Engagement spoiled by Chinese Traditions

[chevysl]

My boyfriend and I have been together for 6 years. We''ve been talking about moving on in our relationship and changing our titles to "fiancee" at least. Well, being asia, there are auspicious days for him "pop the question." Since 4''s in chinese are bad numbers, we decided that it had to be this year or 2005. He didn''t want to wait another year so I knew it would be sometime this year. Since we didn''t know much about "auspicious days" we had to consult my mother who unfortunately told BOTH of us the days to get engaged. So the suprise is over, and I''m fustrated that there is so much superstition involved with this engagement thing! My question is then, should we continue with this planned engagement date or just forget it and tell him to pick his own date? I really rather keep it this year but how can it still be a surprise when I know the date? Maybe I need to get over this fantasy of having a fairy tale engagement and just be happy that we''re getting engaged. What do you think?

 

[tomatoe]

ahhh u guys left it too late in 2003 to have an engagement... only about 1 mth left before cny in mid jan...

it really depends on whether u r willing to go against ur mother & her auspicious date and how important it is to the both of u re getting engaged in 2003 more than anything else.

if u r willing to ignore the superstitions, by all means go ahead with a suprise engagement thingie. guess this is an example of how eastern and western cultures dont always meet successfully. a surprise engagement is so much of a western influence. or else u can compromise by having a surprise engagement but have an auspicious date to get married...

best of luck!!!

 

[chevysl]

tomatoe-

thanks for the advice. in fact, i did tell my mom specifically that i did not want to know the dates and to tell him only...that way we would have auspicious dates and have it a surprise. but it didn't work out that way since he doesn't speak chinese and communication was rather difficult. in any case, i'm just going to leave it up to him to make up for the surprise element...some how. We're not planning on getting married any time soon since he's still in school and figured that once he does get a "real job" he can just get me another ring...propose on a date he wants...whatever. Weird..greedy, I know...we'll see what happens...Thanks again.

 

[winyan]

Just a thought, but is it a '4' year in the Chinese calendar? Can't you say you are using that, if it's not?




win

 

[Hest88]

Heh. Sorry, I know how you feel about not having a surprise engagement. I didn't either, but I know it's silly since I chose to pick out everything. I would just concentrate on everything that *does* make your lives together special and magical.

 

[fire&ice]

Okay, I'm intriqued. What is unlucky about certain numbers & why? I think various cultures have lucky numbers (7 comes to mind) but I didn't know there were unlucky numbers.

Always curious to learn something new.

 

[magna2]

chevysl,

It all depends on where you put your priorities. Do you want to get engaged or do you want to get surprised? Anyway, I don't see why you can't still get engaged in 2004 since May 2004 should still be a good month in the chinese culture.

fire&ice,

The reason that the number "4" is consider bad is that phonetically in cantonese, it sounds like the word for die/death. Hence, considered as a number to be avoided.

Conversely 5/2004 would be good since it contains the numbers 2, 5, and 4. In that sequence, it phonetically sounds out the words "difficult to die" or better yet "difficult to kill".

 

[tomatoe]

f&i and magna: in the chinese language (not only cantonese), four has the same sound as the word die, thus the negative connotations of the number four.
on the other hand, the number eight is very auspicious cos it sounds like the word to prosper or prosperity.

 

[fire&ice]

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On 12/10/2003 10:36:33 AM magna2 wrote:

chevysl,

fire&ice,

The reason that the number '4' is consider bad is that phonetically in cantonese, it sounds like the word for die/death. Hence, considered as a number to be avoided.

Conversely 5/2004 would be good since it contains the numbers 2, 5, and 4. In that sequence, it phonetically sounds out the words 'difficult to die' or better yet 'difficult to kill'.

----------------

So, it's related to the language?

 

[tomatoe]

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On 12/10/2003 11:34:19 AM fire&ice wrote:

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So, it's related to the language?
----------------

F&I, hope u dont mind if i answer the q first.

YES!

it has everything to do with the way words sound in the chinese language. some people even go to the extent of buying car license plates, houses, etc etc with auspicuous numbers while avoiding the 'bad' ones.

 

[fire&ice]

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On 12/10/2003 11:42:16 AM tomatoe wrote:

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On 12/10/2003 11:34:19 AM fire&ice wrote:

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So, it's related to the language?
----------------

F&I, hope u dont mind if i answer the q first.

YES!

it has everything to do with the way words sound in the chinese language. some people even go to the extent of buying car license plates, houses, etc etc with auspicuous numbers while avoiding the 'bad' ones.

----------------

Interesting. I just wouldn't give it a thought. Would that apply to ages also?

 

[tomatoe]

f&i, u wouldnt give it a thought cos its a cultural thing more specific to the older chinese. not even considering the overseas born chinese, younger chinese like me living in an asian society dont even give much thought to things like this anymore.

ages? lol even if they were extremely superstitious, they cant do anything to change their age!!! but seriously, i have never heard of any drama related to age and unlucky sounding numbers so far.

the number 4 really does sound like the word for death in chinese, just a slight difference in the intonation.

 

[fire&ice]

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On 12/10/2003 12:09:41 PM tomatoe wrote:

f&i
the number 4 really does sound like the word for death in chinese, just a slight difference in the intonation.

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Are you sure it's not related to age? I'm 44

 

[tomatoe]

rofl, but u aint chinese

 

[fire&ice]

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On 12/10/2003 2:34:21 PM tomatoe wrote:

rofl, but u aint chinese

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But, what if I was in a former life?

As F&I obsesses about this 44 thing.

 

[Lanee]

Too funny F&I.

Since you and BF discussed the engagement happening, it's really already not a surprise but if you don't know what your rign looks like that will be a surprise even if you know the date. I know what my ring looks like but, I have no idea when I'll get it officially from FH.

 

[tomatoe]

aww come on F&i, dont worry about ur age. stop obsessing about this and go obsess about diamonds!!!!

 

[Volred]

I have never thought about it that way with the english language..

one...
two... too... to
three.. free.. tree.. shopping SPREE... (yea I've seen this used in advertising)
four..
five..
six...sex...
seven..
eight...ate...
nine..

I guess six is the only good word that sounds like another.
The sixth day is friday, I guess that would be a good day for sex

 

[chris-uk04]

It depends on how important this Chinese tradition is to you and your fiancee to be. In one way it may be very important to you, but in another you are an American now (i presume) so you dont necessarily have to follow the old traditions. I'd say get engaged when it'll be a surprise.

 

[chevysl]

Well, it all worked out at the end. He ended up proposing to me twice...with the same ring

It worked out great! The first proposal was nice and romantic and a surprise...the second proposal was at our "anouncement/engagement party" (how my mom wanted it to be) in front of my entire family and other strangers at a nice chinese restaurant. Boy was he nervous! proposing in front of 50+ people!

I liked the fact that the first proposal was romantic and it was just us two at sunset out in an open field where we were dancing (like two crazy people out in the middle of no where). The second, I liked the fact that my family and his family (which meet for the first time)was able to celebrate that moment with us.

Thank-you all for the advice...

 

[chevysl]

Oh, and another thing, it's funny that you mentioned about the Car license plate, I did have to pay extra just to have a license plate with 882 in it. Yes, some superstions are hard to break. In fact, when we were looking at diamonds, we tried to look for ones that didn't have any number 4's in it (laser inscriptions...) Boy did we drive the sales person crazy! I'm just very superstitious about 4's on the diamond since my fiance is going to be a police officer. So trust me, I'll be looking for houses without 4's as well!

 

[hoorray]

I'm so glad that everything worked out well. Best wishes for your engagement!

and...as a side note, now F&I can go back to obsessing about earthquakes

.

 

[tomatoe]

congratz, that must be ur e-ring in ur avatar

glad that everything worked out for the best

 

[fire&ice]

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On 1/11/2004 10:26:08 AM lop wrote:


and...as a side note, now F&I can go back to obsessing about earthquakes

. ----------------

But my age, 44, hasnt' changed

I can obsess about both. I'm talented that way.

But, congratulations on your engagement. Is you ring your avatar?

 

[tomatoe]

f&i, i did some googling and found these 2 sites for u to read more about this. and besides, according to the lunar calendar, ur most prolly not 44 years old and other lotsa other things like the date, time of birth, blah blah blah.

an important excerpt from the 1st page is "Do not be afraid of numbers. Numerology is there to serve us, like Feng Shui, not the other way round. Choose a house, a unit and a car that you really like first, then worry about the numbers. If you are destined to have them then the luck of the numbers can be changed by mandate of heaven, expressed through your will. Numbers by themselves do not have any power. The effectiveness of numerology comes from your perception of what these numbers can do. They can give you a numerical hint (or an intuition) of how you are feeling about a situation or a place. Likewise, the act of changing or re-ordering a number empowers you to change the situation psychologically. Physical changes for the better often follow a change of mind set. Remember the wisdom of the following Chinese saying on Qi energetics:

“Where the Mind goes, Qi will follow and Action will take place”


2nd page
1st page

 

[glitterata]

Chevy, is that your ring? It's so beautiful! Congratulations.

 

[iceprincess]

Well said Tomatoe! Cheers from L.A.!

 

[Jaded Gem]

Hello. I loved this post because I could relate to the poster. And everything that was written is very true about the superstitious numbers and the Chinese correlation and meaning of certain numbers. Well said magna2 and tomatoe!

I went through the same Chinese torture with my family and my husband's family. But you know what, I went with my lucky number 7 (forgoing Chinese traditions). What is so special about the seven number? FYI, I just like it for no reason, and I don't know the significance of this number. Anybody care to inform me about the history or significance of the number 7?
Anyway, so I got married this past July (seventh month) on the 7th day of 2003. And if you take one of the sevens and add the year of '03 and divide it by two people then you get five which is my husband's favorite number. Or you can count both sevens and count the year which equals 17 which has the number seven in it. Yeah I could go on forever about this numerology.

For the poster, if you want to know (but I'm sure you already know though), August 8th fulfills both eights, and this year August 8th is on a Sunday which is deemed by most people as a holy day. So if you're both Chinese and Christian then this day may be perfect for you. And in essence, you could book that day as a lucky day as well. I already know most of the August 8 reservation days this year are already booked well in advance at most locations, and who conincidentally are mostly Chinese bookings. Somebody told us about their frustrations of trying to book a reservation on August 8th, 2003, but to no avail so far booking in the Bay Area of California of all places where there is a significant Chinese population in SF. So hey at least you got your day picked out. Congratulations!

 

[sumi]

hey! my husband has a friend who is half chinese and she was married on August 8th!

By the way, the number four is also bad luck in Japanese, it's a homonym with the word death. I think number nine is also an unlucky number because it's a homonym with "to suffer".

 

[Jaded Gem]

Hey, that's way too funny sumi!

Yeah, that person who is struggling with the August 8th, 2004 reception is me. I was trying to explain secretly...or really, it's my husband's mother who is trying for the August 8th day for this year (2004) to be held in the Bay Area. Boy, she called us last night close to midnight scrambling and telling us that all places she went to had Sunday, August 8th already booked. We both have enormous families and many friends all over the United States and worldwide, and we didn't think it would be fair having more than a hundred people flying to either the Midwest or the West coast. So we decided to have two receptions and letting people choose which one they wanted to to attend; one reception done and one to go. July 7th, 2003 went fabulously, but I don't think that August 8th, 2004 reception will happen. Oh well...we'll have to see what other numbers pop out as good luck days in Chinese numerology sense. Any suggestions for me?