I went on an impromptu walk with two of my students yesterday, and got around to asking them how they got their names. most people are named by a lama when they are born - which is why there are so many pemas, dorjis, tashis.. i think lamas often have a small list of favourite names..
but one of these boys has a name that is fairly unique - Pema Tender. Well Pema is dime a dozen, but Tender???
It turns out that he was born just before the census, so when his father went to register the family, they hadn't given him a name yet. So the father, together with the village headman, came up with the name, Pema Tender (I think Tender must mean something else in his language.. although who knows really.. it seems to suit him in the end, he's a sweet guy).. and hysterically when the father got home, he forgot what name they'd written down! So they called him something else ENTIRELY (Tshering Dorji or something like that..). So he happily went by that name until the next census, when he was 13, and he found out his "real name" and so he switched back! apparently there is still great confusion among his childhood friends as to who that Pema Tender guy is!!!
It makes me realize how funny my attachment to my name is. I have had heated conversations with some men about why women would change their name when they get married (still doesn't make sense to me) - and here women don't change their name actually - but my reaction seems a little extreme when you see how many people here change their names or the spelling of their names simply because the census official got it wrong! and no one seems to care too dramatically. apparently the paperwork involved in changing your name in the census, or on official documents, is simply not worth the hassle... better to change your name!
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From my personal experience in life, I would encourage any woman who is marrying, to keep her family name. None of us enter a marriage with the thought it may not last a life time. But, if it doesn't, it feels weird and wrong somehow to keep "his" name, when he is no longer a key part of your life. On the other hand side, if you haven't been using your family name for several years, while useing your married name, you don't feel quite like that person either. There is a stage of feeling quite in limbo,of being neither one name nor the other; it's somewhat a "no-man's land of unknown identity. I didn't like that.
Melinda
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