Gigil: The Untranslatable Overflow

This is part of my blog series, Uyayi: A Lullaby Across Generations — a homage to our roots during the month we celebrate Araw ng Kalayaan [Philippine Independence Day]. Each post explores a single word from a picture book we brought home after our last visit to the motherland. Filipino words I didn’t grow up using, but now read aloud with love and intention. Words I now gift to my children, one page at a time.

Inip. Gigil. Sabik. Hiya.

Even one word, spoken often enough, can begin to root a child.

. . .

There’s a kind of love so fierce, so tender, so Filipino, there isn’t quite an English word for it. But we know it. We’ve lived it.

We’ve been on the giving end — and the receiving.

We call it gigil.

My earliest memory of gigil?

I was four years old, asked to keep an eye on my baby sister. She was all cheeks and lashes. Soft, perfect, squishy.

Something in me snapped – not from anger, but from adoration too big for words. It surged through my tiny body, overwhelming in its tenderness.

Gigil. That wild urge to squeeze her. Eat her up. Devour her whole with love.

It was a little funny. A little scary. And very, very real.

That unbearable, fizzy feeling in my chest. That primal, ridiculous delight that made me want to bite her. 

(So I did. And I'm not sorry, haha!)

Now, as a mother, I feel it daily. In the way I hug my children a second too tight. Press my nose into their necks. Whisper “I love you” over and over like a prayer. That ridiculous delight that makes me want to squish them — just a little! — because I love them so much it hurts.

Gigil is love too big to stay still. It bites. It bubbles. It bursts.

I see it in my children too — when they squeal at the sight of a cat or tackle-hug their favourite cousins. Gigil squeaks. It shakes. It grips tight.

Even adults feel it. My husband’s own expression of gigil — unfortunately for me — is sneakily pinching my bum. I yelp, “Masakit kaya!” [That hurts, you know!] but he just grins, conveniently forgets my protest, and does it again at the soonest opportunity.

Gigil is like that; a bit chaotic, a lot intense, and uniquely ours.

I feel it when my kids are sleeping and I just want to press my face against theirs, breathing in that sweet, sleepy scent.

In its lighthearted form, gigil is playful, even funny. But beneath the squeals and pinches is something deeper: gigil is one of the oldest expressions of love we inherit, and one of the most enduring. It’s our mums' way of loving us through second servings and tight embraces. It’s our ates [big sisters] kissing us too long, too loudly. It’s love that bubbles over and takes up space.

Anthropologists and linguists say that when a culture has a word for a thing, it means that thing matters deeply to the people. Gigil isn’t just a funny little quirk we throw around in memes and videos. It is, at its core, a cultural lens. A word that gives shape to how we express affection – passionately, physically, overwhelmingly.

From an anthropological lens, gigil offers more than cultural charm. It reflects a high-context culture where affection isn’t always spoken but felt, shown, enacted. It hints at a pre-colonial intimacy, a tactile tenderness passed down through generations before love was measured in words.

To a Western eye, it might seem excessive. But to us, gigil is home.

So I now teach my children the word. We say it when we see puppies, when the baby is being extra adorable, when love overflows and doesn’t know where to go. In doing so, I hope I’m giving them more than a vocabulary word. I hope I’m giving them memory, muscle and belonging.

Because gigil is more than a playful pinch or a squeal of delight.

Maybe it’s the language of the soul when words fall short – the way our elders clutched us just a bit tighter, fed us just a bit more, kissed us just a bit longer.

Maybe gigil is the tenderness behind every "Kain ka pa", the fierce love behind every packed lunch, every call to come home.

And maybe passing that on — to the little ones we now carry, cuddle and chase — is how we remember who we are, and who we were always meant to be.

. . .

But gigil isn’t just about babies or butt cheeks. It’s more than that. It’s our word for the fierce tenderness we feel when overwhelmed with affection – a kind of love that is almost too much for our bodies to hold.

To anthropologists and linguists, it’s a culturally embedded term; one of many “untranslatables” that offers a glimpse into a people’s inner world. A semantic lens into our emotional DNA.

Gigil defies clean categorisation.

It’s not quite aggression. Not quite affection. Not even just excitement.

It’s the embodied Filipino way of saying: “I love you so much, I can’t contain it in words – so here’s a squeal, a pinch, a bite, a burst.”

It’s a word born from a culture where emotions are not simply felt, but expressed – physically, often comically, but always deeply.

Across generations, it’s been our secret language. Grandparents who pinch cheeks so hard they leave marks. Titas [aunties] who can’t help but squish your child with affection. Even in diaspora, the instinct stays. Our bodies remember, even when our tongues forget.

To an outsider, it might seem unruly. But to us, gigil is a ritual of joy.

A response so visceral it bypasses logic. It’s a love language – loud, unfiltered, distinctly ours.

. . .

To raise a child in gigil is to raise them seen. Not just with words, but with gestures. With tickles. With kisses so loud they echo. With hugs so tight they squeak. With love that’s not just felt – but felt in the bones.

To fill their lives with that kind of too-much-love — loud, expressive, unembarrassed — is to wrap them in the kind of affection that sticks. That tells them they are worth delighting in, not just caring for.

I look at my daughters now and wonder how they will remember gigil.

Will they think of me, wild-haired and laughing, chasing them around the living room?

Will they remember the big, noisy kisses on the belly, the butterfly fingers on their necks, the way I couldn’t not squeeze them tight after every school drop-off?

I hope they do.

I hope they remember that they were loved in the language of their roots.

That they were held — not just in my arms — but in a legacy.

So maybe next time we’re tempted to shush a squeal or stifle a squeak of affection, we pause instead. Maybe we allow it. Maybe we even lean in and gigil back.

Because even that is heritage.

. . .

And in a diaspora context, it matters more. Because when we speak of gigil in our homes, we’re not just naming a moment; we’re preserving an instinct.

We’re telling our children: This is how our people love: with our whole hearts and hands, and sometimes our teeth!

In a world that encourages detachment, we model delight.

In a culture that prizes cool, we cherish heat – the heat of holding, squealing, belonging.

. . .

So this is my prayer today:

That our children grow up in homes where gigil is known – not just as noise, but as memory.

As a touchpoint of joy.

As the sacred overflow of love.

That even when they’re grown and gone, and no one pinches their cheeks anymore, they’ll remember what it meant to be loved so fiercely, so fully, so Filipino.

. . .

🌾 Gigil is the second reflection in my Uyayi series – a quiet revolution of words, memory, and culture for parents raising children far from home.

You can start from the beginning with 👉 Uyayi: A Lullaby Across Generations or read the first word in the series, 👉 Inip: The Ache We Carry

I didn’t grow up using these words, but now I am reclaiming with intention.

Because to speak these words is to root them. To live these words is to pass on a heritage. And to write them — in a quiet post like this — is my own fierce kind of love.

To every parent raising roots far from home: your gigil is a gift. And it means more than you know.