First Comes the Car, Then the $10,000 License Plate

[doumeizhen]

An excerpt from the New York Times.

GUANGZHOU, China ‹ At a government auction inside a dingy gymnasium, a young

businessman named Ding walked away a happy winner the other day. Like

everyone else, he was bidding on license plates and did not seem to mind

that his cost $6,750.

For the same money, Mr. Ding could almost have afforded two of the

Chinese-made roadsters popular in the domestic car market. His bid was

almost 20 times what a Chinese farmer earns in a year, and almost 7 times

the country's per capita annual income.

"I thought it was rather cheap," said Mr. Ding, 30, a gold chain glinting

under his open black sport shirt, as he walked off with the paperwork for

APY888. "Since I have a nice car, I thought I should get a nice plate."

No country is more bonkers over cars than China, where achieving the new

middle-class dream means owning a shiny new vehicle. But the car is not

always enough for those who aspire beyond the middle class. A license plate

has become almost as much of a status symbol as the car.

The reason is the potent blend of new-money aspirations and Old World

superstitions. For centuries, numbers have served as a second language in

China. The unluckiest number, 4, or si, which can also mean death in

Chinese, is so dreaded that some buildings have no fourth floor. The

luckiest number is 8, or ba, which rhymes with fa, the Chinese character for

wealth. It is no coincidence that the Summer Olympics in Beijing will open

on 8/8/08 at 8 p.m.

License plates are usually issued randomly. But in a country where 100,000

people die annually in traffic accidents, a plate that ends in 4 is

considered a very bad omen for a superstitious motorist; it might as well

read DEATH. Yet a plate overflowing with 8's portends good fortune.

The rest of the article is about corruption, as expected, but wouldn't it be fascinating to actually look at these 100,000 fatalities and see which license plates were involved. I am sure with the kind of money the governemnt is making any finding indicating that 4 is really not so bad and 8 not so good would be censored, so this would be a futile endeavor, I'm sure...

[Lu]

This would be very interesting research. The government won't need to repress it, superstitious people wouldn't believe it anyway. And isn't superstition feudal, non-communist?

[doumeizhen]

Perhaps this is what they meant when they said Communism with Chinese Characteristics (economic development). The Chinese characteristics aren't actually economic policies, but using the traditional and superstitous beliefs of the people to fund the Communist Government.

Hmmm. I wonder how willing the Police would be to give out this kind of information... Although, if my theory is correct we're out of luck. Either way, it never hurt to ask. undercover, of course.