TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Meet US president, Baz-Baz Obayani Jr
Do you wish your name was Nacho Halo2 Esteban de la Cruz III? I do
Change Size
D
o you wish your name was Nacho Halo2 Esteban de la Cruz III? I do. Readers from the Philippines have kindly offered to share their wonderful name-generating methods with the rest of us. And volunteers have offered to “Filipino-ize” any names we send them.
A flood of letters arrived following a column in this space about the unsurpassed level of creativity in the names of the citizenry of the Philippines. “Thanks for celebrating our creativity.
However, you only scratched the surface,” wrote Adoracion Punonbayan, who highlights unique names such as Tabangcura, which means “fat monk” in Tagalog and Sapin which means “underwear” in Ilocano. If you meet a very tired-looking mother with lots of children, watch out for one called Labindalawa, which means “number 12”.
Reader Erich Beck met a woman with a child called Bonicar. “What does it mean?” he asked. “Baby start to come and we rush to the hospital in the taxi,” she replied. “But the baby come out before we get there. So we call her Born-in-the-car, or Bonicar for short.” What will happen if her next child is born in the back of an Airbus A380 Superjumbo? Will the child be called “A380”? Or “Superjumbo”. Or “Back of the Bus”, perhaps?
A reader named Mike wrote: “My friend surnamed Juan named his kids Annie and Avery.” Get it? Annie Juan sounds like “anyone” and Avery Juan is pronounced “everyone”. I think this may be a problem if the two Juan sisters are loitering somewhere and a police officer starts asking questions. “Name?” “Anyone.” “Yeah right. And what about you?” “Everyone.” “Okay, you’re both under arrest”.
Reader Angela Sias, who was born in the Philippines, kindly offered to Filipinoize the names of readers who contribute regularly to this column. Christy Chiang becomes “Maria Christeta Cassandra Conception Cuneta Jr.” Ram becomes “Jose Ramoncito Boncato Alcantara IV”. Chamin da Silva becomes “Maria Chaminda Veneracion DeJesus III” Jason becomes “Jay2 Tondo”. Mahjuja becomes “Maria Juleena Jalimao”. And the guy who signs himself “Lift Lurker” becomes “Boy Elebator”.
A reader from Manila explained how to do it. You get a list of names and then you perform one or more of the following operations: you double bits, add Tagalog nouns, add Spanish religious terms, add English cutesy words, combine Chinese syllables into single words, change V to B and F to P, and then you add a bit of magic and a suffix.
To demonstrate, here are some famous celebrity names which have been Filipinoized.
Barack Obama becomes “Baz-Baz Joselito Reyes Obayani Jr”. Harry Potter becomes “Harrison Bagwis de los Santos Potter-Pacifico”. Lady Gaga becomes “Our Lady Gaga”. Michael Jackson becomes “Michael Magtanggol del Rosario Jacinto IV”. David Cameron becomes “Dabid-Danilo ‘Boy’ Rizal Camilo”. Fred Flintstone becomes “Pred Antonio Plintstone Isagani III”. This columnist, whose nickname is Mister Jam, becomes Jamon de la Cruz IV.
To add interest, some residents regularly change names or nicknames. Erich told me that his Filipina friend mislaid her passport and lost the ability to travel. “Is it hard to get a new passport in the Philippines?” he asked. She replied: “No, not at all. It’s just that I can’t remember my name.”
