Been talking a lot about names lately and while I have heard of some really outrages names, I am surprise to read from some comments that there are people who actually name themselves like Fruity and Tweety. I laughed when I read those.
Some of you may know that I spent a few months in China. No, I am not there for holidays but to work. It was one of the most high tech companies I have ever seen. Trust me, when I was doing the company tour, I thought I was in NASA or something, it was really cool. A story for another day perhaps.
One thing I must admire the local Chinese, is the ability to adopt names. My first experience came when I was introduced to one of the director of the department. When he stretched out his palms to extend a handshake, he said... “Wo shi RedStar” (I am RedStar).
I paused for a while, thinking I might have heard wrongly. I did not, his name was indeed RedStar… RedStar Liang. It was not until I got to know his Chinese name that I realised why he adopted such name. His native name was Liang Hong Xing, “Hong Xing” means ‘red star’.
Over the next couple of weeks, I realised the local Chinese will literally translate their names into English and will proceed to take on such names. Some of the more interesting names I have encountered when I was there includes…
Water Lee… I presume his name was ‘sui’
Hunter Xie… quite a cool name, don’t you think?
Ocean Wang… translate that into Cantonese… how does that sound?
One that tickles me is this girl by the name of Wu Xiang Wei. And her English name… Aroma… Aroma Wu… how about that?!
Another one which I find rather extravagant is this girl by the name of Ji Hui. Her name means opportunity and her English name? … “Chance”… Chance Ji… what a name!
Coming back to home… some of my fellow slaves in this particular company will know of a particular name which often comes out from the paging system. Yeah, there is a paging system in this company and the name which made all our jaws dropped when we first heard it….
“Cinderella Tan”
We never got to see her in real person. Maybe her or her parents were preparing for a good reason not to work overtime passed 12 a.m.
So have you heard of any Pocahontas lately?