Vejiga = balloon

Question

There were balloons at the office today. I asked someone - from El Salvador, I think - what the word for balloon is in Spanish. He said, "vejiga" - so I'm wondering whether it should be in the definitions of vejiga.

Answer 1

Ehm... the word for balloon is "globo" or "balón". "Vejiga" is bladder or a bad word (insulto) when refered to someone else as adjetive in some countries.

Answer 2

There's a balloon in the main blood vessel to your brain is a vejiga.

That clown wants to give your child a balloon is a globo.

Yes, but I pointed to balloons and asked him, Que es en espanol? He said, "vejiga," and spelled it for me. - CharlieMcKeon, May 19, 2011

Answer 3

Hmmm. Always heard globo for balloon. Interesting one.

Answer 4

This is not quite so surprising. The first things ever used as balloons, in a similar sense to those modern party balloons, were pig bladders - vejigas. It wouldn't surprise me that the term remained in some places.

Apparently there is a tradition and a tourist attraction somewhere in Galicia that involves using inflated cow's bladders.

And this image:

Is from a web page for a party services and supplies company in the Dominican Republic. They offer "vejigas".

Answer 5

English uses the same root, but only for medical or scientific terms:

"vesica", "vesicle", "ventral"... all of them from *wend, bladder.

Answer 6

I believe that globo is common for ballon.Vejiga means bladder,so I can see how in some places this term might used . A bladder for air.

Answer 7

this use of bladder/balloon might interest you