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I belatedly realized that there were a few categories that had been left out in the first post on Mallu Christian names…
The list continueth:
1. Phonetically translated from shortened English names (Elizabeth = Lizzy or Jessica = Jessie or Rosemary = Rosy) but then subsequently miss-spelled, e.g. Lissy or Licy (fortunately not Lousy!) I once came across a Wincy – kept me wondering if a miss-spelled Eensy weensy spider nursery rhyme was responsible! The reason is that the letter ‘z’ does not exist in Malayalam – the closest equivalents are ’s’ and ‘c’!
Male Mallus are not spared. I once met a ‘Reggie’ (or so I thought) and innocently asked him if his full name was Reginald – as in the Archie comics. he threw me a disgusted look and then spelled it out to dispel any doubt. “R-e-j-i : that’s my full first name.”
“Oh!” I replied, trying to be polite, “Ji like the Northies – with respect and all that jazz… ” I trailed off as he gave me a blank look!
2. Names that sound like noises – the most common from Kerala is Achu which sounds like a loud, too-late-to-check sneeze to me.
Tamil is not immune to similar tendencies – Kichu is extremely common diminutive of Krishna – I think that sounds like a politely suppressed sneeze! I once met a Bhooma and couldn’t help thinking her name sounded like a mini explosion!
Here is a post from Timofeyevich on some more amazing laugh-aloud examples of Tamil names!
© Sosha Srinivasan
The story with a WW2 twist that I recounted in my previous two posts got me reminiscing about a few others…
During my stint as a management trainee at a Chennai hotel in the early 1980s – yes, the very same one where I had to do a juggling act with three telephones at the front desk(!) – I got talking to Mrs. Fernando*, an Anglo-Indian (Eurasian) lady in her fifties who worked in the linen room. One day she sprang a huge surprise on me when she told me she was a survivor of Japanese prison camps in Singapore/ Malaya! She was very young at the time, around nine or ten years of age, and she remembered being force marched for several months between POW camps with her family – and surviving it all!
It really is amazing how you can meet people who have the strangest stories to tell.
Which brings me to three excellent books based on each author’s experiences in South East Asia during the war.
Empire of the Sun (also made into a riveting movie directed by Steven Spielberg) by J G Ballard.
A Town Like Alice (US title: The Legacy) by Nevil Shute.
*Name changed to protect the privacy of the individual concerned.
© Sosha Srinivasan
The story doesn’t end there.
Yohanan* stayed, thriving on the small kindnesses of the extended family, while Lukachen’s* wife cursed him every time she lay eyes on him – and treated him like a slave…
There he lived another ten years far from the land of his mother’s ancestors (Tamil Nadu) and even further from the land of his birth (Burma (Myanmar)), until Lukachen drew his last breath. The treatment he got from Lukachen’s widow only worsened until Lukachen’s youngest brother, who worked in Bombay (Mumbai) intervened. He arranged a job for Yohanan in the same city.
Yohanan, now a strapping young man, returned to our hometown every few years and his thoughts naturally turned to settling down. A young servant maid caught his eye, a fact not lost on the family. The wedding was arranged in due course and the couple moved to Bombay. After several years there, Yohanan landed a better-paid job in the UAE, where he lived and worked while his wife and three daughters stayed back in Mumbai, where they eventually bought a large, well-appointed apartment with his hard-earned money (something most Indians couldn’t even dream of in the 1970s and the 1980s).
Yohanan was well into his fifth decade when he was felled by a massive heart attack. His daughters, though, subsequently did very well for themselves and the last I heard were well settled in the United States…
Footnote: I am not sure how Appachen’s brother who went to Singapore fared during WW2. I know, though, that he decided to settle there and his family flourished in the years that followed. One of his grand-daughters married a Singaporean Chinese, and another, a Swiss guy. Other cousins of mine from the same side of the family (the “house name” is Ikareth) have married, variously, a Swede, an Iranian, and Americans of Indian and Pakistani origin. Thus our generation is truly an international melange.
*Name changed to protect the privacy of the individual concerned.
© Sosha Srinivasan
I spent quite a few summers at my maternal grandparents home in Kerala while growing up. Invariably there would be visitors – neighbors from across the hill or the next village dropping in for a leisurely chat and tea, and sometimes relatives on a round of visits during their vacation…
One such family was Yohanan’s* – only we didn’t know for sure whether we were blood relatives – or did we?
Once Yohanan and his family had left, Ammachy, my grandmother, filled me in on the history – and my jaw dropped and stayed that way for a long time – I’m not exaggerating.
It’s a story that is truly stranger than fiction – one of those amazing tales of not just adventure, but unimaginable hardship and heartbreak…
It all began in the 1930s when one of Appachen’s (my grandfather’s) dozen brothers (let’s call him Lukachen*) took off to seek his fortune in what was then colonial Burma (now Myanmar). He was followed closely by another brother who decided to try his luck in Singapore…
The Japanese conquest of Burma
But elation turned to consternation for, what was this? He had a young dark-skinned boy, not older than five, in tow!
Lukachen explained that he had traveled overland into Assam as part of a huge exodus of half a million strong Indians fleeing the Japanese invasion. The refugees died in their thousands of malaria, typhoid, dengue, infections, starvation, and gastrointestinal causes… It had taken him over a year to travel mostly on foot, down from Burma to our home state of Kerala in the deep south of peninsular India. He had joined a group of Tamil laborers traveling south when they were all stricken with cholera. Already weakened, the group, including the mother of the toddler, was decimated by the epidemic. Before she succumbed she had asked Lukachen, who had recovered from the diarrheal illness, to take responsibility for the child…
The only problem was that Lukachen’s wife – he had married shortly before leaving for Burma – wasn’t buying the story! It wasn’t helped by the fact that Lukachen refused to give up the child and put him in an orphanage… His wife then accused him of fathering the child… and our Kerala village buzzed with the scandal…
There was a family huddle and still Lukachen refused to back down. The child, by now named Yohanan*, stayed…
Did Lukachen actually father the child, or was it just that he took a promise made very seriously – or was it simply because he could not break a strong emotional bond he had formed with Yohanan on his long journey home? We never did find out…
*Name changed to protect the privacy of the individual concerned.
© Sosha Srinivasan
All those strange Mallu names suddenly make a lot of sense! Mine, though, does not belong to this category – read my post Tame that name for details. You have to admit, though – we Mallus know how to laugh at ourselves!
A relative of ours’ firstborn was named Sony – this was back in the 1980s when music tapes and the Walkman was the rage. When my cousin George heard of it, he chuckled and quipped, “What are they going to name their next two kids – National and Panasonic?”
Finally, the name ‘Boben’ is mentioned twice below – reminds me of a cartoon strip called Boben & Molly on the last page of a Malayalam magazine that my parents used to subscribe to during the 1970s in Bombay (Mumbai). We kids couldn’t read the language, so would pester my mom to, even though we mostly couldn’t understand the jokes – probably because they were political satires…
The formula below that I got through a mailing list may be old hat – from 2005 or thereabouts – but worth reproducing!
© Sosha Srinivasan
It has been a well kept secret for eons, but finally Itty Boben Jacob Elias Kuruvilla from Pazhookaville, near Thelmasherry, Kerala has consented to let us publish this classified Mallu formula, on the naming of Mallu Christian kids.
1. Select a combination of both the mother’s and father’s names. e.g. Suresh and Sharon = Susha, or Joseph and Beena = Jobi.
2. The addition of a ‘mon’ (meaning son) or ‘mol’ (meaning daughter) is optional. eg: Sushamol, Jobimon
3. To attach a modern, Anglicized feel to the names, the mol or mon can be replaced with boy or girl. eg: Jobiboy, Sushagirl.
4. For the politically correct Keralite family, mol and mon can be replaced by the universal ‘kutty’(child), which
can be used for both boys and girls! eg: Jokutty, Susikutty.
5. Even parents having combination names can still give their children suitable names eg: Libi and Jobi = Lijo.
However, in the scenario where the parents already have combination names that cannot form more comprehensible child names. eg: Itty and Amukutty, would produce only Itam (which doesn’t even sound like a name), or Amit (which is like Northie and stuff!!!!), then:
a. Use an English word like Baby, Merry, Titty, Pearly, Smiley, Anarchy, etc.
b. Use a combination of two English names that you think sound cool (but never cool enough) like
Meredith + Gina = Megi, or
Sharon + Darlene = Sharlene
c. Use a name from the Bible (and not Nebuchadnezzar! Use one that even Vellia-ammachy can pronounce!) like Jacob, Sam, John, Joseph, Mathew, or Jijo!
d. Use a name that sounds like a cuss word but isn’t. eg: Boben, Prussy, Shagi, JustinTimberlake etc.
Note: The use of the letter ‘j’ is useful in the naming of sibling where names that sound alike are a novelty. eg: Ajji, Sajji, Majji, Bhajji and Nimajji, or Sijo, Lijo, Jijo, Anjo, Panjo, Banjo.
On one of our evening outings in late 1995, I suddenly clutched my husband’s arm.
“Oh! The poor, poor man!” I exclaimed, indicating an individual who stood on the curb, half turned away from us, talking to himself and gesticulating wildly with his left arm.
Obviously a schizophrenic, abandoned on the streets by his family. The same thought seemed to have crossed hubby’s mind, judging from the sympathetic expression on his face. But wait… he seemed too well dressed and well groomed to be a candidate for the lunatic asylum! Oh well! Perhaps the condition was in the initial stage…
I burst out laughing and hubby couldn’t help but join in because just then the man had turned and we both saw what he held to his right ear… Sure, it was the size and shape of a brick… but the cellular phone had arrived in India!
~~~~~~~~~~
Fast forward to the present. I can hardly believe I actually went and bought one of those “things” – a Nokia 6233! Not after my rant against them in a previous post: Whatever it is, don’t call…! Several reasons why I did though:
1. I’d accompanied my son and hubby on a pilgrimage to a hill temple 100 km from Chennai last December and really felt the lack of a camera to capture some truly scenic shots.
2. I thought it was time I upgraded my mobile telephony skills – I don’t know how to make or receive calls on one – no kidding!
3. I finally allowed sonny boy to talk me into it – he should consider becoming a lawyer/negotiator! One of his most convincing arguments was that I could change the ringtone from the traditional, irritating one to a softer, more pleasing one of my choice!
The verdict? I’m quite amazed at the services and features.
I didn’t take the mobile to work the first week as I still operate it with a great deal of trepidation. If it had rung, I’d probably have handled it like a live grenade and chucked it out of the nearest window….! It is now on silent mode at work.
I find Generation Y so much more tech savvy – I read through the instruction manual several times and got totally lost… my son doesn’t touch the manual but seems to intuitively absorb how the phone works and then transfers the knowledge to me by a process I call “reverse osmosis!”
© Sosha Srinivasan
In 2004 I read a page-long feature in The Hindu by a retired IAS (Indian Administrative Service) officet, K S Ramakrishnan, called ‘Taking Cities to the People’ where he talked about developing our tier II cities in an effort to “divert” our job seeking population from our main metros. The full article can be accessed here.
Three years later, it seems the Indian government has finally begun work in earnest on such a project. The International Herald Tribune recently carried a story by Anand Giridharadas that Nagpur, bang in the geographical center of our country, has been awarded the distinction of being the first town to be developed.
© Sosha Srinivasan
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