A work of reality

29.01.2018 22:25

Listening to this song after watching her perform it on the 2017 mma stage really opened up my eyes. I’m pretty sure I totally didn’t get her point, but the important thing is that I found a point that made me think about this whole topic. Dear name. A name so dear to me. Dear *insert name*.  A name holds so much meaning. Too much meaning. 

When you think about it, your name subconsciously carries a lot of your identity and personality traits. A lot more than you think. There’s a reason why celebrities often prefer working under a stage name. Kai - Kim Jongin. Why though? Because your name determines other people’s first impressions and opinion about you. “I present you the impressive and such talented dancer and singer Kai” seems a whole lot fancier than Kim Jongin. It’s short, eye-catching and memorable. On top of that, by working under a stage name, you’re able to differentiate between the normal you and the celebrity you. It’s almost like a mask you can comfortably put down, after working all day. Of course, that alone won’t make it. Your personality, morals and behaviour hold the most amount of importance. However, people will automatically connect your name to your traits. Talented charismatic dancer? Kai! Soft bear? Kim Jongin!  The fact, that we’re able to split his identity this way shows us the insane phenomenon, when it comes to names. Being off and on stage in this case, is a determining factor. Let’s take a look at it from a “normal” person’s point. -(Hypothetically) There’s this girl named *ajshfl* I really dislike. She’s not only super selfish, but also obnoxiously loud 24/7 and constantly judging. ajshfl suddenly sort of has a definition stuck to her - selfish - loud - judging

It gets more serious, if you apply her name to other situations. See, when you have to name your kiddo someday, would you ever call her ajshfl? Obviously: no. You wouldn’t. Why? Because in your perspective ajshfl means selfish, loud and judging.  So what’s my fucking point? In 1998 my lovely parents(bless them), decided to get their second kid and gave that poor thing a pretty shitty name. Okay, shitty is the wrong word. Let’s just say, a fucking inconvenient name, for someone living in Germany. And that’s the thing. In itself the name Nguyen Thuy Duong does not hold any meaning whatsoever. But now that it’s something people should call me and associate me with, it opens up a whole nother book. 

So there I was, probably overwhelmed by actually being out of my mum’s vagina and now in the cruel cruel coldness, that is called the world. And my parent’s initial thought was: Let’s call that pink wrinkly ass kid Nguyen Thuy Trang. That alone held some meaning already. The child, who came out of my mum’s vagina first, was my precious bigger sister Nguyen Thuy Linh. Obviously, I had to be called Nguyen Thuy something then. So the only thing they had come up with was that something. And apparently, Trang seemed to be the perfect “something” at first. But a few days later, my dad probably saw some talented ass human being on tv called “Duong” and thought damn, my kid should be called Duong as well and here I am: Nguyen Thuy Duong Well I wish it ended here, but unfortunately the story continues. After being renamed a few days after my birth, everyone called me Duong. And that lasted for two whole years until we moved from Munich to Waldkraiburg. So from being surrounded by Vietnamese people only, we switched to a pretty white neighbourhood, which in itself means no harm. But once people wanted to call me, the very first problem occurred. How the hell do you pronounce Thuy Duong? My sister had it easy. Linh. Pretty self explanatory. Mine, however, was as mentioned before, fucking inconvenient. So instead of practicing my name, people around the neighbourhood called me Twisella. Generic German name, so: Gisela + Thuy apparently equals to Twisella. That’s how the neighbour kids called me. In kindergarten I just went with that name, because I accepted Twisella as my official german name. When I started elementary school, I realised what a shitty name Twisella was though. Which is why I introduced myself as Tü Dong instead. yeah. my name got butchered real bad.

And until 12th grade, people called me either Duong(Vietnamese ppl) Twisella(white Waldkraiburg kids) Tü Duong(casual schoolmates) or Tü(non Vietnamese friends). It wasn’t until uni, where people actually put in some effort to pronounce my name correctly. Naturally, it was my fault too, for introducing myself a certain way and not asking people to rather repeat my name often times until they got it than just let it be butchered like that. And now, I’m mainly called Duong and Tü. 

28.01.2018 17:26

27.01.18 12:09