Argentinians curse without consciously realizing it. It’s true. We use ‘Che, boludo’ a lot.

All the time.

We’ve lost sight of how agressive it may sound to foreign ears to know that we call each other something like ‘asshole’ or ‘idiot’ to show affection.

Once I read someone who said something in the lines of “what can we expect other than to be ‘un país de boludos’ if we call each other like that?”

The uses of CHE have already been covered in another post, but the combination of these two words is also really frequent and wasn’t included then.

I explained that CHE can be used to grab the attention of another person, alright? Well, the addition of BOLUDO or its feminine counterpart BOLUDA after CHE is redundant, as it serves the same function.

• Che, boludo, ¿tenés idea cuánta gente vive en Argentina?
• Che, boluda, ¿vos sabés si el feriado del 17 se pasa al lunes?
• Che, boludo, mirá esto.
• Che, boluda, ¿viste las fotos de Clara en Bariloche?

We could use the name of the person instead, but using it when it’s clear who we are addressing would be too obviously redundant. At work and with acquaintances, however, boludo would be the placeholder for the person’s name.

In spite of its intrinsic meaning, when we say it it’s clear for us that we don’t mean to offend the other person and no Argentinian would feel aggrieved.

There is yet another use. If a friend overreacts we can extend the “e” in CHE and say:

• Cheee, boludo/a, pará, ¿qué te pasa?

Like I said other times for other cases, it’s better to play safe and understand the use of Che, boludo or Che, boluda passively rather than to force it into your conversations.

Hope this post gave you some insight.

Let me know if you are up for a lesson!

Happy Spanish learning,

You might also want to read these articles:

• How to go about with reading in Spanish
  In this post I want to make you want to read, even if you feel you’re not ready for it.
• Implied subject
  This post deals with a little tweak that can make your Spanish sound more natural —dropping the subject pronoun.
• Start Shadowing now!
  Today I’ll get you started with shadowing, so your Spanish speaking skills go through the roof.
• Argentinian Provinces and Demonyms
  This is a short geography lesson, where you’ll learn the name of the provinces and demonyms for each of them.
• Let’s in Spanish
  In this post we take a minute to see how Let’s phrases translate into Spanish.
• Papelón
  In this post we pay attention to a word that you can come across very frequently when referring to embarassing events.