“Is that your real name?” Anyone with an unusual name will get that A LOT, and partially why I do not quite enjoy introductions.
While ‘Winky’ isn’t technically my legal name on government documents, it is the name used throughout my school and work so technically yes, it is my real name.
So how does one come up with a name that sounds like an emoji you may ask and rhymes with ‘Stinky’ and ‘Kinky’— not exactly something most parents would want their kid to be associated with.
Well, the catch is — my parents didn’t name me — I did.
You see, immigrating to Canada, my parents thought to themselves, what better way for a child to be well integrated into western society than to have an English name.
Without knowing much of the language though, they asked input from my cousins who the only introduction to English names for them, was the Teletubbies, which I, as a 3 year old, watched every weekend. So my teenage cousins presumed to ask me, a toddler, which out of the four Teletubbies I liked the most, and I pointed to the purple one. Its name was — you guessed it — Tinky Winky — so my parents agreed that Winky suited me well (at least they didn’t choose Tinky!).
Now, I have to give myself credit because out of the four Teletubbies, I chose the best one. The red one is called Po which is one letter away from it sounding like feces, the green one is called Dipsy which would’ve gotten me tipsy jokes every time I drank, and the yellow one is Laa-Laa which is merely just a sound.
Also, Winky is also not an unusual name in China as there is a famous actress named Wen Qi who sounded similar. You may find this to be the pattern with a lot of English names of immigrants children where they are named a similar sounding word to their Chinese name that may sound normal in the language (like Apple) but may come off a tad bit unusual in English.
It is just rather sometimes embarassing to be associated with a kid sounding name. Sometimes I still have moments where I cringe when people call me. I’ve tried to change it multiple times but ultimately, it doesn’t sound right. I sort of embraced how unique it is and at least I will be memorable in people’s minds.
