With aspirations of improving his luck, a driver in China spent a small fortune on a vanity license plate that has only caused him grief.
The seemingly ingenious idea centered around obtaining a license plate featuring five 8's, since the number is considered good luck in the Chinese culture.
Incredibly, the 'lucky' license plate cost the man over $100,000 to acquire and affix to his modest pick-up truck.
However, immediately upon taking his newly-created 'luck mobile' out for a ride, the man began to see the error of his ways.
Chinese police wound up stopping him an amazing eight times in only the first day he had been driving the vehicle!
The prevailing opinion was that the license plate was a fake and authorities refused to believe that it was legally assigned to the unassuming truck.
Making matters worse, the encounters with police drew the curiosity of onlookers who swamped the truck to take pictures of the 'lucky' license plate, stranding the driver at the traffic stops for more than 30 minutes each time.
Fortunately for the owner, he may be able to resell the lucky license plate to someone else, provided they have not heard his unlucky experience.
And, in other Chinese provinces, the other all-eight license plates adorn luxury cars, so perhaps he can find a buyer and actually manage to make a profit from the failed scheme.
In that case, being pulled over 8 times while driving a truck with an 88888 license plate may actually have proven to be good luck.
Coast Insiders looking to learn more about the power of numbers can check out the many previous appearances on the program by numerologist Glynis McCants.
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Source: Telegraph / Shanghaiist