Weird Names

It just struck me now that while we Filipinos have Latinized or Americanized names, we still manage to bring out the Pinoys in all of us by adopting unique nicknames.

For instance, every town has several Juniors. Felipe de Leon Jr, Andew Michael dela Paz Jr. It is not uncommon to have half the boys in the class nicknamed "Jun." To make their nicknames unique, Pinoys would turn the ubiquitous "Jun" into "Jhun."

The extra H doesn't affect phonetics. It just makes the common "Jun" into something quite unique, to an extent. This practice of putting the silent H into other names caught on. Jenny would become Jhenny. Mike would be Mhike. Jay would be Jhay.

Filipino parents have a knack for giving long names to their children. For instance, Richard Guillermo Salvador Gabriel de la Cruz. Richard is after the actor that his mother made "lihi." Guillermo is his dad's best friend who passed away fighting insurgents. Salvador is his grandfather's name and Carlos is taken from his mum's book of saints. To make matters simple, the boy is just named Don.

But Don's parents also have an affinity for making monosyllabic nicknames, uh, different. His parents would turn Don into Dondon. Ton would be Tonton. Dot is Dotdot. Jo would be Jojo. To make it more unique, they would make Jojo into Joji. Tam into Timtam. Dong into Dingdong.

I can't wait to name my soon to be children Margarita Annika Esperanza Megan or David Logan Xavier hehe.