These terms have entered the Chilean vocabulary in the last few years.
Sign of the times.
In a Portonazo, a vehicle as attacked it stops to enter a home or parking lot, hence the name, as the victim often gets out to open the gate.
Turbazos occur when (mainly) young people attack in groups.
This type of crime that emerged in 2016 began with robberies in pharmacies or supermarkets, but has spread to homes, particularly those where older people live.
Abordazo: An attack by groups who operate by surprise They gather in a vehicle, identify the victims, mainly pedestrians, get out, intercept them, intimidate them, steal all their belongings, and then drive off.
Encerrona: A violent form of vehicle theft that involves blocking the victim’s path while the vehicle is moving, and then forcing them to abandon their vehicle with violence or intimidation, in order to subsequently steal it.
Motochorros: Criminals who commit robberies or other crimes using motorcycles as a means of escape.
An encerrona from some years ago, frustrated when the victim escaped by shunting the blocking vehicle forward with his own car to where the road widened enough to drive round it.
Ah, yes. Chilensis. Perhaps a dialect within a dialect that only seems to look like Spanish.
Let us add to our Chilensis word power. Today’s suggestions –
RATI — You know what a Paco is, a Carabinero, tu amigo en el camino. But rati is a slang expression for the PDI, Chile’s largely incompetent plain-clothes answer to the Keystone Cops.
cachetada - What we called a bofetada in Spain, in Chile and probably other countries down here, an open-handed slap. The gendarmes in Chile’s jails are known for some pretty serious cachetadas that will take all the paint off your face.
robo hormiga – Nothing to do with ants. Means “petty larceny” as in shoplifting of small-value items or stealing office supplies or similar.
chaucha -- Meaning depends on context and possibly region, but for many years this has meant about the same as a “brass farthing” meaning a coin of almost no value. A ten-peso coin today would be a chaucha. But in an automotive context, the word can mean a valve shim, and those suckers might not be cheap. I have a bag of 29mm chauchas that turned out to be worth several hundred thousand CLP.
On the chaucha…id say a 10peso coin has the most copper content after the old 50 and 100 peso coins and possibly close to the new copper core 100 and 500 coins. A true chaucha would be the 1 or 5 peso coins that are little more than aluminum or tin…or dare i say it the paper/acrylic bills. Lulz
As far as the other various terms for crimes…dissapointed that there are so many words for permutations of chilean crime manifestations…an indictment on chile in my mind
I was told there was yet another modern meaning here for chaucha so… sure enough (this is a translation)
In December 2017 in several national media the name of Chaucha, the first Chilean cryptocurrency, began to appear. It was noted that in just 4 months the electronic currency had managed to grow by up to 2,000%, allowing Chileans access to this technology that has been revolutionizing the global economy for nearly 10 years
The article goes on to discuss the origin of the term (here also a translation; bold is mine)
Why is it called Chaucha? The name Chaucha comes from the 20 centavo coin, whose counterpart today must be the 10 peso coin, which nobody really wants now, but it is part of the economy …
On further investigation it appears that chaucha in Chile may be derived from an indigenous term and previously was used to describe seed potatoes, considered to be unsuitable for eating.
More local words, or if not uniquely local then amusing to discuss.
aperrado / aperrada. Wifey likes to describe her tenacity in business as her being “aperrada.” I’ve only heard it here in Chile and in México. I can attest to her stubbornness as well as her business acumen. Apparently the term derives from a dog’s tendency to get a solid grip and hang on. Yup, that’s her.
Which bring us to other dog words.
Patiperro. Likely everyone here knows the term, which refers to one who travels a lot. From pata de perro, the foot or feet of a dog.
Carne de perro . Superficially you’d think that meant edible dog meat. But in Chile it seems to mean about the same as what I remember in Spain: a product or item very successful, reliable and durable. In Chile I most often hear it in reference to long-term reliable cars and pickups.
Not uniquely Chilean this one but the old folks around here sometimes say " como perro en misa" to mean somebody or something totally out of place, lost, particularly when someone is over his/her/its head in a work situation. Supposedly a dog at Mass would be inappropriate but the number of dogs in churches here at any given time is somehow disturbingly acceptable.
And speaking of being lost, there is the rather well known and uniquely Chilean "más perdido que el teniente Bello" – referring to an historical Chilean aviator who (presumably) got lost and vanished without a trace.
