What does “bre” mean in Serbian?

Bre is the little word Serbians add to put push, warmth or impatience into a sentence. Alo, bre! is “hey, come on!”, ajde bre is “oh, go on”, and šta bre? is a mock-offended “what?!”. It has no direct translation, and the voice decides its tone: friendly between friends, sharp in an argument.

In this sketch someone protests «Alo bre dečko, to su moje naočale» (“Hey, boy, those are my glasses”), and the scene ends on a plain «Alo, bre!». The word is shared across the Balkans, with cousins in Bulgarian, Macedonian and Greek (re, vre). You’ll hear it far more in Serbia than in Croatia, so it’s one of the quickest ways to tell the two apart by ear.