Why do Chinese native speakers also have English names? Blame it on the poor, unsuspecting foreign language teacher. Trying to pronounce a Chinese name is like asking a cat to solve a Rubik’s cube while riding a bicycle. The classroom became a circus, not a classroom. To save everyone’s sanity, English names were invented.
But the linguistic challenges are a two-way street. Chinese speakers struggle to pronounce Western names. At the beginning of our fourth year of Chinese classes, our teacher Gao saw Robs name on her list (with a nice cluster of 5 consonants in it “rschr”) and she started laughing. “I’m not going to try to pronounce your name, it’s time to give you both a real Chinese name.”
“Rob, yeah that sounds like hope”, she said. The way she pronounced it, Rob & Hope sounded indeed exactly the same. “So, Your Chinese name is 希望 (*Xīwàng), which means hope.” It’s a common word in Chinese, normally not really used as a name. But we both liked the name. Dirk was having a harder time, as the name, teacher Gao gave him, was the Chinese translation of “Daddy”.
Our last evening in Vietnam, the evening before we were flying to Taiwan, we met in a bar in Hochi Minh City two great Taiwenese transmen, coming from Taipei. We had a great evening, talking, laughing & then came as well the subject, our Chinese names. They liked Robs name 希望 (*xīwàng), but they both agreed that Dirk isn’t really a daddy. So for a couple of minutes the two of them were brainstorming and then came the official moment. “We think 夢想 (*mèngxiǎng) is a better name for you, it means ‘dream’ “.
From then onwards, when we get the question 你叫什麼名字 (*what’s your name?), we can proudly say “我叫希望, 希望你喜歡” (*my name is hope, I hope you like it) or “我叫夢想，我是你的夢想” (*my name is dream, I am your dream).
Our names aren’t common names, nobody we meet, forgets them. When flying into Taiwan after our Winter break, the Customs Officer made a comment “I really like your name”, it made his day.
Pronouncing our own names, was hard in the beginning. We couldn’t get the tones right, nor the consonants. We had to say them twice, sometimes 3 times. But everybody remembers our names. The only exception is our friend Chase from Taipei. A couple of weeks ago we found out that he put our number in his mobile phone under “Death”. The Chinese for “death” is “死亡” (*sǐwáng which sounds nearly the same as *xīwàng ). Let’s listen to the names and practice your pronunciation😜.
How do our names sound?
Rob – 希望 (*xīwàng)
Dirk – 夢想 (*mèngxiǎng)
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