I love celebrating birthdays! I think of a birthday as that very special day that brought us to this world and put the people we love in our lives.
Now you will be able to chat about birthdays in Portuguese, send and receive wishes of happy birthday in Portuguese, and even sing the Brazilian birthday song!
Birthday vocabulary in Portuguese
The first thing that gets students confused is the word for birthday in Portuguese:
- aniversário
It sounds like “anniversary”, but it is not always so. If someone asks when your aniversário is, they are asking about your birthday.
You can greet your birthday friends in two ways:
- Feliz aniversário = happy birthday
- Parabéns = Congratulations — Yeah, we congratulate people for their special day. I love this 🙂
Now you might be wondering what to say when you want to ask about an anniversary. In this case, we would need to specify what the event is. For example:
- aniversário de casamento = wedding anniversary
Asking someone’s age
The question about someone’s age is totally different in English and in Portuguese:
- Quantos anos você tem? = How old are you?
Literally, our question is “How many years do you have?”
Here is how you answer:
- Eu tenho 25 anos = I am 25 years old
Literally, that translates to “I have 25 years”.
Useful Phrases to talk about Birthdays in Portuguese
Here are a few useful phrases for you to talk about birthdays in Portuguese:
- Quando é seu aniversário? = When is your birthday?
- Meu aniversário é em setembro = My birthday is in September
- Meu aniversário é no dia 18 de setembro = My birthday is on September 18th
- Eu faço aniversário em setembro = I have my birthday in September
- Mariana vai fazer 14 anos = Mariana will be 14 years old
- Seu aniversário está perto = Your birthday is close
- Seu aniversário está chegando = Your birthday is coming up
- Você gosta de comemorar seu aniversário? = Do you like to celebrate your birthday?
- Você vai fazer festa? = Are you going to throw a party?
- Qual é seu signo? = What is your star sign?
The Brazilian Birthday song
Brazilians sing Happy Birthday with a lot of energy. It is clearly a festive and joyful event. We sing loud, clap our hands, yell, whistle… that’s right, we know how to make noise 🙂
Below is the Brazilian Birthday song. I sing it in the video. No, I cannot sing, but I do that in this lesson for your Portuguese 🙂
| Português | Inglês |
| Parabéns pra você | Congratulations to you |
| Nesta data querida | On this dear date |
| Muita felicidade | Much happiness |
| Muitos anos de vida | Many years of life |
At the end of the song, there are variations to add joy and excitement to the celebration. For example, let’s say that it is Mariana’s birthday. At the end of the birthday song, the group will sing:
É pique, é pique
É pique, é pique, é pique
É hora, é hora
É hora, é hora, é hora
Rá Tim Bum
Mariana, Mariana, Mariana
Let’s see if I can explain what this means:
- Pique = enthusiasm, peak momentum
- É hora = it is time
- Rá Tim Bum = a play with the sound of drums playing 🙂
Great, now let’s celebrate!
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I was just curious if you knew why it’s customary to sing “com quem será q mariana vai casar” after the birthday songs. My family always sings it after and I never understood why it was a tradition but they sing it every year
I don’t know the history of that. It is common to sing that part, as you know 🙂
Muito obrigado por sua explicação direta a detalhada dos costumes no brasil a cantar parabéns aos nossos queridos. É exatamente o que procurava para ensinar a canção aos alunos de minha classe de introdução de português na escola secundária baixa cá em Utah, EUA.
Que bom, Randy! Fico feliz de ajudar 🙂
Adorei esse post e vou compartilhar com meu marido Canadense, que aprendeu a cantar a musica pras crianças mas não entende muito o que significa 🙂
Não se esqueça do
“e pra Mariana nada…”
“tudo!”
“então como é que é?”
“E pique, é pique…”
🙂
Obrigada 🙂
Very helpfull. Keep up the good work. Muito obrigada querida!
Muito obrigada 🙂
Thanks for all your efforts…i really appreciate!
Obrigada!