ANNCR: Good evening! You�re listening to 81.6 WJPN, America�s Asian Alternative. For tonight�s Midnight Hour Profile, we stay on the continent and speak to Filipino-American, Adobogirl.

RPRTR: There�s a saying -- if you can speak three languages, you�re trilingual; if you can speak two languages, you�re bilingual; if you can only speak one language, you�re from the United States. Adobogirl is determined to squelch that myth. This summer, the energetic, ambitious, 21-year-old will be studying Tagalog, a Filipino dialect, in the Philippines.

She believes going to the country is the best way to learn a language because it is only then that you realize it isn�t about the classroom, the grade or the learning of the language -- it�s about thinking in a completely different way.

"That you have to use it or else no one will understand what you�re saying at all then it really hits you to a level where I don�t think a classroom could ever reach because it totally validates the reason of even bothering to learn it."

The University of Hawaii, Manoa, and the University of the Philippines, Baguio, run the program she will be going through. Baguio is just outside of Manila, the capital of the Philippines.

This won�t be Adobogirl�s first time studying in her parents� homeland. Three summers ago, she attended another program called Tagalog on Site. This seven week program was located in Palawan, a much more natural setting than the urbanized Baguio. Adobogirl fell in love with the essentially untouched, clean beauty of Palawan and hopes to visit it, if given the chance, while studying in the more industrialized Baguio.

Even though she�s studied in the Philippines before, the focuses of the two programs however, are different.

"Tagalog on Site focuses more on placing your identity, finding yourself as an American of Philippine descent and AFA is, like, okay, we�re going to learn verbs."

Adobogirl can already speak a fair amount of Tagalog but she didn�t always want to learn. Her parents spoke Tagalog around the house and they visited the Philippines annually. However, when she was in elementary school, she was teased for saying words in the foreign tongue. Her interest in studying Tagalog began during her preteen years while visiting cousins. She disliked the inability to communicate effectively with her relatives.

"You look like everyone else for once, but not being able to speak or just feeling like a double agent -- you�re blending in but you don�t feel like you belong."

Now, she embraces her parents� heritage. They teach her how to cook dishes such as adobo and pansit. She�s president of the Filipino Student Society at Wayne State University and active in the Filipino community.

Learning Tagalog is one way for her to hold onto her family�s traditions and keep the love alive while she passes all she�s learned, and is still learning, onto her own children.

~* March 09, 2003 @ 11:07 pm *~