Ask Lemmy

(Don't share your real name, obviously)

Okay so, wall of text warning:

My legal name is a Chinese name, three characters.

Family name (one character) is said/written first, then the given name (two characters for me... and I assume for most people).

Its a very interesting name, and overall naming system, each character has meaning, well other than the family name which I don't think it really means anything.

My older brother's first character is the same as mine, only the second character is different. (It's [Family Name] + [Character A] + [Character B], Character A is the same.)

I have never met anyone with my exact name, well to be fair, being in the US made those odds even rarer. I did meet someone with the same family name in a US school, and they also had the same DoB as me, which was very weird coincidence.

But my name is so rare in the US, if it ever got leaked, that's practically a unique identifier.

When I look at my name, idk I kinda feel a sense of antiquity. I have a genology book and the pages are falling apart, I had to scan it and made a .pdf from it. I mean those names are from hundred of years ago, I guess they had to keep remaking/rewriting those books because I doubt something from pre-1800s would've survived till now. It makes modern tech feel so futuristic when I think about it, I mean, that geneology book could potentially live om forever, without any deterioation unlike a book.

But simultaneously, when I look at my name, it kinda reminds me of my parent's emotional abusive and neglectful behaviors. Ugh, idk, feels so conflicted about it. I really wanna ask questions about the past, but we aren't really on speaking-terms anymore.

When people ask my name, it's always just so awkward, since... the pronounciation is totally foreign to them. I kinda wanted to choose an English name for simplicity here in the US, but like... I didn't pick one when I was younger and I think its kinda too late to use one now. Idk what name to even choose.