What's in a name?

More than you think.............
Since history began, the Chinese always believed in the significance of one's name.
They have developed a very comprehensive system of naming one's children as it is
believed that the name of a person strongly influences one's destiny and fate.
Astrologers, fortune tellers, academics and monks are consulted when choosing a
name for the newborn. Most other cultures, however do not really believe in it and tend
to brush it off as superstition. Whether you believe it or not, however, the other cultures
are not spared of this correlation.

One very good example is Lee Iacocca, who's name IACOCCA stands for :

I
Am
Chairman
Of
Chrysler
Corporation
America

coincidence? Look at the following familiar examples.

Bush stands for :

Beat
Up
Saddam
Hussein !

Clinton stands for :

Call
Lewinsky,
I
Need
The
Oral
Now !

However, no one can beat this latest casualty in bad naming Osama stands for:

Oh
#,
American
Missiles
Again!

With all these, you better believe in the 5000 year old Chinese culture and
make sure you choose a good name for your children.

Just an e-mail a friend sent me.

I thought they just threw pots and pans down the stairs and went with the sound it made...

Hahaha. Good one Gaz .

A splendid theory, Gazrok, and almost certainly correct.
Chinese names are an administrative nightmare: there are somewhat more of them than it appears (the same pinyin or Romanised spelling my refer to a number of Chinese characters so two Zhou's could be very different in Chinese. But there are still very very few to choose from)
At my college, everyone is given an English name, or admin would just about be impossible.
Weirder than the Chinese with names are the Thais. When I worked in Thailand, full Thai names (usually about as long as the average urban telephone directory), were something of a nighmare. Worse than that, Thais will often give you a wrong name because they have a sort of fear of your having some kind of power over them if you find out the real name.
Odder still is the habit of giving infants offensive nicknames: "ugly" or "weak". The logic is that if the child already has bad luck with the name, the spirits (and the Thais are probably the most superstitious " developed" people on Earth) will spare it any further bad luck.
This "bad brings good" thing is characteristically Oriental and an example is the common sight of spectators at a fatal road accident. They're all writing down the licence numbers on the theory that these will now be very lucky in the lottery -as all their "bad luck" has been used up.
Heads are frequently not right, in the Mystic East.

[Edited on 17-4-2003 by Estragon]

Interesting.