You sure it’s five?

posted on 11 Jul 2011 in Almost Engrish

Photo courtesy of Scott Larson.

  • cl

    In Chinese culture, the number 4 is considered unlucky because it sounds like ‘death’. Maybe that’s why they put it as 5 instead of 4.

    Fore more info, look up “tetraphobia” in Wikipedia.

  • xila31

    The fifth ingredient is love.

  • Big Fat Cat

    The fifth spice is river powder extracted from the cow river

  • coffeebot

    Secret ingredient!

  • Hank Schwab

    and then their kids kick our kids asses on the math exams!

  • Cordelia

    The name 五香 is the name of a triditional Chinese mixture of spices. My family uses it for years. It could contain more than five ingredient or less, depends on different area.

    五 (Five) just means “a lot.” It has nothing to do with the fear of four.
    香 could translate to spice, taste, or smell.
    粉 means powder.

    Here’s the link for 五香粉 in wiki:
    http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/五香粉

  • Tatsu

    Ancient Chinese secret, eh.

  • Timo

    The fifth ingredient is lead, duh!

  • sarah

    Once past its “best before” we realise the extra ingredient is “old spice”!

  • Duck

    I’m so glad that on the ingredients they backed up the idea that it is dried.

  • Chris

    The fifth ingredient is people! Dried five spice powder is made of people!

  • http://none Fredji

    It’s true, the word for “four” and the word for “death” are romanized the same (si); they have different tones, but even so, the number is considered unlucky. It is equally true (tho less known) that the number five (wu) can mean “many.” So, there are two reasons for not using “four”

  • Ric

    5th is magic fairy dust.

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