Names
I couldn’t resist the temptation to blog, especially after the conversation I had today. Well, please read on and tell me what your comments.
Ok, I was having breakfast today and inevitably the conversation topic was on food, and buffets. But then, out of the blue, somebody said, “you’ve got the Peter look.” We were of course shocked. I mean, what exactly is the Peter look?
“Oh, Peter look means boring look. Peter is a boring old name, don’t you think so? It’s like how old-fashioned and traditional…Think of the Peter rabbit…”
Well yes, I must agree. Peter has always been associated with something old school so I can’t fault the person for using it to describe a boring look (sorry Peter). With that, we started on an amazing topic of names.
It is interesting of how humans (or at least we, in general) tend to associate a name with some stereotypes. For example, Richard is associated with the rich, the powerful; Gabriel is associated with smart, intelligent people (ahem, not for the Gabriel I know, hehe), Joseph with the flamboyant, playboy type. And it’s quite amusing because they started to think of an English name for me. Ok, some names that popped up were Daniel (I object to that! Haha, I always think Daniel as somebody big…), Richard (the lionheart?) and etc. One of my peers was telling me to stay off names that end with ‘bert’ or ‘son’. Haha, don’t ask me about the connections. Anyway, I’m sure you people who know me (and currently reading this) will know of what’s the English name that I associate myself with. Hope I fit into the mould (no, I’m not a dog! If that’s what you are thinking!).
Now, another started to talk about the funny names that she encountered along the years, and most of them are from Hongkies (pardon for the slang)…Apparently they got the habit of changing it annually. So some names that appeared are “Summery” (luckily its not summary!), “Calf” (young of a cow?), “November” (this is normal), “Clarity” (to be crystal clear?), but the one that won it all is “Natural”. God, natural! Haha, imagine someone calling himself “Fake”!
Haha, here comes the funny part. Somebody went on about hearing of this guy called 郭毅志 (ok, not the same words but the sound is approximately there).The Chinese name sounds nice right? But once you convert it to English, its quite funny. 郭 is Kok, 毅志 is I-chi. Put them together and see what you get. Haha, whether the surname is in front or at the back, its equally bad. And what happens if the poor guy has an English name like Harry or Dick? Haha. Worse, we were even bad enough to attempt to think of his siblings’ name? Like 郭 毅 德 (I-Tok Kok). Yes, I admit that we were sadists who were plain evil.
Haha, some other names that cropped up along the way that doesn’t sound too nice are names like “Lam Jiao” (蓝峤). Yes, we were just plain bo liao and evil. Haha.
Ok, I hope this is a lesson to all prospective parents. Please, make sure when you give your children a name, please make sure that it is something which sounds appropriate in all languages if possible. Haha, I remember hearing about the decent Chinese name that sounds like shit in Korean. So yup, giving names is not as simple as you think it is. If you don’t want your kids to be ridiculed at or to hate you, please put in plenty of time and consideration.
P.S. I truly apologised to all who are actually insulted with this post. Please do not feel offended and just take my views with a pinch of salt. If you are seriously offended, you can kindly drop me a comment/tag and I will gladly remove this post from my blog.
Ok, I was having breakfast today and inevitably the conversation topic was on food, and buffets. But then, out of the blue, somebody said, “you’ve got the Peter look.” We were of course shocked. I mean, what exactly is the Peter look?
“Oh, Peter look means boring look. Peter is a boring old name, don’t you think so? It’s like how old-fashioned and traditional…Think of the Peter rabbit…”
Well yes, I must agree. Peter has always been associated with something old school so I can’t fault the person for using it to describe a boring look (sorry Peter). With that, we started on an amazing topic of names.
It is interesting of how humans (or at least we, in general) tend to associate a name with some stereotypes. For example, Richard is associated with the rich, the powerful; Gabriel is associated with smart, intelligent people (ahem, not for the Gabriel I know, hehe), Joseph with the flamboyant, playboy type. And it’s quite amusing because they started to think of an English name for me. Ok, some names that popped up were Daniel (I object to that! Haha, I always think Daniel as somebody big…), Richard (the lionheart?) and etc. One of my peers was telling me to stay off names that end with ‘bert’ or ‘son’. Haha, don’t ask me about the connections. Anyway, I’m sure you people who know me (and currently reading this) will know of what’s the English name that I associate myself with. Hope I fit into the mould (no, I’m not a dog! If that’s what you are thinking!).
Now, another started to talk about the funny names that she encountered along the years, and most of them are from Hongkies (pardon for the slang)…Apparently they got the habit of changing it annually. So some names that appeared are “Summery” (luckily its not summary!), “Calf” (young of a cow?), “November” (this is normal), “Clarity” (to be crystal clear?), but the one that won it all is “Natural”. God, natural! Haha, imagine someone calling himself “Fake”!
Haha, here comes the funny part. Somebody went on about hearing of this guy called 郭毅志 (ok, not the same words but the sound is approximately there).The Chinese name sounds nice right? But once you convert it to English, its quite funny. 郭 is Kok, 毅志 is I-chi. Put them together and see what you get. Haha, whether the surname is in front or at the back, its equally bad. And what happens if the poor guy has an English name like Harry or Dick? Haha. Worse, we were even bad enough to attempt to think of his siblings’ name? Like 郭 毅 德 (I-Tok Kok). Yes, I admit that we were sadists who were plain evil.
Haha, some other names that cropped up along the way that doesn’t sound too nice are names like “Lam Jiao” (蓝峤). Yes, we were just plain bo liao and evil. Haha.
Ok, I hope this is a lesson to all prospective parents. Please, make sure when you give your children a name, please make sure that it is something which sounds appropriate in all languages if possible. Haha, I remember hearing about the decent Chinese name that sounds like shit in Korean. So yup, giving names is not as simple as you think it is. If you don’t want your kids to be ridiculed at or to hate you, please put in plenty of time and consideration.
P.S. I truly apologised to all who are actually insulted with this post. Please do not feel offended and just take my views with a pinch of salt. If you are seriously offended, you can kindly drop me a comment/tag and I will gladly remove this post from my blog.
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