The Digits of Death

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The Digits of Death

Posted by: redsaid on May 27, 2010

Tagged in: Your (Cell) Number Is Up , Unlucky Number , Mobitel , Bulgaria , 0888 888 888

The number of an easy-to-remember cellphone number is finally up after every person who had the number assigned to them suffered premature deaths.

Bulgarian mobile phone company Mobitel has suspended the cellphone number 0888 888 888 after two of its customers and the cellular company’s former CEO all died while having it as their cellphone number.

Former Mobitel boss Vladimir Grashnov, the first holder of the seemingly unlucky number, was struck down by cancer in 2001. He was just 48 years old.

The number then passed on to Bulgarian mafia boss Konstantin Dimitrov. He was gunned down in the Netherlands while having dinner with a beautiful model. The cellphone with the cursed number was in his possession at the time. He was 31 years old.

Konstantin Dishliev, a Bulgarian real estate agent with a drug trafficking operation, next inherited the number and ended up meeting his demise when he was also shot to death outside an Indian restaurant in Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria, in 2005.

For the last five years, the number has been dormant during a police investigation into Dishliev’s murder and his crooked business dealings.

Apparently spooked by the deaths, Mobitel has now finally suspended the digits of death for good. The company refuses to comment, simply saying that they don’t discuss individual numbers, but it is believed that they did not want anyone else to possibly be jinxed by the unlucky number.

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written by Dissol, May 27, 2010

Yes, aren't we humans strange; trying to see patterns in everything, and then using confirmation bias when we think we do!!? Many hotels do not have a 13th floor or a Room 13. Deemed unlucky in Western Countries, but in some countries it is a lucky number (mathematically it is an interesting prime number...I had it explained to me once by a maths professor, but my brain could not keep up...). Some cultures view a black cat crossing your path as unlucky...in other places it is lucky... Many sportmen & women have lucky charms, or quirks (Valentino Rossi always prays crouching next to his bike holding the footpeg).

I would not want the number...not for any superstitious motive, but many more chances of wrong numbers... I think my own number is lucky though...as usually only people who I gave it to call me on it!!

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written by redsaid, May 28, 2010

Dissol, I also find most superstitions highly amusing (like no 13th floor in many office buildings/hotels, etc.). And it is also funny how what is considered to be terrible unlucky in one culture is quite the opposite in another!

I think I would have wanted that number though. As I've told (and proven to sgb) earlier, I am NOT good with numbers! I still don't know anyone's phone number off by heart and can only recall mine when I recite it in English - even though I'm Afrikaans!

The 'best' number I ever had was for a landline in the States. Once, when I told the receptionist at the hairdresser's (yes, THAT hairdresser's - and no, by the way, I've sent a post card but have heard nothing back yet) what my home number was, he clutched his chest and said: "Oooh, it sounds like a number from the movies!" It didn't quite (all movie numbers seem to begin with 555), but it WAS a pretty easy number. So easy in fact, that I still remember it after four and a half years!