my apologies mr. wiersma but you obviously don't know what you are talking about. the official languages of the philippines are filipino and english. one can survive the country with either of these two. furthermore, filipino is not the amalgamation of these two official languages and different languages from the country. yes, aside from these two are other languages that you mistakenly call dialects. given that they have their own syntax or grammar and vocabulary, they are properly langugaes and not merely dialects. filipino stands by its own right along english, tagalog, cebuano, waray and other philippine languages. please do a thorough research before writing an article.