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421,000 Chinese share one given name "National Day"
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2009-10-05 12:34

More than 421,000 Chinese citizens, among the country's 1.3 billion population, share the same given name -- "Guoqing," which literally means "National Day," government data showed.

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The Chinese capital Beijing alone registers 6,600 citizens with the name "Guoqing," according to the data released by the National Citizen Identity Information Center under the Ministry of Public Security.

These people may have different family names, such as "Zhao Guoqing," "Sun Guoqing," or "Li Guoqing."

A total of 168 of them were found to be born on October 1, 1949, the same day when the People's Republic of China (PRC) was founded, the center's figures showed.

Most of the Chinese with the given name "Guoqing" were born in the 1960s and the 1970s, with more than 80,000 in each decade. However, the number dropped sharply this century with 29,782 children under 10-year-old named "Guoqing" since 2000, the center said.

China is marking the 60th anniversary of the founding of PRC with 8-day celebrations starting from October 1.