Huahuehuahue

About

“Huahuehuahue” is an onomatopoeic expression of hearty laughter in Portuguese, equivalent to “hahahaha” in English. Due to its frequent use by Brazilians in massively multiplayer online games such as Ragnarok Online and League of Legends, the phrase is also used by non-Brazilians in a pejorative manner similar to the connotation carried by the Korean expression “KEKEKE” in the multiplayer real-time strategy game Starcraft.

Origin

According to League of Legends forum user GreenEyedMonster’s explanation, “Huahue” and its variations, along with other phrases like “BR?” (are you Brazilian?) and “Gibe moni plos” ("give me money please) became widespread through the massively multi-player online game Ragnarok Online in 2003, which saw a “literal race war” break out between Brazilian players and an alliance of non-Portuguese speaking players. This sentiment is thought to be embodied in a webcomic portraying the Brazilian takeover of a massively multi-player online game, created by an unknown artist and posted to the Brazilian Arena IG forums^[1] on September 24th, 2008.

Spread

On August 15th, 2009, it was posted to the War Bunnies Forums.^[2] A Portuguese version was posted to the Brazilian site Barbalonga^[3] in January 2011. On February 10th, 2010, YouTuber MrLegiaoo uploaded a computer-narrated slideshow featuring each pane from the comic with English translations.

An Urban Dictionary^[4] entry was created for “Huehuehue” on March 10th, 2011:

Huehuehue: Laughter – most prominent with speakers of Brazilian Portuguese. The Brazilian equivalent of “haha”.
MMOplayer1: “gibe moni plos”
MMOplayer2: “buff plis”
MMOplayer1: “br?”
MMOplayer2: “HUEHUEHUE”

Search Interest

External References