Brazilian affection/cuddling vocabulary
Companion piece to the casual relationship vocabulary.
- Carinho: caress; cuddle. Literally “little care”. In the strict sense, a gesture of physical affection; more generally, any action that makes you feel cared for.
- Carinhosa: cuddly in a caring way. Affectionate and care-giving. A highly valued trait in a partner.
- Carente: the emotional state of being in need of carinho. Care-seeking. Like “needy” but without the negative connotation. “Hon, be nice to me cos today I'm carente.”
- Chorosa: the emotional state of feeling prone to crying. Vulnerable due to an influx of emotions. “Feeling fragile right now”. Implies similar needs as being carente. Distinguish “chorona” which is crybaby; being prone to crying as a stable personality trait.
- Aconchego: coziness; a cuddle that feels cozy.
- Chamego: a more intense form of carinho. In some dialects it's sexually charged, like, to grind on someone while dancing can be described as giving chamego.
- Chameguice: chamego-ness. The trait of being highly affective, in a physical sense.
- Colo: “lap”. But metaphorically like, nestling. The happy safe place in your lover's arms. To be “asking for lap” is essentially a way of expressing being physically carente.
- Cafuné: headstroking. Making carinhos by lightly massaging their head, passing your fingers between their hair and so on. Used symbolically in a similar way as English “headpat”, but it's slower and more intimate than simple patting.
- Xodó: someone who is your xodó is your baby. A xodó evokes in you an intense warm fuzzy protective care-giving emotion, maybe to the point of you getting overprotective or jealous. Not an exclusive term to romance; can also be used e.g. of a child or a pet, or a prized collector's item, etc.
- Mimar: to spoil. To treat someone; to go all-out on spoiling them, no holds barred. A highly valued behaviour in a partner.
- Mimo: a treat. A single “spoil”. Can be like, a physical gift, or a service like making fancy breakfast, or just a bout of intense affection, praise, cuddles etc. “You better be ready cos I'm gonna stuff you full of mimos tonight you cutie”.
- Dengo: when you act in a childish or playfully cutesy-dramatic way in order to elicit mimos and get a good chamego. The quality of dengo-ness is denguice.
- Manha: similar to dengo but hits different in a way I have trouble expressing.
- Manhosa, dengosa: being in an emotional state where you do dengos or make manha; or having that as a personality trait. Bashful from Disney's “Snow White” was named Dengoso in the Brazilian dub. n.b. being dengosa is a positive trait in a partner.
- Melosa: “honeyed”. Someone who expresses affection verbally to a shamelessly intense degree.
- Grude: “sticky material”; “glue”. Someone who wants to be up close to you at all times. can be used negatively or positively; e.g. “these two are such a grude lately [admiringly]“.
Much of our rich vocabulary for this field is indebted to Bantu languages. Once again, there's probably more I'm not remembering, exact nuances vary with speaker and age and subculture etc.