Wealthy Splurge on ‘Lucky’ License Plates, Phone Numbers
Duong Tech, the owner of an import-export company, spent $150,000 on his chrome-rimmed Cadillac Escalade SUV. Then he shelled out an additional $10,000 at the Phnom Penh municipal transportation department for a license plate ending with the numbers "9999." ... In Phnom Penh, custom-numbered license plates are affixed to many luxury cars navigating the city's traffic, while mobile phone shops offer bespoke phone numbers costing thousands of dollars. ... While Chinese culture, pervasive throughout Cambodia, holds certain numbers to particularly auspicious, Dok Narim, secretary of state for the Ministry of Cults and Religion, said that a belief in lucky numbers usually has nothing to do with the numerals most often chosen for license plates and mobile phones. ... "It's just a tendency of people to follow each other," he said noting that the ever-changing obsession of the rich with certain numbers is a boon to business people such as phone shop owners. ...
