Couple wants to name their baby '@'
Categories: Newborns, Pregnancy & Birth
Just when you thought 4Real was the weirdest baby name human beings could possibly conceive, today we learn that another couple is trying to name their child "@."
At first you'd probably think this was a pair of uber-nerds, trying to make some kind of statement about the infusion of technology and humanity (or something) -- but the name isn't quite as odd as it looks.
Not only does the world use the symbol everyday in sending e-mails, but, more importantly, the word "at" translates to "love him" in Mandarin -- which is actually kind of sweet.
No one knows yet whether or not government officials will accept the unique name, though odds are that @'s parents will have to come up with something else -- especially considering that Arabic numerals, foreign languages and other symbols that aren't found in Chinese languages were banned from names as of earlier this year.
I hope this catches on. I'd love to one day meet a person named +, or ?, or ! -- the possibilities are endless.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
caitlin 8-16-2007 @ 5:29PM
I wouldn't name my child after a symbol. I have an apostrophe in my surname, and it's a real pain in the ass to sign up for things online. More often than not, it's coded so that I always get back "Invalid Last Name. Please only use the characters A-Z". Or worse (and more common), the coder hasn't figured out how to properly escape the apostrophe, and you get back the default error message.
I imagine it'd be a million times worse trying to sign up for anything online if you only have symbols in your name. When people validate form data, I can almost guarantee "@" is not going to validate. If this goes through, this poor kid won't be able to do things online like shop at amazon, buy plane/train tickets, or apply for a credit card or bank account. He's probably also going to take a very long time to get through the same tasks in person, because most programs aren't set up to accept "@" as a valid first name and management + tech support will have to figure out how to get him in the system.
I wouldn't be surprised if he changes his name to the Chinese equivalent of "Chris" when he's old enough to have to deal with this :P.
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Danielle 8-17-2007 @ 6:57PM
I speak Mandarin, and can't for the life of me figure out how they get "love him" from "at." Who told them that?!?!
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nicolebarber 8-22-2007 @ 9:07AM
I thought we caused a family war when my husband wanted to name a son if we had one, Lucifer.
His mom was so rude about it he told her to get pregnant have her own kid and name it whatever she wanted. Thankfully we had a girl and named her Emmaleigh ( pronounced Emily)
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