Etymology

gweilo

G2W4E1I1L1O1

Today it means: A white person in China, (particularly) a man; a ‘foreign devil’. Full definition →

Cantonese 鬼佬
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The story

  1. Cantonese · borrowed from鬼佬
  2. English todaygweilo

From Cantonese 鬼佬 (gwai² lou²), from 鬼 (gwai², “ghost”) + 佬 (lou², “guy, man”).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.