Numbers

Math, and numbers in general, are really interesting to observe in another culture. I guess it's because while I've known all along that languages are wildly different around the world, I somehow thought that counting should be the same. I got some feeling for this kind of difference in France where, possibly along with most of continental Europe, for example, the decimal point and comma have exchanged functions - a dot marks off the thousands place etc., and a comma separates the units from the tenths position (e.g. 1,300.5 in France would be written as 1.300,5).

Chinese has even more numerical surprises. First of all, it uses Arabic numerals, but when numbers are 'written out,' they of course get written in Chinese. 1, 2, and 3, correspond to 一, 二 and 三, for example, which is all very well and good. Even four through ten, now, are easy (4,5,6,7,8,9,10 are 四,五,六,七,八,九,十）. From then on Chinese is extremely systematic, using a simple combination of the digits from 1-9 with ten (two tens through nine tens, or 二十through 九十, and then a simple combination with 100 (百), and one thousand (千). For example, the number 3,846 would be written 三千八百四十六, or 'three thousand eight hundred four ten six.' The difficulty begins with 10,000, because instead of starting over after 1,000 and so grouping the powers of 10 into groups of three, Chinese has a word for 10,000 (万,another term akin to thousand, hundred, and ten) and groups the numbers ever after by fours instead of threes. So instead of saying one-hundred thousand, you have to say ten ten-thousands, and instead of one million, it's one-hundred ten thousands. And is 100,000,000 ten ten-thousands? No, a new term, 亿, is introduced. What about 1 billion then? Ten 亿, of course. It's not like they're using some other base or anything, but it's surprisingly difficult, at least for me, to quickly convert, and I can't yet understand large Chinese numbers without writing them down.

Another numerical difference is just the pronunciation of numbers in different contexts, such as in phone numbers, in dates, or in bus lines. In most cases the Chinese like to say the numbers each individually, such that bus line 82 is not eighty-two but eight two. and I was born in eight four year, not nineteen-eighty-four. This year is two zero zero seven year, not two thousand-seven. And yes, age is often asked by what year you were born, I think mainly because it lets people know your Chinese zodiac sign.

Tally marks are also not the same. At the gym today, I noticed a sheet of paper on the main desk filled with the character '正.' I had already kind of guessed, but asked about it to find that indeed they were keeping track of the number of people using the gym at various times with these 'tally marks.' Instead of drawing four lines and then crossing them like we do, they were writing a stroke of this chacter zheng, which has a total of five strokes, for each person who came in.

Hand signals for numbers are also different in different countries. I already knew that some places tend to use the thumb and idex finger to indicate 'two,' instead of the index and middle finger that I am used to. Chinese also has a system for indicating numbers greater than five, such as that putting up the thumb and pinky means six (such as when the bank teller asked me to create a six digit pin number), and putting up a hooked index finger means nine (such as in a giant advertisement for alcohol on a screen in town, because the pronunciation for the number nine is exactly the same as the pronunciation for the word 'alcohol'...but that's all a little complicated).

Finally, the last numerical difference I've noted so far is the presence of abaci/abacuses. They're not that common, but they're around -- they're sold in the store in the school supply section, and I've seen them in the bank, and in some stores to help the attendant count back change.

This is all very simple numbers and mathematics, and I am curious what kind of differences there are between higher levels and more complicated concepts. Maybe I'll be inspired sometime to ask around.