My wife from Makassar pronounces this as Mangkok, rather than Mangkuk. Is that a Makassar thing or are both spelling acceptable nation wide?
Both spellings are acceptable nationwide. The spelling that we learn in textbooks are mangkuk but in daily conversation we prefer mangkok.
My dictionary has both spellings
Mangkok is informal Mangkuk is formal
there u go
Could you use adalah instead of ada?