Telling doctor stomach hurts: Answering the doctor's questions about your symptoms

💬 à is a + a merged into one word, so "at the night". The same pattern gives à tarde "in the afternoon".

💬 There's no word for "it": dói alone already means "it hurts". Point and say Dói aqui and you've answered the doctor.

💬 The opposite is em baixo "down below". Together they're handy for pointing out where pain is.

💬 In Portugal it's spelled vómitos, with an acute accent. In Brazil it's spelled vômitos, so expect the accent to differ between sources.

💬 Putting the thing first and não after is a quick, natural way to rule out a symptom. Swap it: Diarreia não "No diarrhoea".

💬 The -ei ending marks "I did it" for verbs ending in -ar: vomitar becomes vomitei. For -er verbs it's -i instead, as in comi "I ate".

💬 manhã ends in a nasal sound: let the air go through your nose on the last syllable (ma-NYAN, without a full n).

💬 comeu is the "you did" form used with você or with polite address. It's the same form as "he/she ate", so context tells you who's meant.

💬 Meals take ao, which is a + o: ao almoço "at lunch", ao pequeno-almoço "at breakfast".

💬 num is em + um merged. Likewise, em + uma becomes numa: numa farmácia "in a pharmacy".

💬 Deve ser works like "it must be", a handy way to guess at a cause. do is de + o, literally "from the seafood".

💬 Instructions from a doctor use this polite form: beber becomes beba, with the vowel swapped. That's why you hear beba rather than bebe.

💬 Same polite instruction pattern: comer becomes coma. You'll hear it constantly from pharmacists too: tome "take".

💬 In everyday speech the first syllable is often dropped, so you'll hear tá bem (tah bayng).

💬 obrigado matches the speaker, not the listener. A man says obrigado and a woman says obrigada.

🇵🇹 Doctors, pharmacists and neighbours all say this to anyone who is unwell. Reply with a simple Obrigado or Obrigada.