Mê tín

Yesterday in Vietnamese class, whilst discussing marriage customs and related vocabulary, I got a little primary on Vietnamese numerology.

• Women aren't supposed to get married when they are of an odd age (21, 23, 25...) This doesn't hold for men, but a man's age is important when building a house, which is again not to transpire when he is of an odd-numbered age.


• 9999 (and various sequences of 9s) are apparently lucky because 9999 is the code for vàng chất lượng (high-quality gold). 8s are lucky because the Chinese-Vietnamese word for 8, bát, apparently reminds people of phát triển 'development'. Similarly, the Hán-Việt word for 6, lục, reminds Vietnamese speakers of lộc, meaning 'wealth, blessing from the gods'.
  

• This obsession with 8s and 9s extends to addition as well. So for example, the motorbike license plate number 3271 is particularly đẹp (beautiful) because the numbers added up to 19, which contains a 9, natch. My motorbike license plate number, 5973, is rather xấu, however, because the numbers added up to a measly 24 (no 8s or 9s involved, and it's even to boot).

• Taking a picture of just 3 people is considered unlucky, particularly for the person in the middle. (However, when lighting incense at the pagoda or at an altar, you always light 3 or 5 sticks, never an even number like 2 or 4. I'm not sure what the deal is here. Get back to you on this one.)
  

• Another tidbit of Vietnamese superstition unrelated to numerology: when walking out of a door, it is considered lucky if the first person you meet is a man, but unlucky if the first person you meet is a woman.
  

I'm not sure how many people are actually keen on this kind of thing, but Erich has assured me that it is quite a lot. As if to prove the point, Marion came home last night bemoaning the fact that she didn't know when her office was going to be closed for the holidays, because the Vietnamese partners had yet to go to the fortune-teller and determine a sufficiently auspicious date. Is it really any stranger than Judeo-Christian customs? No meat on Fridays, Lent, confessing to a priest things you wouldn't tell your own mother, etc.?

EDIT: Van has provided us with some additional insight:

• 4 is unlucky because the Hán-Viêt word for 4 (tư) sounds a lot like the Hán-Việt word tử, which occurs in a lot of compounds related to death and dying like tử vong 'to die, pass away', tự tử 'to commit suicide', tử hình 'death penalty, to execute', etc.
  


• "2 is unlucky because when a person dies you put two sticks of incense in the pot. that's why it is unlucky or highly offensive should you leave your chopsticks standing up in your bowl instead of laying it on top of your bowl/dish. you are either saying hey dude sitting across from me drop dead, or you are just a jackass who likes to jinx everyone around you..."

So there you go. Western people, don't be stickin' yr chopsticks in your food when you're not using 'em.