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Part-2

The first week was at the usual best,exploring the places around the university. I also did my passport verification by that time. And here again, I had my name in my I-94 differ from my passport( the same usual FNU stuff-refer earlier post for more details) and I was asked to rush to the nearest Immigration office at the earliest. I later realized from the immigration office that this problem existed with almost all the South-Indian students heading to US for Masters. The officer was kind enough to hurl abuses at people with name like mine, and I was kind enough to hear everything she got to say. I could do nothing since, she had my passpost . Somehow, I was happier by the fact that I was not the only fish caught in the net and I also later realized there were a dozen people in my university who had the same problem. There is in-fact an International Advisor at the university who specializes in these kind of “FNU” problems . Yay!

All said and done, It looks like the tag “FNU” is bound to follow me throughout my stay at US. My way through this will  be possible only when I change my name in my passport(when my passport expires, which is highly improbable at the moment) or when I get back to India for a visit(which is not possible in the near future). The advisor was kind enough to issue letter asking anybody concerned not to include FNU anywhere, though my official records will carry the tag.

But a matter that gives me a great comfort- All the people here can pronounce my name properly and FNU is just an extra bit that tags along with my name. So, unlike the Chinese/Korean/Japanese, I don’t need to name my self with an English name.I am any day Ravi Nitin Balajee where as a guy named Xing Yo Zang( no offence, I dont know anybody with that name in USC and if so,its purely co-incidental) will call himself some Roger or Martin or Joseph just because people cannot spell his name .  But I don’t think Indians are far away from this “pronounce-my-name-properly” syndrome. Probably I was lucky enough.

A sample of names of my fellow Indian friends and their pronunciation as done in US-

Archana is pronounced as Or-kan-aaa

Ranjini is pronounced as Ran-genie (‘ran’ as in “she ran away with a  genie “)

Prasanna is pronounced as Pra-san-ha

Venkatesh is pronounced as When-cut-yesh

Subramaniyam is pronounced  as Soob-raa-maan-eeee-yam

and the list goes on..

(All the names above are not co-incidental and is meant to be done on purpose )

But,its pure fun here to watch the Americans pronounce the Indian/Chinese names

Life’s good with these comedies around.

More to be continued later!

Cheers

RNB

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