Category: Let's talk
hi!
In my job, I come across many unique and interesting names that people are naming their children. But I have also come across people who, in the desire to be unique, either give their kid some far-out name that no one in their right mind would want, or spell a traditional name incredibly weirdly....
Has anyone seen this as well? What are some weird names/spellings you've come across?
Kate
i used to know some brothers, washington and orlando. seriously. also used to know someone with the name spider. ocean is another one i've come across, and cruise (2 diffrent people mind).
Believe it or not, "Orca". I hope that child doesn't gain weight. "Shaytanya", Arabic for "Satan", and "Allah". Hope the latter doesn't travel to the Muslim world, where he will be shot. Another one, under annoying celebrity file, actor Michael Douglas & his wife named their daughter "Carys". ?? Is this like dental caries? "Carys Douglas" sounds like a fungus.
A relative of a friend of mine named her new baby Jalaya Lové. And yes, jaws butchered it all to hell. It should be pronounced, Julayah luh-vvay.
One Ease Indian authoress, I believe the lady lives in Great Britain, has the first name 'Jhumpa'. Now there are an awful lot of pretty Hindi names out there, but 'Jhumpa' is something her parents made up & has no meaning in any language. Ms. Ladhiri, I remember reading in one article wished she could have had a simple name like 'Amy'.
om. no... seriously. that's her name. another boy i know has the first name of tiger.
I can't think of it right now, but there's some girl whose name I've seen that his like five syllables... some variation of Antoinetta or something.
Kate
oh i love this topic!!! I collect names. I know a lasagna. i kid you knot. my son's next door neghbor, who is a real redneck sow named her firstborn landon. my son said "moon landon? landon in the shit pile?" what's with sara palan naming her kids after places in alaska. bristol? it's a big bay but not a kid's name. on a similar subject there is a mr. sprinkle and a mr. blizzard who work for the national weather service. we have a dermatologist named dr spot, i kid nyou not, who is actually a nice guy. i know a mr. fish who works for the national marine fisheries service. there's girl here who has twins named monique and unique.
Oh my Gods wow! Someone I know told me that there was a couple named Bing and Bong. We used to joke about whether they'd name their child Bang. Thankfully, legal name changes are possible in America and in many other countries.
bing and bong. that's hillarious. Chris Martin from Coldplay has a daughter named Apple. That's an odd one.
Cherity. why on earth would you name someone that?
apple is a very common name for celeb kids. i've heard it several times. i have no idea why someone would name their child after a kind of fruit. demi moore's girls are rumer and scout.
Not that they're not ridiculous, but "Rumer" & "Scout" are allusions to the child characters in Harper Lee's "To Kill a Mockingbird." I'm not even sure those were the actual names of the kids in the story or just nicknames. "Apple"?! Is it a fruit or a computer? Stupid name for a kid.
Some names might work in some societies, but not others. For example, Angus Young is the respected founder of the band ACDC in Australia, but I knew a kid named Angus here in the states who was teased without mercy.
"Charity" is a bit much, but it doesn't sound to bad in Spanish, "Caridad". I once knew a young black woman named "Fatangela", pronounced "fuhTANgela", her mom's made up name. She was called "fat Angela" by her schoolmates, and told me, "You know, spongebob, these parents should think long and hard before giving their kids some of these names. They're making it hard on the kids." She was right.
One of the kids in To Kill a Mockingbird was called Scout. It was a nickname. Her name, if I recall correctly, was Marie Louise Finch. Her brother was called Jem. I believe his name was Jeremy. Speaking of Jeremy, very common name and all, but ick. I hate when people pronounce it germy. Not quite on topic, but my mind wanders... And back to the point, I don't recall anyone named Rumor in that book. It's been awhile though. They had a cousin or something who spent summers with them but it seems like he had a normal name.
Okay, the name Landon is actually pretty...I don't see anything wrong with it, better than some of this weird shit going around here...just sayin.
I hate the name Landon; ugh!! sorry to go off topic, but I had to say that.
Actually Scout's real name was Jean-Louise, though whether it was actually hyphenated in the book as I've done here I forget. But it's not just the names themselves that can make it hard for the kids. I don't imagine BP are initials to be proud of if you live in the GUlf of Mexico region these days. And I feel sorry for anyone with the initials BS, P O S or SOB, given what those combinations have come to mean. That reminds me of a couple frineds of my brother and his wife. They did think long and hard about their child's initials in the hope of avoiding just such a situation as mentioned in the topic. Well their last name was Fountain and so their child's name was Paul. All well and good, but unfortunately his middle name also began with the letter P, although I forget what it actually was. PP fountain? They'd thought so long and hard and yet still slipped up with the initials.
I suppose because I've never experienced teasing and don't think along those lines, many things like that would go over my head unless it was explained to me. In any case, I love unusual names but not completely bizarre ones. Of course, I adore Greek names. But I also like many found in the Harry Potter books because they have a Latin sound and are dignified somehow, though others, I think, are better left in the pages of a book. lol
I really don't think I could name a kid after a book character, unless the character had a really common name or something. I like some unique names, but naming your kid after something that can easily be made fun of by other kids? Hmm. I just don't know. I think names should be thought about very carefully. At the same time, though, your name shouldn't define you.
another point I forgot to make, is that I wouldn't name my kid something religious. while a name certainly doesn't define a person, I wouldn't wanna give people the go ahead to wrongly assume something that isn't true.
yeah. That's actually a really good point.
I agree with the last two posts.
I met a woman named Feather, I kid you not. I thought it was pretty, but this is me we're talking about.
I mean, I'm not Feather, but my username and all lol
My cousins are named Martial and Mesa after the amps.
I've heard of Martial as a name, but not often.
As a name, it's usually Marshall. it's different. lol
Jhumpa Lahiri lives in Canada.
I heard of one couple, last name Arena, and they named their kid Joe Lewis... that's horrid!
I don't get the reference. If I were to ever have a child, I would give him/her an ancient Hellenic name. I wouldn't choose something completely crazy but definitely something that speaks of pride and of Hellenism, both in the secular and in the religious sense. Of course, he/she could wind up not following Hellenic Polytheism when older, but at least his/her name would be one of honour, given with love and with a desire of a blessing from The Gods.
Joe Lewis Arena is where the Detroit Redwings play
Ah. I've never heard of them. But I suppose it makes sense why the name is strange.
I met a girl named Geulianne once...I suppose it was supposed to be like Julian or Juliann but it looked strange.
I'm surprised no one included the stupidly named Palin kids...Bristol?? Willow?? Track?? Like a race track? And the poor Downs baby...Trig. How stupid is that? "Trig" is what we used to call one of the senior year in high school math classes...Trig & Analyt, or Analytic Geometry. The parents of these kids annoy me to no end.
to the poster who brought up the Palin kids...thanks; I totally forgot about them!! I agree completely that their names are absolutely ridiculous!!
I hadn't heard of them before now, but now that I have, I agree. Track and Trig? And yes, when I heard that last one, I thought of triganomatry.
Ok, I swear I am not shitting you, but I forgot this kid's last name. It was one of those where the parents had changed their name to something ridiculously long. However her first three names go: Rainbow Marie Butterfly-Song.
What??????
As lovely as this is for an elf in a kids' book, it is NOT lovely for some poor little girl.
I know someone who happens to have legally changed her name to Jedi.
That one takes the cake, Feathery.
Anyone hear about a study that tracked mens' criminal records by name? The names found on a lot of repeat offenders' backgrounds were Alec, Ivan, and Ernest.
Personally I don't think those names are that bad. Makes me wonder about the potential careers in crime for those with truly bizarre names. Look what happened to River Phoenix. Every so often on my drug screens I'll see names that I wonder if when a child that person got teased & used drugs later on to soften the impact of that?
she had an odd hippie family, and her parents had their own coven, and all sorts of things. I didn't know her too well but she seemed nice, just unfortunate in the name department. lol
I once had a friend originally from Georgia who told me her grandfather was a doctor who would go out to peoples homes in rural Georgia to deliver their babies. Now back in the old days some people who lived way out in the country weren't educated and didn't know much. So this couple once asked the doctor what he thought they should name their baby girl and he took advantage of their ignorance and told them they should name her placenta.. And I'm serious, they said it was a pretty name and actually named their child placenta.
What a horrible man to do that and not at least explain that no, this is not really a good name. Poor kid. But I do wish that more doctors would make house calls today.
Well as for the Palin kids I can understand Track and Trig and perhaps Bristal to some extent but Willow isn't actually all that odd and neither is Piper, even if they're not all that common names. I've known a few Pipers.
The Georgia doctor should be licensure revoked. The poor kid!
If I've said it once, I've said it 1000000 times: WE NEED DENMARK'S BABY NAMING LAW! IF FIRST CHOICE ISN'T APPROVED, TRY AGAIN!
To avoid committees' personal biases, like I can't stand the name 'Emma', law would be specific, like if it has no known meaning in any language...hey come right out NO MADE UP NAMES...or if it is something like a part of the body, like "Placenta", or something that will stigmatize the child, like Adolph or Saddam, try again.
Yeah. I knew a girl in my High School who had the unfortunate? name of Lisa Simpson. Granted she was eighteen at the time so she was born at least two years before the cartoon was on TV umch less well-known but she still took a bit of ribbing for it.
Well I named my daughter Fiona and my entire family gave me hell for it because even though it's an Irish name and has been around for years all they know it for is the stupid shreck movies.. They never got tired of telling me that the kids would make fun of her in school because of it.
Now here are two examples of society acting stupidly. There's nothing abnormal about Lisa Simpson or Fiona. That last is actually pretty.
And if it's not the Shrek movies it's the singer Fiona Apple. But you're definitely right.
A girl in high school named Cashmere
A little girl who was the sister of a boy I tutored named Cashay Monay Alizay Pea
A boy on the school bus named Meant To Be and his middle name was A Miracle
A lady had twins and craved orange jello and lemon jello. her boys were named Oranjello and Lemonjello
Twin girls named Phenominon and Millennium
My mom had a student in her class named Ocean House and another one named Rainbow but spelled it Reignbeaux.
These are all in the high desert of Southern California where the sun shines so hot on peoples' brains that they become fried and useless when naming their children. Oh! and I forgot about Capricorn and Aquarius.
*sighs* Sunshine, whatever hapened to common sense?....lol
I knew a Rayneboa but I actually thought it was sorta pretty, if really strange.
Fiona is sooo pretty!
I, too, love the name Fiona.
Goodness gracious! The names in post 49 are... I don't even have a word for them. Perhaps, certain parents should let computers or little brothers and sisters (under 5-years-old) name their children. They'd probably do a better job! Just wow. Did anyone hear of the person who literally changed their name to a web address as some kind of protest? I think it was last year or so.
I think Willow's kind of pretty. And I really like Cashmere. I'd rather be known as a fabric than as a jello. lol
I must admit, I like Willow.
Yeah, Willow's a pretty name. So is Acacia and I think Summer and Rose are pretty girl names. I wouldn't name my daughter any of these but...:)
My nephew's name is "Aaren," and while I love him to bits (he's 7 weeks old) I can't stand the spelling that his parents (my little brother and his wife) chose for his name.
Actually, now that I think about it, I don't like the name either... too bad for me because his parents DO like it and they're the ones who get to name him.
I also know someone named "Catherince" (yes kath rinse)... she was born in Hong Kong and was supposed to be named Catherine... however, when her parents went to register her birth, the idiot at the registration office typed the name in incorrectly. When her parents pointed out the error, the idiot refused to correct it for them without collecting a second registration fee, so Catherince she remained.
Wow, Kate! LOL
Sponge, I have a problem with governments stepping in and deciding names. Name approval? Seriously?
As stupid as some parents can be they have the right to name their poor kids Jello or Cupid or whatever.
LOL
Kate
Well the late singer Frank Zappa, or maybe it was his brother or son, actually named one of their kids Moon Unit. Excuse me? Moon Unit?
Okay, so these aren't exactly weird names, but the initials made me wonder what the hell! was wrong with their parents. Some friends of mine in college were named Nadia Allison, Adrian Ian, and Steven Tyler, and their last name was Davis! Look at the initials... AID, NAD, and STD? Can you be any more cruel! And they have been teased for it endlessly.
I was supposed to be a "K.K.K." until my Dad stepped in and told my Mom "NO."
She wanted my Japanese name to be Kiyomi and was set on having my English name be Karen or Katherine... however that combination coupled with a family name that begins with a K, could only spell trouble for a little Asian girl... in the end, they compromised and named me Katherine Naomi K_____.
Why give you both a Japanese and an English name and not just one or the other?
I received an English name because I was born in an English speaking country, and it would just be easier all around if I had a leagal English name to go by... my Mother's Mother was named Kazue (ka zoo eh) and was called "Kay," but none of her identification reflected this.
I received a Japanese name because my ancestry is Japanese and while I am Canadian at heart (it's the only home I've ever known), my parents didn't want me to lose contact with my cultural identity.
My parents, their siblings and most of their Canadian born relatives are named this way... it's not necessarily a traditon in the Japanes community in North America because I have a few friends and cousins who don't have Japanese names... in fact, my nephew Aaren only has English names.
Moon unit's brother is named Dweezle. And I have spoken to a person who legally changed his name to Mr. Tongue. I believe he worked as a chef. Someone in my school is named Pink-eye. Wonder where that name came from?
I heard a radio contest where one contestant was required to change his name to "Heywood Jablome"
He did it in hopes of winning a car. I saw the change of name ad in a local paper.
My Innitials are GMC.
On a different note, before my daughter was born I was reading an article that talked about how to go about picking your baby's name. The author was trying to make the point that not only should you worry about the child's name or innitials or how it sounds, but also if the child has an older sibling how their names are going to sound when they are said together. For example, she made the mistake of naming her son Sam and her daughter Ella. Sam and Ella, lunch is ready!
sounds like an interesting article; where can I find it?
I was naming kids on an rpg and I realized their names would be Viviana, Lilliana and Iyana. (my name in said rpg is not Iyana) So I realized that I had to change them because they were too alike, so I have Lilian, Marie and Iyana lol. I shall make sure not to do this in real life.
Whether or not a name goes well with the last name makes a difference. I used to have two cousins. One died, the given explanation is he was stubborn about taking prescribed medication for asthma, though he was known to have other problems. The mother was my mom's black sheep of a sister, was hippie even though she was a bit old for the movement by then, had kids by several different men.
These two cousins' names? Stone & Kiko. There's a reporter named Stone Phillips, that's not too bad, and 'Kiko' I believe is a nickname for 'Enrique'. But with the last name 'Singh'?! 'Stone Singh' sounds like a stripper's name, & it just doesn't go with 'Kiko'. The latter is the one who died. I wonder if he got teased ruthlessly about his name by peers.
Hmm.. interesting.
The article was on babycenter.com, by the way.. I don't remember what it was called but I believe it was in the baby name finder section.
My favorite one was Haywood Jabuzzoff. Heard that one on the ending credits of an episode of Car Talk years ago.
I was out Christmas shopping yesterday with my mother and aunt. And while waiting in line at Sears, I heard some woman calling her daughter Charminellia... First of all, what a mouthful. And secondly? Charmin? Like the toilet paper? That's just awful if you ask me!
Charminellia? Ew? Just don't squeeze her. *smile*
wow, I went to school with a kid who had the last name" Rottencrouch," pronounced rotten crotch
Okay, at first I wasn't going to post here, but here are some names for you to look at or shal I say letters?
The first name is ABC and it is meant to sound like A-bee-cee
And the other is ABCD and it is meant to sound the same way, except it has the D sound at the end.
Um? That tells me either the parents were lazy as hell, or they thought they'd take a stab at being unique. If it's the latter, I think they were probably high when doing so.
Another name I came across in Kentucky Fried Chicken: I overheard some kid saying he went to high school with a girl named Theocilla... I am just guessing at how that's spelled because this way, JAWS is saying it right. Is it me or does Theocilla sound like it ought to be the genus of some plant or animal's etymology?
lol I don't think that should even be a name in the first place...
Just imagine that.
Hey abc, come over here. And abcd, do your homework! And you abcdefghijk, take the dog abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz for a walk.
hahahaha Oh my Gods! Some people are insane!
i knew a charity who was a very nice person. she had two sisters named, you guessed it, faith and hope. my friend robin has three daughters named faith, grace, and hope. excuse me but you'd have to live up to those all the freakin time. my mom knew a girl named comfort who killed herself because of her name.
anyway, i was constantly picked upon because of my name. holly hunt. you know "go hunt holly." "let's hang ya on the tree holly." i could go on and on. my married name is turri. people say "holly tree." how cute." I say get tested for dyslexia, a gd hearing test or a brain transplant please. My mom died shortely after my husband and i got married 25 years ago. One of the last things she said to me was "whatever you name the kids, remember they got to live with your choice on the playground in first grade."
I sort of like "Charity". It's pretty in Spanish..."Caridad". I like "Faith" and "Hope" too. Good ideals to live up to.
I worked with someone years ago who had a fairly easy to pronounce Spanish surname "Pomales", and like "Turri" people butchered this relatively simple surname & called her "Lisa Palmolive Soap" and others. She couldn't wait to change it in marriage to the even more simple "Bostick".
I would never have seen anything wrong with the name Holly Hunt without reading your post. As for being named something like Faith or Hope, it would never occur to me that one would need to live up to those ideals. Killing yourself over your name is incredibly stupid. Either have it changed or just go by a different name with your friends/family and use your legal name only for documents and the like.
Unfortunately, getting your name legally changed costs a crapload of money. Here in New Jersey, for example, changing either your first or surname costs $500. Changing them both? Well a good many people can't afford the $500, so forget them both. lol I hate it when parents think they're naming their kids something cute, and it just turns out to be a bad pun. Not sure if this has been posted yet, but here is a link to what some are calling THEE! worst celebrity baby names:
http://www.babble.com/celebrity/celebrity-style/33-worst-celebrity-baby-names/
Take a look at some of these and you'll see just what I mean!
Ah, so you're in NJ too? Cool! I don't want to go offtopic here, but if you've got a moment, could you please check out my post on name changinging? It discusses the idea in general but also includes a few links and things specific to NJ. You said it would cost $500 for a first name change (so I'm guessing it would come to $1,000 for first and last names). But is that with or without lawyers? Anyway, here's the link so as not to clutter this thread.
http://www.zonebbs.com/boards.php?t=21344
In any case, if you hate your name so much that you're actually considering suicide, $500 isn't alot when compared with your life. I certainly don't hate mine that much.
as long as the person changing the name doesn't think that new name equals new life with no problems. my sister in law changed both her first and last name because she wasnted to "distance herself from her childhood." I though aging did this but i digress. Anyway, what she shock she had when she realized that shiny new name, same old stinky memmories.
On another topic, i live in a part of a town in maryland called hollywood. people tease me and say i picked it because of my name. We went with the place where we got the most house for the least amount of money.
Anyone who thinks that changing their name will automatically change their life seriously needs to consider why they're doing it in the first place.
Tiff killing yourself over a name is stupid, especially if you can pick a nickname, but I see just about every screening in my line of work, including drug screens. I can't reveal any names, but some drug screen patients have such outrageous first names I wonder if they turned to drugs to numb, in part, how they felt about being teased about their names. Kids can be incredibly cruel, & some parents just don't think about this before they pick some of these 'unique' monikers. And when you're depressed, feeling like the outsider, it's not easy to avoid destructive behavior.
That's still a pretty ridiculous excuse to do drugs. "Oh, I hate my name. Let me get high." Honestly! I never got people who cared so much of what others thought of them that they allowed it to ruin their lives.
how about the couple in toronto who unfortunately named there baby storm, and then there's jazz and then kia. what sort of names are those? Oh and how about the baby named like? there's some others called pie and honey too how stupid.
How about the couple who named their daughter "Facebook"?! At least they could have picked a name of a site with some intelligent conversation on it, like The Zone.
What's next? Twitter? I shutter to think of the life that kid would go through, especially the short form. Hey twit! get over here! Hey Twit! Do your homework! Honestly, I think the price to change your name is ridiculous, although it's just another way for the government to justify taking loads of money from people.
Next, instead of Kate we'll have K8 and so on.
Yuck! That's not even laughable or sad. It's horrible grammar and/or spelling.
I've never really understood why people have to give their kids weird names. I knew a girl who named her daughter baby ruth. I tried to talk her out of it but she thought it was cute and funny. I want to know what happened to everyday names like Joe and Sam lol. I would want my kids to have names everyone and pronounce and spell.
If it's a cultural name, that's different. People shouldn't be limited to the simplist of names because of lack of knowledge of pronunciation. But some of the ones on this board are insane and seriously make me question these people as parents.
First, I think not naming your children something, because they might get teased, is idiotic. Your kids, whether they are named sam, or they are named abcde, are going to get teased; deal with it. They're going to get teased for their hair, eyes, fat, skinniness, tallness, shortness, hairy arms, buck teeth, crooked teeth, stupid looking smile, strange birthmark on their left cheek, or their oddly shaped big toe on their left foot. They are going to come home crying at least once, and your going to pick them up, hug them, make them hot chocolate, give them a bowl of marshmallows, and life is going to go on as if nothing happened. the point is, kids tease each other, its how life works, if your kid can't handle it, maybe you should worry about getting your kid some thicker skin, rather than a new name.
Now, I do find some names stupid, but I would never go so far as to think that my opinion should effect that decision in the slightest. I personally hate the name louise, hate it, with a passion. Would I tell my next door neighbor, sister, cousin, niece, nephew or the scotty dog down the street not to name their daughter louise because of my dislike for it? Absolutely not, ok well maybe the scotty dog.
The point is, its not your kid. If its your kid, you can name them sam, joe, billy, bob, mike, lucy, july, becky, michelle or ashley; in short, whatever you want to name them; providing that they are your kids.
I am quite sure that, if I had kids, and I were allowed to name them what I would name them, they would get teased. I doubt cordelia elizabeth kirchner would be all that accepted on the playground; but I like it. I think it sounds refined and pretty.
Another thing I don't like is these people who make up african sounding names because its going to give their child some mystical connection with the orrigins of their family. Sorry, but I doubt many africans are named shaquonda or something like that.
as for the strangest name I've ever come across in my life, I graduated with a girl named taquila, who had a sister named shardinay. Did we tease her and ask if her parents drank a lot, of course we did, did she care, no.
My sister's name is Charity. My aunt wanted my pom to name us Faith, Hope, and Charity. She got one of the names. I don't really see anything wrong with her name. I think that exposure to a name has a lot to do with whether or not it is ok. I mean my name is Pipi. lol
Also had a friend growing up named Summer Rain as first and middle. While it's different, I always thought she had a pretty name.
Thanks for the laugh, everyone. It's been a while since I've seen this board, so the laugh is appreciated :)