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BASIC INFORMATION
There are more Portuguese speakers ("Lusophones") in the world today than there are German-speakers, Francophones, or Japanese-speakers! It is currently the sixth most spoken in the world, over 190 million (190,000,000) strong. Some characteristics of Portuguese that you will notice are the tendancy towards contractions and elisions in European Portuguese, whereas Brazilian tends toward a consonant-vowel norm. Despite the spelling reforms of the 20th century, both the European and the Brazilian are written with a historical orthography, meaning that the written language does not reflect trends in the current spoken language, but a more archaic state.

PRONUNCIATION
Please visit my page on pronouncing Portuguese.

BASIC GRAMMAR
The Portuguese noun has either a masculine or feminine gender. In the singular, masculine tends to end in an -o or a consonant, feminine in -a, and words in -e can be of either gender.

Words in -ção/-são (related to Spanish -ción/-sión, French -tion/-sion, Italian -zione/-sione, Romanian -t¸ie [sometimes -t¸iune]/-sie [sometimes -siune], and Catalan -ció/-sió) are feminine, just as in those languages.

When forming the plural, a consonant adds "-es"; an -o becomes -os, an -e becomes -es, and -a becomes -as. If we take the word expulsão (expulsion; as Spanish expulsión, French expulsion, Italian espulsione, Romanian expulsare, and Catalan expulsió), for example, the plural is expulsões (from Latin expulsione(m), it was initially written in Old Portuguese as expulsõ, later spelling changes forcing it to conform to a series of -ão endings (cf. razão reason), whereas its plural retained the nasal "o" and final "e" (expulsiones > expulsões)).

The articles agree with the gender and number of a noun:

The articles usually accompany the noun, and it is common to see them where English would reject them: (É que) o senhor fala o espanhol? (Do you speak Spanish, (sir)? -European), Você fala o espanhol? (Brazilian).

The Portuguese verb follows the same basic principles as its sister languages, so don't be surprised if you recognize a verb, verb form, or usage of a verb as being similar to Spanish, French, etc. As in any Romance Language, the present indicative active of the verb often occurs where English would use the present participle (in Portuguese, for example, falo means "I speak" or "I am speaking in fables").

Portuguese has three verb terminations ("infinitive endings"): -ar, -er, and -ir. Here are the regular present indicative tense conjugations for each of the infinitive endings, including sample verbs:
 

	-ar	falar (to speak)	-er	vender (to sell)	-ir	servir (to serve)
eu (I)	-o	falo	-o	vendo	-o	sirvo*
tu (you)*	-as	falas	-es	vendes	-es	serves
ele (he)	-a	fala	-e	vende	-e	serve
ela (she)	-a	fala	-e	vende	-e	serve
você (you)*	-a	fala	-e	vende	-e	serve
nós (we)	-amos	falamos	-emos	vendemos	-imos	servimos
vós (ye, thou)*	-ais	falais	-eis	vendeis	-is	servis
eles (they)	-am	falam	-em	vendem	-em	servem
elas (they; all female)	-am	falam	-em	vendem	-em	servem
vocês (all of you)*	-am	falam	-em	vendem	-em	servem

* Tu is used for familiar/informal situations when addressing a single person in Europe, although Brazilians only use você (in standard Portuguese this is the equalizing pronoun - not too formal, not so informal). Vós is the archaic plural of tu, found in some dialects of European Portuguese, mainly among older speakers, as well as in poetry, literature, or the Bible.

In Portugal, If you wish to be formal, use o senhor (male) or a senhora (female) plus the third-person singular verb form (-a/-e), os senhores (as senhoras if speaking to a group entirely composed of women) plus the third-person plural (-am/-em). In Brazil, however, note that only você(s) stands as the common second-person form of address.

* sirvo consists of a radical change (i.e. change in the stem) in the eu form, as is common to some -ir verbs. This is not a large occurence in Portuguese (especially since -ir infinitives represent the smallest class of verbs).

Adjectives agree with the noun, and most always follow them: uma coisa branca (a white thing), as coisas brancas (the white things). An adverb is simply formed by adding -mente to the feminine form of the adjective: rápidamente (quickly, rapidly; from rápido quick, fast, rapid).

BASIC WORDS AND PHRASES
These are some of the more common phrases you would hear protruding from the mouth of a Portuguese speaker on a daily basis, so, if you wish to become acquainted with the language, these are a great way to start:

Bom dia! = Goodday!
Olá! = Hello! / Hi! (Portugal)
Olá! = Hello! / Hi! (Portugal)
Como estás? = How are you?, How's it going? (European Portuguese)
Como está? = How are you? (formal in European Portuguese)
Como você vai? = How are you? (Brazil)
Bem. = Well.
Mal. = Badly.
Mais ou menos. = So-so.
Muito... = Very...
Como se chama? = What's your name?
Como (é que) te chamas? = What's your name? (informal, European only)
Como é seu nome? = What's your name? (no formality attached)
E tu?, E você? = And you? (e tu? in European Portuguese only)
E o senhor/a senhora? = And you? (formal; to male/female, European only)
Senhor = Sir, Mr
Senhora = Madam, Mrs
Muito prazer. = Pleased to meet you.
Faça favor. = Please.
Faz favor. = Please (informal, European only)
Com licença. = Excuse me.
(Aqui) Há/tem... = Here is/are...
Há/tem... = There is...
Há/tem... = There are...
Sim. = Yes.
Não. = No.
Obrigado/Obrigada. = Thank you. (from male/female)
De nada. = You're welcome.
O quê? = What?
Quem? = Who?
O porquê? = Why?
Que horas são? = What time is it?
Adeus! / Até logo! = Goodbye!, See you later!