What's in a name? Ask Gothi!

Whats in a name anyway? Random letters put together to give an identity to your existence. Quite often, these very random letters make you want to jump out of your existence, or end the existence of another.

Puzzled? Let me tell you what I'm talking about. My name is Priyanka Gothi.

And basis seasons, times of the day or mood swings of people, I'm called Gothi, Goths, Gothu, Gothax, Gothamma, Gothika, Goat, Goatee, Ghoti, Godhi, Guthhi.

Ans there are those who love to give their priceless two gold coins worth of comments on the names of others. For instance, the rare few who chose to call me Priyanka, hardly ever fail to remark, "Oh.. Priyanka, as in Priyanka Gandhi? Or is it Priyanka Chopra you like?.. Hehehe" .. Well.. hehe.. I just laughed my Gut(hi)s out on that one.. :)

And there are those who are ready with a critique on your name,. I met a gentleman in a train once, we were exchanging regular pleasantries when he asked my name and as i soon as I uttered it, he went "chhheeeeee, itna old-fashioned naam? main to kabhi apni beti ka naam yeh nahi rakhoonga, baad me mujhe kosegi aur bolegi kya bekaar naam rakh diya!!"
Well...

No one in my family ever really got used to being called Gothi, My aunt, when she was getting married was escatic about that fact that "I'm not going to be a Gothi anymore!!" Its another thing she became a Ran-a-de soon after :)

Another issue, we (and here I speak about the entire community of wierd-namees) face is that everyone in the house, would be called the same. My grandfather and grandmother are Mr and Mrs. Gothi, my father is called Dr. Gothi, My mom, Ma'am Gothi and my sister and myself .. just Gothi!
I found this is the case with many such unfortunate souls as myself.
We had a friend in college called Abheishek Chatterjee, popularly known as Chatty, people would call his home and ask his mom who picked up "Aunty, Chatty se bata kar sakte hain?" Aunty would say, "Beta, is ghar me 5 Chatty hain.. kisske baat karni hai?" :)

But there are positives to even names like ours... for one, it's really easy to spot people..

Looking for your name in the rail reservation list? Luck be with you if you are a Sharma, Verma, Gupta or Jain.. you'll be looking up and down for hours and still not be able to find yourself. Gothi, on the other hand, is right there.. the lone warrior, the one of its kind, almost jumping out of the sheet so that you can spot it. Sure, it may be spelt as a Ghoti, Goti or Gati, it still catches you eye, which is the purpose of the whole activity in the end, isn't it?

Well, sometimes I think I'm lucky to just have Gothi and nothing more terrifying. I knew a family in Bombay with a last name of "Galakaatu", apparently some ancestor at some point of time had cut someone's throat, so they called themselves Galakaatu to pay penance for life! Phew!

I'd rather not even be a Tyrewala, Flatswala or Treasurywala. Makes people judge you a lot I believe. We had a Kelawala in our college, his birthdays were a nightmare as he was quite unimaginatively showered with bananas, banana chips, banana milkshakes despite his futile protests. :)

Names it seems strengthen personalities rather than identities. I remember a girl in school who was called Honey, who started calling herself Aishwarya after the 1994 Ms. World contest :)

So what's in name again? A lot has to do with our own prejudices I guess.

Quick questions to test this:

What would sound better as an industrialist's name?
Raj Singhania or BrijMohan Chaturvedi? :)

Who would sound more credible as a doctor?
Ashish Upadhyaya or P.K Girpade?

Who would sound more sturdy as an army man?
Colonel Ranbeer Singh or Colonel Roomi Tyrewala

Who would you believe more as a teacher?
Malathi Balasubramaniam or Pammi Khanna

Which would sound more like an actor's name?
Rajiv Bhatia or Akshay Kumar
Haribhai Patel or Sanjeev Kumar
Yousaf Khan or Dilip Kumar
Amitabh Shrivastav or Amitabh bachhan? Haiiin??

So there's nothing in a name eh, Mr. Shakespeare? You should have known better!! :)