Little EENYO

One of the things that that I find endearing about the Brazilians is their love of diminutives. These typically involve adding an “inho” (EEN-yo) or “inha” (EEN-ya) to the end of words. For example, although the Portuguese for ‘bill’ is conta, you will often hear people ask the waiter to bring the continha (con-CHEEN-ya). Perhaps this is wishful thinking that the bill will be small? I don’t think we really have an equivalent in English. Well, certainly nothing that doesn’t make us sound ridiculous (“Waiter, please bring me the billykins”).


The name Manuela is often shortened to Manu, but this is then paradoxically lengthened with an affectionate diminutive to make Manuzinha. 


Diminutives are also commonly used in *footballers’ names. My understanding of this is simply that their real names don’t exactly trip off the tongue. Compare Ronaldinho to Ronaldo de Assis Moreira. Or Pelé to Edison Arantes do Nascimento. 




But it can get confusing. The guy that I think of as the original Ronaldo was first nicknamed Ronaldinho. For this reason, the guy that I think of as Ronaldinho was initially known as Ronaldinho Gaúcho. Then Ronaldinho went to Europe and decided he would be known simply as Ronaldo. This then left the ground open for Ronaldinho Gaúcho to revert to simple Ronaldinho. Still following? 

Real name: Ronaldo Luís Nazário de Lima. First went by Ronaldinho, then reverted to Ronaldo on moving to Europe. The Italians, not to be outdone, decided to call him Il Fenomeno (“The Phenomenon” in case you couldn’t guess).

Real name: Ronaldo de Assis Moreira. Originally called Ronaldinho Gaúcho, reverted to Ronaldinho, but still known as Ronaldinho Gaúcho in Brazil.

One other thing for non-Brazilians. One of the idiosyncrasies of Portuguese pronunciation is that “di” sounds like the English “jee”. And remember Rs sometimes sound like Hs. So if you want to impress a Brazilian by saying it properly, say honal-JEEN-yo.

*Can I just clear this up for Brazilians? The English don’t call it “Soccer” – you are confusing us with our North American cousins. We call it “Football”. I have lost count of the number of times that a Brazilian will ask “Do you like football? Oh sorry, I mean soccer?”. 


After we invented the game (sorry, I couldn’t resist) we had our brightest minds think up a logical name for a game that primarily involves kicking a ball with your foot and some bright spark decided on Football. As a nation we are utterly baffled as to why the people of the US insist on calling their game football too… ;)