How to Count Numbers Using Your Hand, The Chinese Way

Count numbers

I was trying to schedule a meeting with a coworker and asked if 9am was a good time. As I asked, I naturally used my right hand to make a "nine". He hesitated for half a second and only then did I realize that this hand gesture was probably not universally understood...

Here I present you how I use my one hand to count from 0 to 10, the Chinese way.

I believe 1-5 is easy to understand. 6-10 is trickier.

You may have noticed that the hand gestures for 6 "六" and 8 "八" look kind of like how the characters are written, and I think that's the reason why we made the hand gestures that way.

"7", "9" , "10" is even trickier. I have no idea why they look like that. "7" is like the way you hold some salt using your thumb, point finger and middle finger; to do "9", make your hand a fist and then curl your point finger like a fish hook; when it comes to "10", I sometimes simply use a fist to represent it, and sometimes I use a fist as "0" and the point finger of the other hand to make a "1".

I never gave these hand gestures much thought, because they have been so naturally blended in my life. However, when I'm in a different culture, I find it really interesting to share these small life details with others, just to add some fun to our lives :)