In the last post I mentioned some of the most common greetings I encounter everyday here in the Philippines. I wrote about “Saan ka pupunta?” and “Saan ka galing?” and also “Kumusta?”. In this post I want to mention a few more common ones. I don’t here these as often but I certainly have been greeted with these.
For example, just the other day I was sitting on the terrace here. It is very close to the street. A man from the neighborhood was passing by on a bicycle and we acknowledged each other with a nod. Then he said “Magandang gabi.” I replied with “Magandang gabi rin“.
Time of Day Greetings
Just as we say “Good morning” or “Good afternoon” in English, Tagalog speakers also have greetings depending on the time of the day. Most notably the greetings relate to morning, afternoon and evening. However, there are also greetings for “Noon time” and also for the day in general. Let’s look at these simple greetings.
Beautiful ….
The first word we need to look at is the Tagalog (Filipino) word for “beautiful”. The reason is, the time of day greetings translate to “beautiful morning” and “beautiful evening”, etc. The word “maganda” means beautiful in Tagalog.
When using an adjective such as “maganda” there is usually a “linker” between the adjective and the item being described by the adjective. Here is how to say “beautiful morning”: Magandang umaga. Notice the “ng” added to the word “maganda“. That is the “linker”. In this case, the adjective ends in a vowel, thus the “ng” linker is used. If it ended with a consonant, then a separate word “na” would be used after the adjective. (Example: Asul na bahay: Blue na house; blue house)
Good Morning, Good Afternoon and Good Evening
As we saw in the previous section, Good morning is actually spoken as “Beautiful morning” which is “Magandang umaga“. If we want to say “Beautiful afternoon, we can say “Magandang hapon“. Finally, in order to say “Beautiful evening” you simply say “Magandang gabi“.
Magandang umaga: Beautiful morning (Good morning)
Magandang hapon: Beautiful afternoon (Good afternoon)
Magandang gabi: Beautiful evening (Good evening)
Good Noon-time and Good day
There is also a greeting for noon-time but I have yet to hear is spoken here yet. The word for Noon-time is “tanghali“. I hear that word used rather often, but not the following greeting: Magandang tanghali. I am mentioning it in this post so you will be aware of it.
Another time-of-day greeting is “Beautiful day!”: Magandang araw! The word for day is “araw” and it is also the word for “sun”. That makes it easy to remember because the sun is visible during the day! Note: Remember to “roll the R”.
So there you have it. I hope you have a beautiful day (Magandang araw!). I will discuss more greetings in the next post and also how to respond when somebody greets you with the greetings I’ve discussed.
