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Heard of triskaidekaphobia, or fear of 13? If the number 13 is synonymous with misfortune, the number 4 is numerologically the mother of all bad lucks. For instance, add up the digits 1 and 3 in 13, what you get is 4, which is homophonous to the Chinese word si, which means death. Hence some people would consider the number 4 as porte-malheur.
Tetraphobia, or the practice of avoiding the digit four, is a superstition prevalent in several East Asian nations. The Japanese word shi and Korean word sa for the digit 4 sound similar or identical to death in their respective languages. That explains why in places like Singapore and China, fourth-floor apartments are a bargain; there is no elevator landing on the fourth floor in traditional buildings; No 3 is invariably skipped in the sequence of hotel rooms, and the calendar date 4 is avoided for auspicious occasions like weddings.
The number 4 has been haunting the world for a while, eliminating great leaders of all time. Princess Diana died in a car crash on August 31 while Indira Gandhi and John F Kennedy were assassinated on October 31 and November 22, respectively. They all add up to 4. Martin Luther King Jr fell to an assassin's bullets on April 4 while Israel's Yitzhak Rabin was killed on November 4 and Kyrgyzstan's Sultan Ibraimov on December 4.
In this haunted year, we lost a galaxy of celebrities, including Joe Diffie, Terrence McNally and John Prine, to coronavirus. Bollywood suffered a double whammy when it lost Irrfan Khan and Rishi Kapoor, two of its most liked and talented actors, to cancer in a matter of two days. We watch helplessly as the Danse Macabre by the possessed numeric 4 continues.
suresh@khaleejtimes.com
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