the National Language of the Philippines

to imitate the colonizer’s culture in everything from the bahay na bato (stone
houses) with its European furnishings to food, with Spanish dishes such as paella,
mechado, and afritada, while looking down at the ways of the indigenous people.
This tension is portrayed in the nineteenth-century Tagalog sainete or short
comic play La India elegante y el Negrito amante (The Elegant India and the
Negrito Lover), n.d., by Francisco Baltazar. In this sainete, Capitan Toming is an
Aeta, also known as the Negrito, one of the Philippines’ approximately sixty
ethnolinguistic groups. Characterized by their dark skin, short height, and kinky
hair, and portrayed disparagingly in early nineteenth-century photographs, the Aetas
have long struggled with discrimination in Philippine society. In Baltazar’s play,
Capitan Toming tries to impress the Tagala (from the Tagalog region) Menangue by
discarding his indigenous loincloth, wearing the tagabayan’s barong Tagalog (the
shirt of the Tagalog) and speaking in Spanish, the language of the colonizer and the
educated class. However, toward the end of the play, she recognizes that it is the
kalooban or one’s heart that is more important.
The play is thus an indictment of Filipinos who discarded their indigenous

culture to embrace that of the colonizers.

Pagbabasa

Read the following passage, and then answer the questions that follow. Study the
following new words so that you can understand the passage better.

Taong 1967 Year 1967
nanonood watch
Pasko Christmas

sine movie
bumibili buy

manok chicken
naaalala remember

Cubao

Taong 1967, at nag-aaral ako ng kindergarten sa Stella Maris College. Nasa
Cubao ang eskuwelahan ko. Malaki ang eskuwelahan ko, at maganda at
malinis ang Cubao. Nakasuot kaming mga estudyante ng puting blusa na
may “sailor collar” at asul na palda. May maliit na simbahan sa loob ng
eskuwelahan namin.