Adeline Yen Mah's Blog, page 7

The baby's forehead is rubbed with a red egg and a bit of his hair is cut off and saved by his mother.

                   Eggs are dyed red and given to friends and relatives at a banquet.

                   Eggs are dyed red and given to friends and relatives at a banquet.

When a baby is one month old，he is given his name during a Red Egg ceremony.

- Dr. Adeline Yen Mah

Please note that 地 is a stem word which means land. The character following 地 will determine the meaning of the two words (compound word) placed together. In this case, 图 means picture or drawing or chart. Thus 地图 means land drawing or MAP. There are more than two dozen compound words with 地 as the stem word. Some examples are 地 球 dì qiǔ (land ball = earth), 地 理 dì lǐ (land logic = geography), 地雷 dì léi (land thunder = land mine), 地震 dì zhèn（land shaking = earth-quake）， 地下 dì xià（land below = underground）， 地 铁 dì tiě (land iron = underground railroad).

On old Chinese maps, south was shown at the top and north at the bottom. The fifth direction was the center, where the country of China was placed. China means middle kingdom.

These colors corresponded to the five elements: fire, water, wood, metal, earth and five directions. In old Chinese maps, south was shown at the top and north at the bottom. The fifth direction was the center, where the country of China was placed. China means middle kingdom.

What colors mean in China

In ancient China，there were five primary colors: red black green white yellow.

The unluckiest number of all is the number 14, because it sounds like" yao si" (want to die) in Mandarin and "sut se" (bound to die) in Cantonese.

Some hotels in western cities such as New York and London have no 13th floor because 13 is an unlucky number in the West. I once stayed on the 20th floor of a hotel in Hong Kong that combined East and West—the 4th, 13th and 14th floors were all missing. The so-called 20th floor was actually the 17th floor.

The number 6 is also considered lucky in China. The word for 6 sounds like a word "Liu" that means `flowing freely' or`everything will go smoothly'. Because of this, the number 666 is considered one of the luckiest numbers in Chinese culture. It is often displayed in shop windows and neon signs. License plate AW6666 was recently sold for $272,000 yuan (US$34,000) in an auction to an anonymous bidder in Guanzhou.