Names

Friday, May. 07, 2004 1:16 p.m.

Edited Sunday May 9, 2004

A month or two ago, at the height of the baby issue in Singapore, there was a feature in the Life! section of The Straits Times about fertility treatments that couples have undergone in order to conceive. I read with horror that one couple decided to name their fraternal twins, Ivfy(female) and Ivfen(male), after the fact that they were succesfully conceived through IVF (in-vitro fertilisation).

Ivfy and Ivfen? I'm sure glad I'm not one of those kids. I'm glad my name is Widya (middle and last names none of your bloody business), which in Sanskrit means "knowledge". Coool.

Sure, every parent, every person for that matter, has the right to call their kid/themselves anything they like, but a name should sound nice or mean something nice, in my opinion. After all, for the rest of your life you're going to be called by that name, so you don't want something that people are going to use as a stick to beat you with, or something people snigger about behind your back.

More and more people here are choosing Western-sounding names for themselves, Singaporean coinages that really annoy the hell out of me. Perhaps it's a symptom of the desire to be unique and modern. Let me give you a few examples of such names:

• Xana - girl in the same dorm as me in uni. (So, so tempting to add a "du" at the end under my breath every time I had to say her name).
• Pengene - another girl in the same dorm. What is this a hybrid of, I wonder? Penelope and Eugene?
• Lichelle - yup, dorm mate too.
• Peggan - former student of my school.
• Ivon - Pronounced like "Ivan", not "Yvonne".
• Linco - a sweet girl whom I like and whom I think is too pretty to have a name like that.
• Mchale - pronounced muh-kale. Male name.
• Charis - pronounced ker-ree, and not cher-ris as you would expect. She told us at first that it was a French name, which was bullshit because I took French and a name spelled like that would be pronounces sha-ree. Later she said it was short for Charisma. :-P
• Ix - local TV actor
• Jacelyn - local TV actress
• Fann - also a local TV actress
• Derrick - dorm mate. Guy, of course.

Then there are people who choose odd Western names, like Bonita, Pierre and Picasso. They wouldn't sound so odd if they were Bonita Rodriguez, Pierre Martineau and Alejandro Picasso. But instead it's more likely to be Bonita Lee, Pierre Wong and Picasso Chan. I also personally know someone called Senorita. Her full name was Senorita SomeMuslimname and she was a divorcee. So in Spain she would be Senora Senorita SomeMuslimname. Weird.

Or people who choose Western names but want it to be pronounced in a different way, like Hermione pronounced her-mee-yon, instead of her-my-ya-nee. In that case I want to call myself FUALLWidya, pronounced wid-ya, the F U ALL are silent.

At the end of it all, I guess, it's a matter of whether you can live with yourself/the name or not. And if you're happy with the sound of your name, then of course you can say, screw what other people think and walk tall and proud.

I take my hats off to you people. Don't mind this name-snob bitch.

Anyone out there want ideas for naming your kids? Looking for a unique name? Or think you already have one in mind and want to make sure that no one else in the world has it? Click here.

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Older entries
Ramadan - 08 October 2006
Where I Have Been - 03 October 2006
Baby Talk - 10 August 2006
6 Weeks of Separation - 16 July 2006
Unacceptable Rudeness - 21 June 2006

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