Goodbye in Tagalog

A friend asks: "How do you say goodbye in Tagalog?" There are several easy ways of saying this in Tagalog or Filipino.

You can use this one word: "Paalam."

But that can sound rather curt, or formal, sad, depressed, or uptight. If you want to sound more relaxed, you can say this in Tagalog when you want to bid someone farewell: "Sige, mauna na ako." Or even "Sige, una na ako."

It translates to: "Okay, I'll go ahead."

Another Tagalog variation is: "Sige, lakad na ako." (Okay, I'll be on my way)

Alternatively, you can use Taglish (which is a combination of Tagalog and English):

• Ba-bay!
  
• Baba-yoo!
  

You can also sound more poetic and say "Hanggang sa muli" (which translates to "until the next time"). There's also the more colloquial "Kitakits" ("let's see each other soon")

I don't know why there seem to be so many ways to say goodbye in Tagalog. Could it be that Filipinos say goodbye to one another so often?

Anyway, good luck to all of you who want to learn how to speak Tagalog! :-)

[ First posted on 01/18/2009 by Manuel Viloria ]