> Main Entry: grin·go
> Etymology: Spanish, alteration of griego Greek, stranger, from Latin

I think this is a Mexican word, nobody uses it in Spain but I am pretty sure that this ‘griego’ etymology is not correct. I see this ‘green grows’ more plausible. I think that it is an onomatopoetic word that tries to imitate the gibberish that the sounds of a foreign language seem to a stranger.
We have a slang word ‘guiri’ with the same etymology I have supposed for ‘gringo’ that we employ when referring to any non Spanish speaker, but mainly from countries with non Latin languages.
Although it can be used in an offensive way, most time we use it quite amiably -we really owe a lot to tourists-. I even have an English friend -Marcos- and he introduces himself as ‘Marcos el guiri’.


Juan Maria.