ponteng

English

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from Malay ponteng.

Verb

ponteng (third-person singular simple present pontengs, present participle pontenging, simple past and past participle pontenged)

  1. (Singlish, Manglish) To skip (school or work); play truant.
    • 1978, Adibah Amin, As I was Passing, volume 2, page 197:
      [] she rushed up to me at the end shouting: "Hei you came! Did you ponteng work?"
      I do not advocated "pontenging" of course but I do strongly recommend one primary school sports meet at least for each parent and soon.
    • Quoted in 2009, Rosaly Puthucheary, Different Voices: The Singaporean/Malaysian Novel (page 124)
      But that was the best place to spend the day if you pontenged school. It was so cool and quiet.

Derived terms

Malay

Etymology

Probably from Hokkien 奔騰 / 奔腾 (phun-thêng).[1]

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ˈponteŋ/ [ˈpon̪.t̪eŋ]
  • Rhymes: -onteŋ, -teŋ, -eŋ
  • Hyphenation: pon‧teng

Verb

ponténg (Jawi spelling ڤونتيڠ, active memonteng, 3rd person passive diponteng)

  1. (transitive) To cheat; to swindle.
    Synonyms: tipu, kecoh
  2. (informal, transitive) To ditch or skip work, school and so on; to skive.
    Synonym: fly (Malaysia, slang)
    Adam tak pernah ponteng kelasnya.
    Adam has never skipped his classes.

Compounds

References

  1. ^ Hamilton, A. W. (1924). Chinese Loan-Words in Malay. Journal of the Malayan Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, 2(1 (90)), 55. http://www.jstor.org/stable/41559569

Further reading