• E-mail to a friend
• Printer-friendly
• Link to this story

If you dream about a big fish, and then see a man on a bicycle when you walk outside to get the paper, be sure to play the lottery numbers 1-0-5-2.

That's La Charada, a system of associating everyday objects with numbers that has taken root in South Florida.

"It's a Cuban tradition," said 68-year-old Juan Campos as he bought a Play 4 ticket on Wednesday at Navarro Discount Pharmacy in Pembroke Pines.

Pescada grande, he explained, is 10. Bicicleta is 52.

The tradition goes back to the 1800s, when Chinese laborers arrived in Cuba following the abolition of slavery. The laborers brought with them "La Charada China," a drawing of a man whose body is covered with symbols, animals and their corresponding numbers.

The Cubans created their own version of the system, and both are used today in South Florida. The numbers run from 1 through 100. (The number 100 is often used for the number "00" — zero.)

The lottery counter at Navarro Discount Pharmacy in Pembroke Pines sees a steady flow of players, many of whom have heard of La Charada.

"For people who enjoy and can afford the lottery, it's something we offer," Navarro Pharmacy VP Cristy Leon-Rivero said. "It's people just having fun, and for some, that's following La Charada."

Leon-Rivero said her grandparents used La Charada in Cuba when they, like many people in the country, played the illegal lottery game known as "La Bolita" (litte ball).

"I mainly remember that if they saw a cockroach, they played the number 5," she said. "It was part superstition and part an attempt to give meaning to everyday life."

Cubans use "La Charada" to keep them connected to their heritage, said Daniel Diaz, co-owner of Government Discount, which was No. 4 in the state in lottery sales for 2011. He pasted the Chinese version of La Charada to one lottery window, and said most of his staff knows the drill quite well.

"But one day, we had a new girl in, and a customer came up and said, 'Give me a drunken prostitute,' " he said. "She was quite offended."

The regular woman at the window simply would have punched 4-9 for "borracho" and 1-2 for "ramera."

Meanwhile, Campos, who had dreamed of a big fish, came up empty Wednesday night. The numbers were 2-4-5-4. That'd be a pigeon ("paloma") and flowers ("flores").

Had he hit, he'd have celebrated. But hopefully not so much as to attract No. 50: la policia.

•  •  •  •  •  •  •  •

Lottery Post has a new Mystical Lottery Charts section, and the first chart included is a La Charada Chart.  Lottery players can look up numbers and the Spanish words, with English translations.