Unpleasant images on Beijing license plates

By: Drivers.com staff
Date: Saturday, 20. October 2007

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The Reuters news agency reports that some Beijing motorists are objecting to having the letters "WC" on their license plates. The Victorian abbreviation for "Water Closet" or toilet has become a well-known English expression, but on license plates motorists think it conjures up unpleasant images.

About 800 motorists have been issued with the objectionable license plates, according to the Reuters report, and they're worried about becoming "a laughing stock".

Licensing authorities are unsympathetic. However, they did remove "SB" from license plates in Xinyang, Henan Province. The SB initials are regularly used in Internet chat rooms to denote a vulgar Mandarin profanity. Also, traffic authorities in Haikou, capital of China's province of Hainan, removed the number 4 from number plates last August because it sounds similar to "death" when pronounced in Mandarin.

In other news around China, the city of Fuyang had a week-long ban on private cars over a recent national holiday to combat "car wheel corruption" and give the city a clean-air break.

The city maintains it not only saved its environment but also saved about 1.2 million yuan ($159,900) in gasoline and other costs.

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