We Filipinos love to eat. We take merienda (afternoon), and enjoy rice-based snacks (kakanin). I recently found out, however, that some of the terms we use have quite a different meaning in aother language…
For example: mamon (light and airy sponge cakes), puto (steamed muffins), and panutsa (liquid brown sugar).
If you check out Jim Paredes’ Home again, workshop again, diving again and… you’ll find out what those words mean in Mexico.
The meanings are embarrassingly different, yet you can still find some connection with eating and drinking. Perhaps there’s some truth to Jim’s thoughts about our colonizers teaching us the “wrong” words.
Does anyone know the etymology of the words mamon, puto, and panutsa (as they are used in the Philippines)?
[Found out about this because of a Twitter exchange between @sassylawyer and @jonijavier]
