Tag Archive for 'baby-name'

Nearly 3,500 Chinese Named ‘Olympics’ (奥运)

Published by
Steve
at November 4, 2007 in China, Olympics and funny. 0 Comments

Does anyone doubt that the Chinese are excited about the 2008 Olympics? I’m pretty sure that Erica will NOT be agreeing to naming our soon-to-be-born son ‘Ao Yun’!

BEIJING — The upcoming Beijing Olympics is more than just a point of pride for China — it’s such an important part of the national consciousness that nearly 3,500 children have been named for the event, a newspaper reported Sunday.

Most of the 3,491 people with the name “Aoyun,” meaning Olympics, were born around the year 2000, as Beijing was bidding to host the 2008 Summer Games, the Beijing Daily reported, citing information from China’s national identity card database.

Names related to the Olympics don’t just stop with “Olympics.” More than 4,000 Chinese share their names with the Beijing Games mascots, the “Five Friendlies.”

The names are Bei Bei (880 people), Jing Jing (1,240), Huan Huan (1,063), Ying Ying (624) and Ni Ni (642). When put together, the phrase translates to “Beijing welcomes you!”

What’s in @ name?

Published by
Steve
at August 18, 2007 in China, Language, news and wierd. 5 Comments

Sonogram ImageErica has been on my case to come up with a name for the little guy on the way. Not sure what the rush is, we have till November…

Anyway, I came across a story about a couple here in China who recently had a baby and they decided to take the path less traveled and to name their kid “@”. Yes, you read that right, they’ve named their precious little baby with the same symbol that is in every Email address all over the world. Man, I’d hate to get that kid’s SPAM!

BEIJING (Reuters) - A Chinese couple tried to name their baby “@,” claiming the character used in e-mail addresses echoed their love for the child, an official trying to whip the national language into line said Thursday.

The unusual name stands out especially in Chinese, which has no alphabet and instead uses tens of thousands of multi-stroke characters to represent words.

“The whole world uses it to write e-mail, and translated into Chinese it means ‘love him’,” the father explained, according to the deputy chief of the State Language Commission Li Yuming.

While “@” is familiar to Chinese e-mail users, they often use the English word “at” to sound it out — which with a drawn out “T” sounds something like “ai ta,” or “love him,” to Mandarin speakers.

Li told a news conference on the state of the language that the name was an extreme example of people’s increasingly adventurous approach to Chinese, as commercialization and the Internet break down conventions.

Considering 90% of the country’s 1.3 billion people share just 129 surnames, it’s no surprise that this is happening. It sorta reminds me of some of the names American actors burden their innocent children with (ie. Apple, Phinnaeus, “Rumer Glenn”, “Scout LaRue”, “Tallulah Belle”, “Sage Moonblood”, “Sistine Rose”, Puma, Jett, Sailor, and “Heavenly Hiraani Tiger Lily” just to name a few.) all in the effort to be different.

Well, different strokes for different folks! I’m pretty sure Erica will NOT sign off on naming our little one “@” - I wonder if she’ll go for “Starbuck”? That’s kinda a cool name for a little guy!?

What do you think?