{"id":1296,"date":"2018-08-02T04:53:54","date_gmt":"2018-08-01T20:53:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hiredchina.com\/articles\/2018\/08\/02\/when-hitler-came-to-my-class-weird-english-names-in-china\/"},"modified":"2024-12-24T01:56:44","modified_gmt":"2024-12-23T17:56:44","slug":"when-hitler-came-to-my-class-weird-english-names-in-china","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hiredchina.com\/articles\/when-hitler-came-to-my-class-weird-english-names-in-china\/","title":{"rendered":"When Hitler Came to My Class: Weird English Names in China"},"content":{"rendered":"

Read about ridiculous English names in China<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It was my first year teaching in China.\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n

I stood in front of the class at an adult training center, reading names from the class roster while robotically checking off the students’ names.<\/p>\n

“Checkers?” I called.<\/p>\n

“Here,” promptly answered Checkers.<\/p>\n

“Bo-Bo?”<\/p>\n

“Here!”<\/p>\n

“Cici”<\/p>\n

“Here!”<\/p>\n

“Hitler?” I called before my brain could process the syllables being formed by my lips.<\/p>\n

“Here!”<\/p>\n

“Uhhh…” I stammered, squinting at the name, second guessing my eyes.<\/p>\n

“Your name is Hitler?” I said with a patronizing yet surprised tone. “Do you know who he was?”<\/p>\n

“Yes,” he said, sitting up proudly, “He was a great leader.”<\/p>\n

I placed my hand on my forehead, shook my head, and sighed with pursed lips, “See me after class.”<\/p>\n

\"StudentNamedHitler1.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Charlie Chaplin boldy satirized Hitler in The Great Dictator.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

My student, however, was not going for satire.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Image: Youtube<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Of course, the Chinese Fuehrer wasn’t my first student with a strange English name.<\/p>\n

One of my classes was attended by a Candy, an Angel, a Cherry, and a Kitty. I thought I walked into Big Daddy’s Showclub, not an English classroom.<\/p>\n

After teaching<\/a> for just a few weeks I’d encountered<\/a> a half dozen Apples, a few Bears, and a Vegetable and a Bacon (who would have made a lovely couple).<\/p>\n

\"StudentNamedHitler2.jpg\"<\/p>\n

If I had a quarter for every Rainy I’ve met in China…<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Image: Quickmeme<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Why do so many Chinese people choose the most ridiculous English names?<\/p>\n

One reason is to make their name memorable. I mean, who remembers a Tim, Alice, or Doug? But everyone remembers a Dinosaur, a Brain, or a goddamned Monster!<\/p>\n

Also, sometimes their English names are rough transliterations of their Chinese names. For example, I had one student named Leeway. This is obviously a silly name in English. However, he explained to me that his Chinese name is \u674e\u4f1f –\u00a0Li Wei, which sounds nearly identical to Leeway.<\/p>\n

In addition to transliterating their Chinese names, many Chinese people will directly translate their name into English. I had a student named White, for instance, whose given name was \u767d –\u00a0bai. As you know,\u00a0bai\u00a0means white. So his name was just a simple translation<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Other Chinese people choose a name that captures some aspect of their personality. Names carry much significance in Chinese culture<\/a>, so the name-chooser may reach deep into their soul when choosing their name.<\/p>\n

A perfect example of this comes from another former student of mine. Her name was Chaos. When I asked her why she chose this name, she told me because she has a dark and chaotic soul.<\/p>\n

I recommended a shrink to her.<\/p>\n

\"StudentNamedHitler3<\/p>\n

So Chaos, tell me about your mother.<\/p>\n

Image: Bamm Global<\/p>\n

\n

I can’t really say that I mind all the strange English names. I find them pretty entertaining, really. They add some zest to my daily life<\/a> in China.<\/p>\n

Besides, I’d be a hypocrite to criticize a Chinese person for a silly English name, since my Chinese name is \u6770\u592b –\u00a0jie fu\u00a0(a translitertion of my English name that sounds similar to the Chinese word for brother-in-law).<\/p>\n

I’m a pretty open and accepting person. They can call themselves Captain Poopypants for all I care. However, my bottom line is naming yourself after one of the worst people in history.<\/p>\n

So what ever happened to my little dicator?<\/p>\n

After our talk, he assured me he would change his name. A few weeks later I saw him in class. I glanced at the roster to see if he changed his name.<\/p>\n

There was no Hitler that day.\u00a0But there was a Hilter.<\/p>\n

He swapped the T and the L.<\/p>\n

Fair play, kid.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Read about ridiculous English names in China It was my first year teaching in China.\u00a0 I stood in front of the class at an adult training center, reading names from …","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":25248,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20,41,21,33],"tags":[60,386,2788,306,29,34,701,396,1319,3496],"class_list":["post-1296","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-funny","category-china-jobs","category-hot-jobs","category-part-time-job","tag-china","tag-chinese-culture","tag-daily-life","tag-hiredchina","tag-jobs","tag-jobs-in-china","tag-teaching","tag-teaching-in-china","tag-translation","tag-when-hitler-came-to-my-class-weird-english-names-in-china"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hiredchina.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1296","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hiredchina.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hiredchina.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hiredchina.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hiredchina.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1296"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.hiredchina.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1296\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25250,"href":"https:\/\/www.hiredchina.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1296\/revisions\/25250"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hiredchina.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25248"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hiredchina.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1296"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hiredchina.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1296"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hiredchina.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1296"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}