Chiro
Broke, skint, without a cent — the Ecuadorian word for the last week of the month.
Related lesson: Ecuadorian Spanish: A Survival Guide.
Hear it in context
Estoy chiro hasta que me paguen el quince.
I'm broke until I get paid on the fifteenth.
No puedo ir al concierto, ando chira.
I can't go to the concert, I'm skint.
Se quedó chiro después de pagar el arriendo.
He was left penniless after paying the rent.
What It Actually Means
To be chiro is to have no money — not poor in a structural sense, but broke right now, this week, until payday. It is used with estar and andar (never ser, which would be a comment on your whole life rather than your wallet), and it inflects normally: chiro, chira, chiros, chiras. Quedarse chiro is the moment of becoming broke; chirísimo is the superlative Ecuadorians reach for on the 28th.
Where It Comes From
Unclear, and worth saying so. Chiro turns up in Ecuadorian Spanish with a cluster of related senses — a rag or scrap of cloth in some older highland usage, a small unripe banana in others — and the leap from “worthless scrap” to “penniless” is plausible but not documented. There is no reliable Quichua source form on record. This is a case where the honest answer is that the origin is not established.
How Natives Use It
Without embarrassment. Announcing that you are chiro is a normal way of declining an invitation, and it is met with sympathy rather than pity — the word is too everyday to sting. It sits in a small national money kit alongside cushqui (money, from Quichua kullki), plata, and pilas for the person who is careful with theirs. Peru’s slot is filled by misio, Spain’s by being sin blanca.
Common Pitfall
Do not use ser chiro — that turns a temporary state into a character verdict, which is not what anyone means. And be careful abroad: outside Ecuador chiro is either unknown or means something else entirely, so the sentence that gets a knowing nod in Quito will simply confuse a room in Bogotá.