What's in a name?

There are some (read Shakespeare and Co) who say "What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet". And then there are some who'd say that a name reflects a lot on one's personality. I personally belong to the secod category, and Boy, am I glad of that. For a long time now, I've been making a collection of funny Indian names. At least, they sound funny to me. Luckily, I've the good fortune to be associated with the District of Kanyakumari, Tamil Nadu, by marriage. And some of the treasures in my collection are from there.

Here's a partial list. Note that I am not even venturing into the realm of the traditional South Indian names like Murugavalli and Bommiraju Sitaramanjaneyula Rajasekhara Srinivasula Laxminarayana Siva Venkata Sai. At least they mean something.

Note: These are NOT cooked up names. I know most of these people personally. There are a couple of names here whose owners are known personally to people I know personally.

1. Renju----------------------My cousin
2. Ninini----------------------Renju's classmate
3. Ziggy
4. Pepa----------------------Ziggy's sister
5. Beutrus Muscarin--------One of the KK treasures
7. Gemma Galgani------------A fairly normal name for a Sindhi. But funny, when you take into consideration that she's a Mallu with no other Galgani in the family tree.
8. Bubble---------------------Try imagining him (yeah...it's a 'He') in a formal situation. "And Mr. Bubble...What do you have for the Board today?"
9. Sunny Deval----------------His mother used to work at our home. A big-time movie buff.
10. Bobby Krishna-------------Talk about communal harmony.

And the best of them all

11. Thankaprema@Aravind----- Futuristic parents. I lay awake at night thinking how they were able to predict the internet revolution and the e-mailing culture when they named their daughter in the early 1980's.

ps: No offence meant to anybody in the above list. How boring life would have been without the variety of names we have.