The Chabacano Conta

Did you know that aside from 'to count', the word conta has another meaning?

In Spanish, aside from 'to count', this word can also mean 'to tell'. I didn't know that this meaning also existed in the Chabacano conta until I heard my mom use this word to mean 'to tell'. If you speak Chabacano, you would know this word as cunta and that its only definition is 'to count'.

Here are some sentences using the Chabacano word conta, with the definition 'to tell'.

Chabacano: Ya conta le conmigo suyo mga problema.

English: He told me his problems.

Chabacano: Ya conta le conmigo todo que ya pasa con ele durante el tiempo que talla 'le na Filipinas.

Chabacano: He told me everything that happened to him during the time that he was in the Philippines.

The average Chabacano speaker will probably use the word habla and ya man cuento instead of conta in the sentences above. I think that there are a very few people who know this meaning of the word conta and use it.

Camins' dictionary defines the word conta as 'to count', and 'to tell'. Meanwhile, Santos' dictionary spells this word as cunta and defines it as 'to count, 'to tell', and 'to relate'.

My hope is that more people will use the word conta in this manner and that this definition of the word conta will again become mainstream one day.


  1. In Caviteño, contá would definitely be understood, although I think platicá might be used more in practice.


  2. Ya conta le conmigo suyo mga problema.
    ( Verb )(Direct Object)(Personal Pronoun)(Object)

    Is that it? What is "Le" here? He?
    and do you have a section here in your page where I could understand clearly the grammatical structure of Chavacano when it comes to Direct Objects? e.g. "Le conmigo suyo"
    Thank you in advance :)
    Vaya con Dios este Page (i dont know if i said that right .. )

    1. Yes, le in this sentence would be he. Suyo is his and conmigo is (to) me. Hope that helped.