The “Abakada” is the Tagalog counterpart of the Latin alphabet, the word taken from the first four letters of the Tagalog alphabet A, B, K, and D which are read as “a” “ba” “ka,” and “da.” It has twenty letters, five of which are vowels and fifteen are consonants. Unlike the Latin alphabet, though, it doesn’t have the letters C, F, J, Q, V, X and Z.
To accommodate words borrowed from other languages, the letters previously mentioned are substituted with Tagalog letters that are closest to them in pronunciation. For example, the letter C is replaced with the letter K, (“check” becomes “tsek”) the letter F with the letter P (“family” becomes “pamilya”), J with the letters DY + vowel (“jeep” becomes “dyip”), Q with the letter K (“quota” becomes “kota”), V with the letter B (“visitor” becomes “bisita”), letter X with the letters EKS (“exam” becomes “eksamen”), and the letter Z with S (“diez” becomes “dies/diyes”).
*For those who are familiar with the “Filipino accent,” this is the reason why a good number of Filipinos struggle with their F’s, V’s and Z’s (including me, especially when I talk a little too fast).
Please note that this may not always be the case as there are times when Tagalog speakers just use the original English word instead of translating it to its closest Tagalog translation to avoid making the word sound awkward.
That’s pretty much it.
Should you have any questions, feel free to leave a comment. (^_^)
