土豪，我们做朋友吧

What does 土豪，我们做朋友吧 mean?

土豪 once meant a rural landlord with more land than morals. The internet repurposed it for anyone flashing money with zero finesse: nouveau, slightly ridiculous, still useful to know. 我们做朋友吧 completes the joke by pretending friendship can be bought through proximity to cash. In September 2013 the line attached itself to a new gold-colored phone and became the season's greeting between broke classmates and the roommate who bought one. What makes it durable is the shamelessness: it admits the motive out loud, which is why even the targets forward it as a self-description.

Where does 土豪，我们做朋友吧 come from?

September 2013, when Apple's gold-finish iPhone went on sale in China on the 20th; netizens nicknamed the color 土豪金 within hours, and the friendship proposal spread along with photos of the new handset. That November the Chinese edition of the New York Times ran a piece on how the phone made China rethink the word 土豪, and December roundups installed the phrase among the year's top ten.

How to use 土豪，我们做朋友吧

• 室友全款买了新房，我当场说：土豪，我们做朋友吧。
  Shìyǒu quánkuǎn mǎi le xīnfáng, wǒ dāngchǎng shuō: tǔháo, wǒmen zuò péngyou ba.
  My roommate closed on an apartment in cash. I said it live: magnate, let us be friends.
• 他晒了一只两万块的手表，评论区全是土豪我们做朋友吧。
  Tā shài le yī zhī liǎng wàn kuài de shǒubiǎo, pínglùnqū quán shì tǔháo wǒmen zuò péngyou ba.
  He showed off a twenty-thousand-yuan watch and the comments were wall to wall magnate let us be friends.