Gege

Gege means older brother, and Chinese uses it far more widely than English uses "brother." A younger sibling calls an older brother gege, or simply ge, rather than his name. The same goes for older male cousins, and often for an older friend of the family. Using his name instead would sound oddly distant, or rude.

Combined with a name, it becomes an affectionate form of address. English subtitles usually translate it as "brother" or drop it, which can make relationships sound more formal than they are.

In romance dramas, gege carries extra weight. A younger heroine who has called a family friend gege since childhood is signaling that she sees him as family, and the story often turns on the moment that changes. Hidden Love builds its whole premise on this dynamic, since the heroine first knows the hero as her older brother's friend. In Lost You Forever, the word marks family bonds in a world where they matter a great deal.

Between couples, gege can also be playful or flirtatious, which is why fans sometimes find it surprising in subtitles.

Don't confuse it with gege written 格格, pronounced with a different tone pattern, which is the title of a Manchu princess in Qing-dynasty dramas.

The female equivalent of 哥哥 is jiejie, older sister. In martial-arts and xianxia stories, older fellow disciples are addressed with a related term, shixiong, which literally means "teacher-brother."