home

From Portuguese home, denasalized variant of homem.

home-home di hoze


sora

Clipping of Portuguese professora, feminine form of professor.

Sora, ele sempre chubí eu!

Sora, êle dáli eu!


china

a Chinese person, especially from mainland China


filo

filo-di-quim

filo-grándi

filo trás di porta


filo

chuva filo-filo


letrado

From Old Galician-Portuguese leterado, possibly with semantic influence from Spanish letrado.


nina

From Portuguese nina, clipping of menina. Possibly a doublet of nhim.


bife

From Portuguese bife, from English beef, from Old French buef, from Latin bovem (“ox”).


cafre

Presumably from Portuguese cafre, from Arabic كَافِر (kāfir, “infidel”).


sium

Possibly from an Afro-Portuguese variant of Portuguese senhor, reduced to *siô, with nasalization taking place by analogy of nhum. Doublet of nhum, via an older form nhom.

Sium Capitám


nhi

Nhi Pancha, passá bem?


bói

Borrowed from English boy. Semantically unrelated to Portuguese boy.

Chomâ bói trazê café co lête

Ask the waiter to bring coffee with milk


cúli

Most likely from English coolie, from Hindustani क़ुली / قلی (qulī, “hired laborer”), possibly from Ottoman Turkish قول (kul, “servant”).

cabéça-di-cúli

stevedore at the docks and markets responsible for a team of coolies; head of coolies

Chomâ quanto cúli para cartá tudo ancuza

Call for a few coolies to carry everything


mulé

From Portuguese mulher. Compare Kristang mulé.


nhonha

Possibly from Portuguese dona or Malay nyonya or Portuguese senhora. See also Spanish doña (“lady”) and Hokkien 娘惹 (nō͘-niâ) & 娘仔 (niô͘-á, “young lady”).

Coordinate term: nhum

Nhonha canta.


amui

head

amui (plural amui-amui, diminutive amuichai)

amui-amui (plural)
amuichai (diminutive)

Borrowed from Cantonese 阿妹 (aa3 mui6-2, aa3 mui6-1).

Amui corrê vem gudam.

girl, specifically an unmarried Chinese girl from a humble background


nhum

From Portuguese senhor, via an older nhom, which seems to have been an abbreviation arisen from Afro-Portuguese. Compare Portuguese nhô, Kabuverdianu nho, nhu. Doublet of sium.

Nhum nunca-sam di aqui.


atâi

Atâi corrê vem gudam.


mainato

Borrowed from Malayalam [script needed] (mannattan), most likely via Indo-Portuguese.


leongfanêro

Chinese diver who collects oysters from the muddy waters of Macau and cracks them open


vêlo-công

Estung'a velo-công ui-di boca brejero!


amuichai

amui + Cantonese 仔 (zai², “diminutive suffix”) and/or Cantonese 阿 (aa³, “familiar prefix”) + Cantonese 妹仔 (mui⁶⁻¹ zai², “maid”).


apó

apó cartâ águ

elderly Chinese woman of humble background


fóquei

Borrowed from Cantonese 夥記 /伙记 (fo² gei³). Alternative form likely derives from the same source as English foki.


siára

head

siára (plural siára-siára, masculine sium)

From Portuguese senhora, apparently influenced by Afro-Portuguese and/or Kristang.


tiro-grandi

Portuguese tiro (“shot”) + grandi (“big”), calque of English big shot.


nhonhônha

Alternative form of nhonhonha: ladies, women


quiança

From Portuguese criança. For /kr/ → /k/, compare quiada and isquevê.

Acunga quiança tâ churâ


quiada

From Portuguese criada, feminine form of criado. For /kr/ → /k/, compare quiança, isquevê, and maquiâ.

quiada já sai

the maid isn't working here anymore (literally, “the maid has left”)

elâ na rabicho di quiada


puliça

Ultimately from Latin polītīa, probably through Portuguese polícia and the colloquial slang form puliça.

puliça-môro

Indian soldier formerly recruited from Goa, Damao and Diu to serve in Macao's police force

puliça pau

(historical) policeman carrying a wooden stick; policeman stick

Puliça prendê êle


chuchumeca

chuchú (“to poke”) or chúcho (“interfering, nosy”) + English maker.

Quelora, ficá careca, vôs nunca bom chuchuméca.

When you grow bald, don't be a troublemaker.

busybody, gossiper, chatterbox, troublemaker


cristám

From Portuguese cristão. Linguistic senses an ellipsis of língu cristám.

cristám-nôvo

adult Chinese convert to Catholicism (literally, “new Catholic”)

papiâ cristám


cristám

língu cristám

Portuguese; Macanese; Kristang; Christian/Catholic language

Christian (relating to or following Christianity)


pacfanista

Cantonese 白粉 (baak⁶ fan², “heroin”, literally “white powder”) + -ista (“agent noun suffix”), probably influenced by Cantonese derivations such as 白粉仔 (baak⁶ fan² zai²) and 白粉友 (baak⁶ fan² jau⁵⁻²).

suffix

drug addict (person with a chemical or psychological dependency on drugs)


chanquêm

Borrowed from Cantonese 巡警 (ceon⁴ ging²), borrowing the now-obsolete sense of "police officer".


pisidénte

From Portuguese presidente. For R-dropping, compare isquevê, quiança, and also pisente (“present”).

Olâ Pisidénte


faichista

faichi (“chopstick”) + -ista. Related to the rules of fan-tan, where a player uses a rod shaped like a chopstick to play the game.


bafo di ade

(idiomatic) someone who talks excessively and repetitively; chatterbox


bafo cumprido

Calque of Cantonese 長氣 /长气 (coeng⁴ hei³, literally “long air”).


tancarêro

tancá + -êro. Intrusive -r- due to hypercorrected form tancar.


estopôr

Uncertain. Possibly from Portuguese estupor (“stupor”).


máno

Presumably from Portuguese mano. Sense 3 (especially with chomâ) possibly also a semantic loan from Cantonese 大佬 (daai⁶ lou²).

semantic loan

Passado más quánto ano, quim logo chomá êle mano?

After all these years, who will call him the boss?


porquéro

From Portuguese porqueiro. By surface analysis, porco + -éro. Compare Spanish porquero.


nuviléro

Possibly from Portuguese novilheiro (“calf-fighter”) (cf. Spanish novillero), with a semantic shift due to Portuguese novidade (“news”) and more distantly Latin novellus (“new; novel”). By surface analysis, Portuguese novo + -éro.

surf

person who likes to spread and know about news


nhim

Possibly a diminutive of Portuguese menina, ultimately from Old Galician-Portuguese meninha, with possible metathesis.

Coordinate term: siára

formal address for young girls, single women and lowly women of a certain age: young lady, miss


ach'á

a Muslim, especially an Indian, Pakistani or otherwise South Asian Muslim


môro

From Portuguese mouro (“Moor”). Compare Spanish moro.

puliça-môro

carí di móro

(by extension) any non-Christian Indian (person from India)


amuiróna

amui (“girl”) + -róna (“feminine augmentative suffix”).


aporóna

apó (“elderly Chinese woman”) + -róna (“feminine augmentative suffix”).

Sã ramendá aporóna,
Cartá pinga vendê brêdo.
She appears to be an ordinary woman,
carrying baskets of vegetables for sale.

(possibly derogatory) large, heavy, ordinary middle-aged Chinese woman


pilizám

Probably from Portuguese pelejão. By surface analysis, pilizâ (“to argue, to dispute”) + -ám.


pilizóna

Probably from obsolete and/or low colloquial Portuguese pelejona. By surface analysis, pilizâ + -óna.


bifalhada

From Portuguese bifalhada (“big portion of steak”), augmentative form of bife.


raspiáti

Uncertain. Variously speculated to be from either French rapiat (“avid; greedy”) or Indo-Portuguese rajputo, rasbuto, resbuto, reisbuto, a military caste in ancient Gujarat, ultimately from Sanskrit राजपुत्र (rājaputra). Semantically, the derogatory senses may have come about when the resbutos, after the Moors took over their Gujarati kingdom, turned to banditry, and were referred to as "great thieves and tyrants".

Raspiáti si sã querê
Tud'ora mostrá grandéza,
Sã têm qui onçôm gemê,
Pinchado na su pobréza.
The pauper who always goes about
Showing off grandeur,
Will end up suffering,
Cast down in his poverty.