Bling is expensive stuff you wear so that other people cannot miss it — thick gold chains, diamond watches, rings that catch the light from across the room. It is not just “jewellery”; it is jewellery (and sometimes clothes or cars) shown off on purpose. The word came out of hip-hop in the 1990s, first as bling-bling, a sound-picture of light hitting metal and stones. People then shortened it to bling. You can use it as a noun (“Look at the bling”) and, more loosely, to talk about a shiny, show-off style. It can sound admiring, playful, or a little mocking, depending on the voice. Though actually, some people now stretch it to any loud expensive look, not only jewellery. In Taiwan, young people sometimes just say the English word itself.