Hella is a word associated with Northern California, mainly the Bay Area. It is a contraction of the phrase "hell of a" or "hell of a lot [of]". Hella is also a common name in the Eastern Hemisphere. It often appears in place of the words "really", "a lot", "totally", "very" and in some cases "yes". Whereas hell of a is generally used with a noun, according to linguist Pamela Munro, hella is primarily used to modify an adjective such as "good".

According to lexicographer Allan A. Metcalf, the word is a marker of Northern California dialect. According to Colleen Cotter, "Southern Californians know the term ... but rarely use it." Sometimes the term grippa is used to mock "NorCal" dialect, with the actual meaning being the opposite of hella.

Hella has likely existed in California English since at least the mid 1970s. By 1993, Mary Bucholtz, a linguist at the University of California, Santa Barbara collated materials from an urban high school (Mt. Eden High School) in the Bay Area, and found that hella was "used among Bay Area (and more specifically Hayward) youth of all racial, ethnic, and socio-economic backgrounds and both genders." "Hella" remains part of the dialect of Northern California, where it has grown in popularity. It is believed by most that the word originated in the eastern portion of the San Francisco Bay Area (Hayward).^{[verification needed]}James Hetfield and the members of Metallica were one of the first celebrities to use the word in both music and interviews.^{[citation needed]} Having come from the bay area around the time the word's popularity spread, it could be said that he was one of the first people to bring "Hella" to the mainstream.

Peter van Dalen (born 3 September 1958 in Zwijndrecht) is a Dutch civil servant and politician. He is a member of the ChristianUnion party, a socially conservative Protestant party, and was formerly a member of the Reformatory Political Federation (RPF), which merged with the Reformed Political League (GPV) to form the ChristianUnion. He is a Member of the European Parliament in the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) grouping.

Van Dalen was educated at the Develstein College, in Zwijndrecht, and studied history and international relations at Utrecht University. At university, van Dalen was a member of the SSR-NU, a Christian social club for students, and worked in the House of Representatives of the Netherlands as a member of staff for Meindert Leerling, with responsibility for health policy. After graduating in 1983, van Dalen enrolled in Utrecht's law school, but had to drop out in 1985 because he was constantly travelling abroad and was too busy to keep up with his studies. He became a senior policy officer for Leen van der Waal, a Member of the European Parliament for a joint RPF-GPV-SPG (Reformed Political Party) ticket in 1984. In 1989, van Dalen joined the Ministry of Transport, Public Works and Water Management, dealing with the then-European Economic Community (EEC). From 1990 to 2009, van Dalen held increasingly senior positions in the Ministry, reaching the position of Superintendent-Director of the Inspectorate of Transport and Public Works.