tompang means to have one's items carried by another; to include items as part of a trip taken by another. It carries an Arena rating of 1669, earned across 7 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, tompang ranks #1,051 of 17,151 for The Improbable, #1,794 of 17,142 for Most Ingenious Words, #2,442 of 17,163 for Funniest Words, #4,113 of 17,140 for Most Whimsical Words.
tompang is pronounced [ˌt˭ɔmˈp˭ɑŋ].
Why “tompang” is a great word
To have one’s items carried by another, to hitch a ride, or to append a request to an existing plan as a personal favor. From Malay *tumpang*, meaning 'to take shelter with' or 'to ride along'. Unlike piggyback, which often implies a strategic leverage of infrastructure, or append, a sterile, formal term for addition, tompang is the gentle, social art of informal accretion. It is the parcel slipped into a friend’s departing suitcase, the last-minute passenger squeezing onto a motorbike, the modest clause added to the bottom of a shared proposal—a quiet testament to the human reliance on the goodwill and existing momentum of others.
Etymology
Malay tumpang (“to take shelter with”).
verb
- To have one's items carried by another; to include items as part of a trip taken by another.e.g.“If you go out then can I tumpang some letters to be mailed from post box?” — 2003, Samantha Hanna, An essential guide to Singlish, page 86:
- To hitch a ride.e.g.“Eh, my wife took my car today. Can I tumpang your car to work?” — 2009, The Coxford Singlish dictionary, page 195:
- To append something to a proposal.e.g.“Party chief Low Thia Khiang said that, while they support the name change to honour Encik Yusof, "we cannot square with the change(s) that are being 'tompang' (piggybacked) with the name change."” — 2015-07-15, Nur Asyiqin Mohamad Salleh, “WP MPs object to change in selection process for board”, in The Straits Times, retrieved 01 Nov 2015:
Definitions & examples from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 3.0).
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