Philippines Quiz Answers

Congratulations to our good friend TJ for winning the Philippine Quiz! Runner up was Naomi! Thanks for playing!

Here are the answers with explanations (and pictures!)

1.  What is the official language of the Philippines?

There are actually two: Filipino and English. Most people say it's Tagalog, and that's kinda right. Tagalog is a language spoken by many people in the Philippines. When the government was trying to unify the Philippines, they selected Tagalog to be the national language. But people who didn't speak Tagalog as their mother tongue didn't like that. So the government "invented" a new language that was supposed to combine elements from all the languages spoken in the Philippines. It was called Pilipino for a while, but this still didn't get wide support from the variety of ethnic groups in the Philippines, so they changed the name to Filipino. 

The varied landscape of the Philippine islands holds varied languages and peoples. (C) Isaac and Kirstie Bickford

As far as we can tell, Filipino is Tagalog with an assortment of loan words from various languages, especially English, Spanish, and regional languages of the Philippines. It was strange going to the Philippines, not knowing a word of Filipino, and being able to understand every eighth word (Isaac knows Spanish and Kirstie knows... when she hears a Spanish word).

And speaking of Spanish, we thought that a lot more people would speak Spanish in the Philippines. There was a lot of linguistic influence from Spanish, but most people don't speak it. In the Philippines, Spanish, along with Arabic, must be supported on an "optional" basis (yeah, we don't get it either).

2. What fruit is Davao known for?

Durian! Does it taste like fruit or like onions? Does it smell like cake or like feet? Is it rotten? Wait, people actually EAT it? Looks like a soggy bun, feels like stringy custard, smells like fetid death. And people across southern Asia LOVE LOVE LOVE it!!!111eleven!!<3!1!!:)!hephalump!!!1

Durian. Nuff said. (photo by Wie146)

We first tried durian in Thailand. And then we didn't try it again. Filipinos love it so much that they erected an enormous statue of it that's housed outside the Davao airport.

(Note: Durian is not the same as breadfruit or jack fruit.)

3. When is Christmas celebrated in the Philippines?
TJ's answer of December 16th through the first Sunday of January is technically correct for some people in the Philippines. But really, this question could be answered in two ways:
a. Christmas is celebrated on December 25th in the Philippines (just like in most places).
b. Christmas is celebrated from September through February (some people keep their decorations up for six months!)

So when we visited at the end of October, many people had already had there decorations up for almost two months! It's been hard enough trying to remember the date in Asia due to lack of fall colors or chilly weather, but the mash of Santa Claus and jack-o-lanterns just made our heads spin.

Christmas tree in Manila on October 28. (C) Isaac and Kirstie Bickford

Stores and radio stations play Christmas carols for this long as well so none of you can complain about getting sick of carols a week after Thanksgiving!


Speaking of Thanksgiving, it's coming up this week! We're in Indonesia where they don't celebrate Thanksgiving; we'll be missing our family and turkey. In the comments section, let us know what you're thankful for this year!


Thanks for playing the quiz!


..Kirstie and Isaac..