babynames | (no subject)

I've seen quite a few of you in

ljsecret, so some of you have already read this, but I thought it was interesting. Someone posted a secret here that read, "I use a pseudonym whenever I order at Starbucks because nobody can pronounce my damn name."

I was disappointed that there weren't more responses...well, there were, but most of them were, "I have that same problem," without mentioning what their names were...

-"My name is Ana (on-a) . . . . Now was that so hard to say?"

-"My name is Xochitl (pronounced 'sochee') and I understand that using English phonetics isn't how you are going to get the proper pronunciation...but it is still annoying that people never get my name right. And for some reason, when people find out my name, they inquire about my personal life! Like what ethnicity I am, where my parents are from, how it was to grow up with a unique name...I can't stand strangers asking me this sort of stuff...but I love my name!"

-"It irritates me when I tell people my name is 'Misti' and they spell it with a y."

-"Lysistrata here, pitchin' in . . . . Sometimes I shorten it to Lysi to try to make it easier, but it's a futile attempt. In additon, I like meeting people, but I hate introducing myself. I don't mind spelling/explaining/tell the story that much anymore, but it just makes me sound really self-important (I think)."

-"My name is Rebecca, but I go by Becca. It's a really common Biblical name. Yet no one at Starbucks can ever spell it right. They always seem to put a k in it. Becka. Beka. Bekka. Rebecka. Always a k."

On a related note, I used to see posts quite often in either

customers_suck or

customerssuck from someone who went by Ter. I believe it was short for Teresa. She pronounced it "tare," and said that no one over the phone could understand her name when she said it and people reading her nametag would often mispronounce it as "terr." Then there were numerous posts about her in

c_suck_snark where they made fun of her for complaining that no one could pronounce her name.

Anyway. Yep. Just thought it was interesting.