It’s on the tip of my mind!

For most things irrelevant (and irreverent) I have an excellent memory – almost photographic. But when it comes to names it falls embarrassingly short. So very often, a friend, an acquaintance, a relative will bump into me, faces will light up in mutual recognition and the other will say, ‘Hi, Wendy, how are you?’ and I will respond appropriately while all the time searching frantically in the attics of my mind for the name that matches the face. Sometimes, I do come up with a name but invariably it is the wrong one – a name for a sister, a brother or a lookalike!

Friends soon got to know and helped me out by stating their name clearly as in, ‘Hi, Wendy, Elaine, how are you?’ What a relief! But for the most part, I am left groping, and so I employ a defense mechanism – I develop an association, a kind of mental image, with the name. Michael is an archangel, Rose is a flower, Oscar as in the awards, Clementine as in the song, Caesar is a Roman emperor, Patrick is definitely Irish, Henry is, metaphorically speaking, the one with six wives, and so on. This works well when you are speaking of the person to a third party, because you have time to flip through the album of all the ‘pictures’ you have created. But when you are confronted by the person and require instant recall, the situation can still be fraught.

I could never remember our Parish Office Assistant’s name. I knew it, but I could never remember it. So, I created a word picture (as usual) and the association was with an American President. One day, when I was in the office with him, I was going through the mental list: Lincoln Abraham (no), Washington George (no), Adams John (no), Jefferson Thomas (no), Jackson Andrew (no) – oh dear! And then I hit it. Of course! Franklin as in Benjamin and Roosevelt! So happy was I that I exclaimed aloud, ‘That’s it! Franklin!’ The office assistant, who had his nose in the Parish register, jumped out of his seat: ‘What happened?’ Sheepishly, I replied, ‘Nothing. I just remembered your name.’ Frequent encounters ensure that I no longer have a problem when I meet him, but he always gives me a wary smile, nevertheless.

Now that I am older, memory lapses are more acceptable and I take full advantage, ‘Take pity on my grey hair, and remind me once again, your name is?’ Being a senior citizen allows for discounts in more than one area, as I am delighted to discover.

Now, where on earth did I leave my keys?

Lost in Translation

Well, not exactly. It’s just that western names do not trip lightly off the Indian tongue, especially if that tongue is more used to communicating in the vernacular. This makes me ‘Windy’ to some, ‘Bhindi’ (the local name for Okra) to others and ‘Vedi’ (mad) to quite a few.

Then, in my absence, the ward boy takes the calls and tries to relay the message; it causes me quite a bit of head-scratching before I can unravel the conundrum: who was it who called?

Sometimes the hilarity is tinged with embarrassment. We had adopted a street-dog and christened him Buster after the four-legged member of Enid Blyton’s famous Five Find-outers and Dog. Buster was very popular with the local boys who chatted him up fondly whenever hubby took him out for a walk. Now, hubby is slightly deaf (a great advantage when I go on a spending spree) and he did not really pay attention to the exchanges with our four-legged house guest. The discovery was left to me, on the one occasion when I took Buster for his constitutional. As any dog-walker knows, every canine has his route and, as we stopped at Buster’s usual haunts, we were hailed with a loud and unmistakable, “Hi bastard, how are you? Come here!”

By the time I returned home, I was quite red in the face and it wasn’t from the exertion. Buster was promptly re-christened ‘Brownie’. His antecedents may not have been pedigreed, but he definitely had a mother and a father who were legal by canine standards and the earlier sobriquet certainly did not apply!

We do come across some unusual names from time to time – people striving for uniqueness for their offspring. According to a recent news item, the Hakki-Pikki people intentionally name their offspring after places and things: Gramophone, Train and Japan are not unusual. So, Paris (Hilton) and Chelsea (nee Clinton), though seemingly far removed, have something in common with a tribe from India!

Then there is the very tongue-in-cheek joke circling the Internet: asked to write his name in English, Sunder Lal Chhadda happily entered Lovely Red Knickers!

It is common for surnames to follow a profession or place and they have been handed down from generation to generation. But given names are chosen according to trends and tastes. Some, unfortunately, end up being an unintended encumbrance for the owner.

My mother chose my name for the Darling girl in Peter Pan. Little did she realise that others would rechristen me to connote a crazy, blustery lady’s finger!