Buy your luck

How much does your vehicle number plate mean to you? If you're Thai, the numbers mean a great deal indeed. There are so many superstitions surrounding numbers that they auction off the most sought-after car registration plates each year. This year's event took place on Saturday 22 March in the ballroom of a Phuket Town hotel. A total of 310 plates went up for auction - and a staggering 14 million baht (R3,5 million) was raised. The proceeds go towards road maintenance.

The ballroom was packed with buyers, as the numbers were resented by attractive young women in revealing outfits. The alphanumeric plates for Phuket in 2008 begin with the two Thai letters ก (gor-gai) and ท (tor-tahaan), followed by strings of anywhere from one to four digits. This year's Thai letters, “กท”, are considered especially aspicious as the letters mean "double progress".

The most highly-sought after plates, for which opening bids were 50,000 baht, were numbers with the same digit four times in succession. As most bidders were keen believers in Chinese geomancy, the top bid, as expected, was for plate กท 9999. The winner was local hotel magnate Wanrak Likhidvong, with a high bid of 740,000 baht (R200,000).

The second highest bid, of 510,000 baht (R150,000), was placed by businessman Atthapan Poojaroen for กท 8888. All 301 plates on offer were snatched up by luck- and vanity-seeking bidders, with the lowest bid fetching 19,000 baht.

In Chinese culture, the lucky numbers are 4,8 and 9, with 9 the most prized. The unlucky numbers are 4, 5, 6, 7, with 4 deemed to be the most unlucky. (Some buildings avoid the number 4 in numbering their floors to avoid misfortune, so there will be no 4th floor, 14th floor, 24th floor, etc) Just for the record, my Phuket car registration number is 9208 (starts with 9, ends with 8 and adds up to 19...not bad at all). And to think it cost me nothing.

The flickers are going

I don't understand what has happened to my cellphone. Sometimes the print on the SMS messages and the phone number print is so small that I can barely read it. Or it just comes out blurry. The same goes for the pin code on the 'pay as you go' telephone cards. And the medical inserts that come with tablets. What the hell is going on?

The truth, my friends, is that the old flickers are starting to give in. Yes, the ravages of years behind a computer screen and squinting into the midday sun are having an effect. Isn't it terrible? Here I am, barely out of my teens (well, only three decades on), and my eyes are giving up the ghost.

I remember my grandfather giving me a hard time about the print size in the Sunday Times. "Why the hell did you change it," he would mutter. "Its not like it used to be. It used to be readable, but now its so damn small," he would grumble. The same went for our elecution. " Stop mumbling," he would say, "Speak up, I can't hear what you are saying!"

Oh, the creeping years play ugly games on the unsuspecting. When I finally confessed about my dimming flickers to some of the closest allies, they all quietly admitted the same affliction. So, now when I read a book in bed, or have to type out an SMS, out come a pair of miniscule glasses. They are not prescription ones (the horror!), but just a cheap pair that one can buy in pharmacies.

They were given to me by my friend Gary Timm, who teaches in Taiwan, He had a spare pair on him and generously handed them over. Says he has a few pairs dotted around the house (suppose he can't spot them easily at night, so he's probably worse off than me!)

So, if you happen to spot me donning a pair of specs one day, please don't laugh. Don't say a thing. Just pretend I am still the sprightly young thing that could easily spot a stray Quality Street sweet under the Christmas tree at midnight or a slither of biltong from 40 metres away.

But if you absolutely have to mention it, please be kind. Be gentle, like the young child who said of a balding man: "Look dad, that man has got a lot of face." Now, that's what they refer to in the East as 'saving face'. And we all need a little bit of it sometimes.