Dreaming in Chinese (10 page)

Shanghai street sweeper on a texting break

Our last name,
Fāng
, is a popular family name in China, number 47 in the list of most-common surnames, to be exact. It is difficult to find a Chinese name that sounds close to Fallows, but at least Fang starts with more or less the same “fa” sound.

Fēi
means “to fly.”
Jié
can mean “triumph,” or “victory,” or “quick.” Triumphant, quick flying. It may not be an ace fighter pilot, but it comes close. “Flyboy” perhaps? My husband loves his name, and he even bought a plaque for our family name
Fāng
, which he hung in our hall. Whenever Chinese people look at his business card, they cluck approvingly.

I was not so lucky with my name. My Chinese friends scratched their heads and sighed over every version of my first name, Deborah or Debbie or Deb. They parsed my name into two syllables: de + bi. They decided that “de” rhymes with
jiè
, pronounced like the first syllable of the word “jeopardy.” (My
jiè
has the same sounds, but a different tone and different meaning from my husband’s
jié
) My
jiè
means “to borrow” and it also means “to lend.” The second sound, “bi,” was easy. They chose
bǐ
. It means “a pen,” or “pencil,” or “writing brush.” The unfortunate result, however, was
jiè bǐ
, or “to borrow a pen.” I could never quite get over the ridiculousness of my name whenever I greeted someone: “Hello, my name is ‘To Borrow a Pen.’ So, I more or less abandoned my Chinese name, and dodged along ingloriously for three years without one.

Even for the Chinese, assembling a Chinese name is quite a complicated job. I have a friend named
Wáng Míng Yuán
.
Wáng
, the family name, means “king,” It is one of the most popular of all Chinese surnames; recent estimates say nearly one in every seven Chinese is named
Wáng
.

The middle name is traditionally used to keep order inside big families.
Wáng Míng Yuán
has many cousins, who all share the middle name
Míng
, which means “bright,” to mark their generation. The need for middle names will become obsolete soon. With the one-child policy, which began in 1980,
Wáng Míng Yuán’s
will be the last generation where it is normal to have siblings. Her children will have cousins, but her children’s children probably won’t.

Choosing a first name is a serious business. There are so many things to worry about: How does the name sound along with the other names? Does it have an auspicious meaning, or does it at least sound like another auspicious word? What about the three names in a row, the family-middle-first names; do they together imply anything? How do the characters look, and how do they look together? Can a six-year-old learn to write them?

Yuán
is my friend’s first name.
Yuán
, as in “money.” Money is a good and auspicious word. Yuán also sounds like
yuè
, which means “moon.” That reminds one of her middle name,
Míng
, which is built from two characters together:
, the sun
and the moon
. It’s no wonder that Chinese parents are given 30 days to name their children officially.