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Improve Your Portuguese: 07 Brazilian Expressions Posted by on Jun 15, 2014 in Uncategorized, Vocabulary

Image by Eduardo Amorim via Flickr – http://ow.ly/ywPE1

Olá, pessoal!

Learning grammar is very useful, but if you want to speak REAL Brazilian Portuguese you need to be familiar with their expressions and peculiar words.

Are you ready to learn seven really useful and cool expressions in Brazilian Portuguese?

Let’s do this!

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01. Torrar grana – to blow money

Queria saber como ele conseguiu torrar tanta grana num fim de semana só. – I wonder how he managed to blow so much money in only one weekend.
Não dá pra ficar torrando grana se você está desempregado. – You can’t keep blowing money if you’re out of work.

02.Tomar pau – to flunk

Na escola, o Paulo tomou pau em todas as matérias menos português. – Paulo flunked at all his subjects at school but Portuguese.
Se você não entrar na linha e estudar você vai tomar pau.
If you don’t get your act together and study you’ll flunk.

03. Quebrar o galho – to make do, to help out

Não tínhamos açúcar para adoçar o chá então tivemos que quebrar o galho com mel. – We didn’t have any sugar to sweeten our tea so we had to make do with honey.
Ele sempre quebra meu galho quando eu preciso de dinheiro. – He always helps me out when I need money.

04. Rachar a conta – to go dutch, to split the bill

Sempre que saímos rachamos a conta. – We always go dutch when we go out.
Vamos rachar!”, disse a Susana quando o garçom trouxe a conta. – “Let’s go dutch!”, Susana said when the waiter brought the check.

05. Não ter nada a ver com… – to have nothing to do with…

Não tenho nada a ver com isso. – I have nothing to do with that.
Deixa ele fora disso! Ele não tem nada a ver com o que aconteceu. – Leave him out if this! He has nothing to do with what happened.

06. Jogar conversa fora – to shoot the breeze

Gosto de passar as tardes de sábado tomando cerveja com os amigos e jogando conversa fora. – I like to spend my Saturday afternoons drinking beer with my friends and shooting the breeze.
Vem aqui pra gente jogar conversa fora. – Come over so we can shoot the breeze.

07. Ganhar dinheiro a rodo – to make money hand over fist

Os negócios melhoraram e eles começaram a ganhar dinheiro a rodo. – Business picked up and they started to make money hand over fist.
Vamos ganhar dinheiro a rodo com este novo projeto. – We’re going to make money hand over fist with this new project.

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About the Author: Adir

English / Spanish teacher and translator for over 20 years. I have been blogging since 2007 and I am also a professional singer in my spare time.