americans have this habit of shortening the names and most of us desi students fell prey to it. in a way, we took it as we being counted among them, without discrimination. that was the initial feeling then.

so, we had pat for pralhad patnik, and harry for harkisandas, and jeff for janardan, and dora for doraiswamy, etc.

but we desis had fun with reverse name change too – desification !

for us, dr harrold (harry) stag was “hari haran”, dr pearl buck was “moti haran” (hindi haran or hiran for deer, stag or buck), prof natalie (nat) warwick was “natwarlal”, prof chad porter was “chandu hamaal”, dr venus rights was “chandani chawk”. the most popular were : prof edward (ted) cotts = “palang tod” and barbara bush = “junglee ped” (ped in hindi for tree/bush).

then we also wondered : if short for charles (or charly) was ‘chuck’ and for marlon (or marley) was ‘muck’, then why for fallon (or philis) is it “fay” .....obnoxious thought ! i leave it at that.

must share another hilarious bit. it was our first day of the new semester and the 1st class of the course. in walks a chinese professor. we had heard about his intelligence and acrid sense of humor. he introduced himself, “i am heinze yu .. dr heinze chiang yu”.

then with a short pause and a mischievous grin he says, “you may call me "prof yu" or "dr yu" or "dr heinze" .. but never ever dare call me “he yu” (hey you) even if you like shortening my name!” ...loud burst of laughter in the class

while working in chicago, i had 3 desi colleagues, 2 of them gujju. there was a jovial american guy in the office called joe. his real name was graham.

once after office, 4 of us desis were in a bar when joe came in. one of the gujjus saw him walk in. he turns to the other, points at him and says, “jo jo .. joe” (see, see, joe there). it sounded so funny, we all roared with laughter. joe heard and saw us. he smiled and came over and joined us.

then we told him the cause of our laughter .. and he says, “actually that’s me. my full name is joseph graham george. joe is a short nickname for graham and also for joseph and also for george” .. so he really was “joe joe joe”!

any guesses for the real name of “kshama shanti”?