Category: Traditional Chinese Festivals

中国数字 Five五

The number  5  (五wŭ) is associated with the five elements (Water, Fire, Earth, Wood, and metal) in Chinese philosophy, and in turn was historically associated with the Emperor of China. For example, the Tiananmen gate, being the main thoroughfare to the Forbidden City, has five arches. It is also referred to as the pronoun "I"[citation needed], as the pronunciations of"I"  (我wŏ, or 吾wú) and 5 are similar in Mandarin.

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中国数字 Four四

The number 4 is omitted in some Chinese buildings.Number  4  (四/肆; sì) is considered an unlucky number in Chinese because it is nearly homophonous to the word  "death"  (死sǐ). Due to that, many numbered product lines skip the "4": e.g., Nokia cell phones (before the Lumia 640, there is no series containing a 4 in the name),  Palm PDAs, Canon PowerShot G’s series (after G3 goes G5), etc. In East Asia, some buildings do not have a 4th floor. (Compare with the Western practice of some buildings not having a 13th floor because 13 is considered unlucky.)

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Lucky Number(2)

FiveThe number  5  (五wŭ) is associated with the five elements (Water, Fire, Earth, Wood, and metal) in Chinese philosophy, and in turn was historically associated with the Emperor of China. For example, the Tiananmen gate, being the main thoroughfare to the Forbidden City, has five arches. It is also referred to as the pronoun "I", as the pronunciations of"I"  (我wŏ or 吾wú) and 5 are similar in Mandarin. In Cantonese, this word has the same pronunciation as the character 唔and means "not", pronounces (m̀h). This word has the same meaning and use as the word 不an therefore is usually negative.

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Combinations with Chinese Number(1)

28, 38: As eight means prosperity, twenty eight equates to ‘double prosperity’, though most Chinese people will typically just read this as "easy to have luck", 38 being one of the luckiest, often referred to as ‘triple prosperity’ though most Chinese people might just read this as "you will grow to success."

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