A Chinese man spent almost US$3,000 on a ‘lucky’ phone number. It made his life a misery

A man from eastern China who spent almost US$3,000 on an “auspicious” phone number found that it was making his life a constant misery after he was bombarded with crank calls when a TV production company used it in one of its dramas.

The Yangtse Evening Post reported on Monday that eight years ago the man surnamed Shen had spent 20,000 yuan on a phone number that ended with 888 because eight – which sounds like the word “fa”, meaning wealth and fortune – is considered a lucky number in China.