Swear words used as names

Factual Questions
101

And I almost forgot…

My paternal grandmother has gone by the name “Dick” all her life. Yes, she’s and 83-year-old woman, and still answers to “Dick”. She has two sisters who still answer to “Pete” and “Johnny”. You see, their father wanted sons, and was blessed with daughters on the first three tries. They all have proper female names - my grandmother’s is Lorena, (and to this day I have no idea what my great aunts’ real names are) but only use them on “official” documents.

Their younger brother grew up suffering with people, who knew his sisters, thinking it was funny to call him Mary. Come to think of it, I don’t know what his real name is either. I’ve never met him.
And somebody mentioned boys named Sue… I had a Korean-born friend (via the Internet) who arrived in the USA when he was five years old. His given name is Soo. He went by Keith when he was growing up, but as an adult decided to go back to his original, Korean name.

102

http://www.widernet.org/sunday/

I give you Sunday D. Goshit

103

In the summer of 1977 I had a job at a federal records warehouse where I proofread names and serial numbers of veterans all day.

To help deal with the tedium, my fellow student hires and I compiled a list of the “best” names we found. It ran to hundreds. I still have it somewhere.

Among them:

Duel Maroon
Baldo J. Mule
Melon Roof
Cosmo T. Percudco
Beecher Cox

If you don’t get that last one, say it out loud.

Outstanding first names I recall included Nig, Commodore, Sergeant,Cinderella and Halloween.

Consider that a person named Commodore or Sergeant likely had a different rank in the military: Corporal Commodore Smith.

There was also a man from the West Indies listed as Catlubong (No Other Name). I learned later that in Haiti an illegitimate child frequently has only one name.

It is interesting that parents can do things to a child with impunity that the law will not permit one to do to oneself. In Missouri, a statute provides that one cannot legally his or her name to something “bizarre” or “offensive”.

The “bizarre” part is treated rather liberally. A candidate for lieutenant governor who was a sort-of prominent businessman was allowed to change his name to Richard “Bullet Train” Pisani. He was urging the state to build one between St. Louis and Kansas City, and he wanted to remind people of that when they saw the ballot. IIRC,
he drew 4% of the vote.

In the 1970s there was a case in, I believe, West Germany which became something of a cause celebre; a child was going by just an identification number because the government would not allow his parents to name him “Che”.

I recall too that at about the same time the government of France had a program to encourage people to change their last names if they were on a list of names deemed to be stupid-sounding or otherwise embarrassing. I wonder what San Abbibas thought that up?

104

Another thought: in Russia, women commonly have the surname of their father or their husband, but with an “a” added at the end.

Some years ago I met an immigrant family which had recently moved to St. Louis. Their name was Vagin, and it was promptly suggested that the wife change her last name. Sofia Vagina: sounds like a car only Malcolm Forbes could afford.

As for “Dick”, I recall that when I was in high school it was popular to observe “Dick Nixon. Before he dicks you.”

105

We were looking up student records at the place I work and were having trouble finding some guy’s file. It turned out that he’d changed his name since joining us and hadn’t let anyone here know.

His original name: Richard Spittle.

And he wanted to change that?!

106

I have a book written by Gay Search. Sounds like looking for internet porn.

And here’s to Mike Hunt, new sheriff of Aiken County, Georgia. I’ve had such fun with the line ** "Mike Hunt * is * Aiken.**

107

Dikshit’s a common name in India - Delhi’s Chief Minister is named Sheila Dikshit.

India has so many languages that quite often we end up laughing at names we come across.

There’s actually an Indian chess grandmaster called URL=http://www.koneruhumpy.com/briteshchampion.html]Humpy.

108

My Japanese husband’s name is written with two characters which have two readings for each one. His mother chose the slightly less used versions for his name. HOWEVER, if you read his name with the bog-standard readings, his name comes out as…“Genitals”. He had endless misery at school and as a teenager finally confronted her about why she had done it . It had never dawned on her that the other reading sounded rude.

We told the story to another Japanese friend, who then commented mournfully that his name misread means “Sperm.”

And Mr Hokkaido Brit’s female colleage coming back after a presentation to a load of American customers… “They weren’t scary at all, they beamed at me each time they met me, and made a point of remembering and using my name!” She had introduced herself as follows:

“I am Mrs Igasaki, I hope we can be friends.”

Clearly the customers were all hoping so too. NO-ONE dared to tell her why they had been so friendly!

(Don’t get it? Say her name out loud, with a long I, to sound like “ee”.)

109

A friend’s sister swears (therefore it’s not true) that she went to Cambridge University with a woman called Ophelia Balls.

110

My brother is called Erik.
My mother is German.
In German, you quite often attatch “chen” to the end of a word as a term of endearment.

You can imagine what happened while out for a meal with my german uncle one day…

My brother burst into tears (he was only about 8), I fell off my chair laughing, and my mumma had to explain to her brother-in-law what Erik-chen meant.

:smiley:

111

So, we’re down to the Krauts, are we?

Here’s two:
When I was in the U.S. Air Force, I was posted to a base here in Germany. We had a German girl working as a secretary, and part of her job was to call the fuel consumption (heating coal and oil) in to another central office on another base. Once a month, she’d call up and ask for the fellow down there and read him a string of numbers. Well, after a year or so, the fellow PCSed (got sent to another base) and another guy took over. His name was Sergeant Fick. No problem for Americans, but “Fick” means “Fuck” in German. This girl was NOT going to call and ask for a fuck, so I ended up doing that part of her job for a while.

Another fick story. I got out of the Air Force, and got a job with a local company. One day, I’m driving the boss to the airport and he looks out the window and starts laughing. There’s a delivery truck up ahead of us with a sign on the side proudly proclaiming that it belongs to the company “Ficker und Sohn” In english “Fucker and son.” Just imagine calling and wanting to speak to the big boss. The young guy answers, and you tell him “I need to speak to the old fucker.”

True stories, both of them.