Names

When the second, third, fourth and fifth child of my parents got baptised into the Roman Catholic church in Sibu, Sarawak, Malaysia, the RC church required us to be baptised with a Christian name.

My dad did not "wear" his green hat aka creativity hat, the type I teach my children to wear. He wrecked his brain and still couldn't think of the four. Eventually, because he was going to London, England to study, he named us, Elizabeth, Charles, Ann and Margaret. You don't have to been a rocket scientist to gather how he got these very English names. Except, the church secretary made a mistake and I lose the E from the name Anne.

Many friends asked why I have an English name, and this is why. I also have a Chinese name, literally translated as Pure Snow, and Elizabeth is Pure ice, and Margaret is Pure Jade.

My namesake came to New Zealand recently.

New Zealand Herald: Monday Sep 15, 2008

Princess Anne will visit New Zealand from November 14 to 18 to represent her father at a conference in New Zealand, Prime Minister Helen Clark said today.

Princess Anne would stand in for the Duke of Edinburgh at the Commonwealth Agricultural Conference in Christchurch and undertake other engagements during her visit.

***Green hat: I chuckle to myself, a Chinese man doesn't wear a green hat. When he is referred to be wearing a green hat, it means his wife made him a cuckold. The way Othelo thought Desdemonia made him one. No Chinese man would be seen one with a green hat. In New Zealand, students are are to wear different colour hats in their writing exercise.***