Made in Macao | The magic Cantonese word to ward off evil

Jenny Lao-Phillips

In the Cantonese speaking world, there are many slang words which only exist in our language and cannot be translated even into other Chinese dialects. One such word that we often hear from the older generation, especially from women, is “Choi” 啋. Even those who do not speak the language may be able to pick up when some repeatedly say the word “Choi! Choi! Choi!” usually with strength while gesturing with one’s hand for someone to go away. So what does it mean? Technically, the word itself has no meaning. It is for warding off curses.

I believe many people know of the blue eye charm popular in the Western world, especially in Eastern Europe used for preventing the evil eye. When being given an evil eye, it is believed that one is cursed for sickness or bad luck. A browse of the internet shows that different cultures have different way of preventing or reversing the curse of an evil eye. Well, there is no evil eye belief in the Chinese culture, but there is a strong superstition about someone saying cursing words or something unlucky. However, we do not need charms, or complicated processes to ward off curses, we need only say the word “Choi”.

Yes, “Choi” is a magic word to ward off curses or prevent bad things from happening, and it can have different meanings in different circumstances. For example, if you do something wrong at work and a colleague makes fun and says “the boss is going to fire you”, you can ward it off by saying “Choi”. In this sense, “Choi” could mean “go away curse”. In a different situation, you may seem to be cursing yourself, like during festivals, when we are not allowed to say anything bad. Then, if someone says something like, “I’m going to die” – not in the real sense but as a figure of speech when the person is very tired, or over stressed, or is asked to climb 18 floors of stairs, for instance, someone may reply with the word “Choi”. In this sense, the “Choi” can be understood as “don’t say that”.

In the latter situation, people may say “Choi” followed by “spit and say again”. Of course, the request to say again does not mean one should repeat what was just said. It means to say something else. What I have never understood is why not say “spit and say something else”, but it is an old language and I cannot find any origin for the phrase. But it is a very useful word. Whenever someone says something you don’t not like to hear, you can always say “Choi” with a go away gesture.

Aside from warding off evil words, the word can also be used in circumstances when we see something we did not want to, like accidentally bumping into two people making out in the bathroom, or someone unattractive walking around naked on the street, we can cover our eyes and say “Choi”. Emphasis on unattractive, because if the person were attractive, we would say “wow”. In such situations, “Choi” could mean “reverse what I’ve seen, I didn’t want to see that.”

Then, what do we say if we want to reverse the curse? Say someone tells you, “you are going to lose in a competition!”, or “you must be pregnant!” (when you don’t want to be). Then we can say “Choi Gwo Nei 啋過콱” which means “Choi to you”. In this case, we reverse the curse to the person who says it. So, don’t forget this very powerful Cantonese word and, when using this word, always gesture with your hand for something to go away.