Philippines: Language and Dialect

While there are over 100 regional languages in the Philippines, the national language is Filipino, with English as the most widely spoken second language. All business, governmental and legal transactions are conducted in English.

Philippines: Useful Filipino Phrases

Travel Quotes:

Traveling, you realize that differences are lost: each city takes to resembling all cities, places exchange their form, order, distances, a shapeless dust cloud invades the continents. Italo Calvino

To travel is to discover that everyone is wrong about other countries. Aldous Huxley

Philippine Cuisine Island Philippines

Puchero (beef in bananas and tomato sauce), afritada (chicken and/or pork simmered in a peanut sauce with vegetables), kare-kare (oxtail and vegetables cooked in peanut sauce), pinakbet (kabocha squash, eggplant, beans, okra, and tomato stew flavored with shrimp paste) crispy pata (deep-fried pigs leg), hamonado (pork sweetened in pineapple sauce), sinigang (meat or seafood in sour broth), pancit (noodles), and lumpia (fresh or fried spring rolls). More details at Philippine Cuisine Island Philippines

Main Dishes Philippine Cuisine

Adobo is one of the most popular Filipino dishes and is considered unofficially by many as the national dish. It usually consists of pork or chicken, sometimes both, stewed or braised in a sauce usually made from vinegar, cooking oil, garlic, bay leaf, peppercorns, and soy sauce. It can also be prepared "dry" by cooking out the liquid and concentrating the flavor. Bistek, also known as "Filipino beef steak," consists of thinly sliced beef marinated in soy sauce and calamansi and then fried in a skillet that is typically served with onions.

More details at Main Dishes Philippine Cuisine