and au on the end of base words are typically pronounced as and . In informal writing, the spelling of words is modified to reflect the actual pronunciation in a way that can be produced with less effort. For example, becomes or , becomes , becomes . In verbs, the prefix me- is often dropped, although an initial nasal consonant is often retained, as when becomes (the basic word is ). The suffixes -kan and -i are often replaced by -in. For example, becomes , becomes . The latter grammatical aspect is one often closely related to the Indonesian spoken in Jakarta and its surrounding areas. Classification and related languages Malay historical linguists agree on the likelihood of the Malay homeland being in western Borneo stretching to the Bruneian coast. A form known as Proto-Malay language was spoken in Borneo at least by 1000 BCE and was, it has been argued, the ancestral language of all subsequent Malayan languages. Its ancestor, Proto-Malayo-Polynesian, a descendant of the Proto-Austronesian language, began to break up by at least 2000 BCE, possibly as a result of the southward expansion of Austronesian peoples into Maritime Southeast Asia from the island of Taiwan. Indonesian, which originated from Malay, is a member of the Austronesian family of languages, which includes languages from Southeast Asia, the Pacific Ocean and Madagascar, with a smaller number in continental Asia. It has a degree of mutual intelligibility with the Malaysian standard of Malay, which is officially known there as , despite the numerous lexical differences. However, vernacular varieties spoken in Indonesia and Malaysia share limited intelligibility, which is evidenced by the fact that Malaysians have difficulties understanding Indonesian sinetron (soap opera) aired on Malaysia TV stations, and vice versa. Malagasy, a geographic outlier spoken in Madagascar in the Indian Ocean; the Philippines national language, Filipino; Formosan in Taiwan's aboriginal population; and the native Māori language of New Zealand are also members of this language family. Although each language of the family is mutually unintelligible, their similarities are rather striking. Many roots have come virtually unchanged from their common ancestor, Proto-Austronesian language. There are many cognates found in the languages' words for kinship, health, body parts and common animals. Numbers, especially, show remarkable similarities. There are more than 700 local languages in Indonesian islands, such as Javanese, Sundanese, etc. While, Malay as the source of Indonesian is mother tongue of ethnic Malay