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Time management

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You may have read that the 12 Chinese zodiac animals are combined with one of the five elements (wood, fire, earth, metal and water) to form the sexagenary cycle to denote years. For instance, 2007 was the Year of the Fire Pig, while 2008 is the Year of the Earth Rat. This sequence of 60 elements and animals is also used to measure months, days and hours. For example, today is the Day of the Water Monkey.

To find out the element-animal combination for a specific date, a traditional Chinese calendar is needed. This information is then used for date-selection purposes: those born in the Year of the Tiger (for example, 1950, 1962, 1974, 1986 and 1998) are advised not to carry out any significant activities on this day.

Traditionally, the Chinese view time in two-hour units.

As there are 24 hours in a day, there are 12 units, with each unit corresponding to one of the 12 animals. The Hour of the Rat runs from 11pm the previous day to 1am the current day, followed by the Ox hour from 1am to 3am. The remaining animals then follow in their familiar sequence, with the Pig hour running from 9pm to 11pm. Some fung shui masters, therefore, state that the day starts at 11pm and ends an hour earlier than the western day.

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