Have you noticed how people tell you they're not superstitious as they check their daily horoscope? Or how the last seats to be sold on a flight are in row 13?

Well, it's not just Americans who are superstitious. In some buildings in China, there's no 4th, 14th or 24th floor because in mandarin Chinese 'four' sounds like the word for death. In Hong Kong elevator buttons can go as high as 25 in a 21 story building. That's after skipping 13 and all the 'fours'. Here are some other Chinese superstitions…

When an American was visiting Beijing he wanted a SIM card for his phone and chose the cheapest one from a list. But in China, a cheap SIM card means a cellphone number full of unlucky 'fours'. Phone numbers containing the lucky numbers 8, 6 and 9 are more expensive.

The Chinese SIM card didn't fit his US phone, but when he took it back to the shop he was told the real cause of the problem was choosing a cellphone number that included the number four!