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This fear of the number 4 (tetraphobia) is a very ancient superstition; as old as the Japanese spoken language, since shi is also the word for death.
It's not uncommon for hotels and hospitals to omit 4 when labelling floor numbers and room numbers. In hospital maternity departments, the room number 43 is avoided because 3 in Japanese is san and shizan means stillbirth.
However, homes on the 4th floor of apartment blocks are considered safe, as are houses with an address which includes the number 4.
Yet even though the superstition is ancient, car parking spaces in Japan sometimes omit numbers 4 and 9. The Tokyo car parks below were all within walking distance of each other.
Even bath houses, yukata and towel basket numbers 4 and 9 might not exist, though number 13 was observed at this onsen in Izu.
(Click any image to enlarge)
You'll notice the twelve onsen baskets (numbers 4 and 9 omitted) are numbered vertically and right-to-left; the traditional way of reading Japanese. | |||
| 12 | 8 | 5 | 1 |
| 13 | 10 | 6 | 2 |
| 14 | 11 | 7 | 3 |
The car parking spaces here also are numbered right-to-left | |||
Along with Chinese, Koreans and Taiwanese, some, but not all, Japanese people avoid the number 4 because of this superstition.
The number 9 in Japanese is ku which has the same pronunciation as 'pain' and 'agony', so 49 would be shiku, which means a painful death. However, most Japanese numbers have two or more pronunciations, known as on and kun. The on pronunciation for 4 is shi and the kun pronunciation is yon, sometimes shortened to yo. Similarly 9 can be pronounced ku or a longer kyuu. As a number, 49 is pronounced yonjukyuu (ju changes 4 to 40).
Both the on and kun pronunciations mean the same number 4, but are used for different purposes. For example in months and days, April 4th is pronounced shi-gatsu yo-kka.
As for the number 4's relation to death, it's estimated only about 1 in 365 people die on April 4th.