by the thousands and tens of thousands (Jan 30, 2011)

A friend to my class asked me how to say "成千上萬" in English. I think something like "by the thousands and tens of thousands" can be the proper expression. But I also found that "thousands of something" meaning "數以千計" and "tens of thousands of something" meaning "數以萬計" are even more commonly used in writing. I have hardly seen any sentence written with the phrase "by the thousands and tens of thousands". Just for everyone's reference here.