pretty chinese name

[nazia]

hi. i'm open to suggestions for changing my chinese name (currently a very boring and meaningless NA JI YA, transliteration of my Arabic sounding real name) into something pretty, artistic, meaningful, even funny - just something interesting. Any ideas?

(A friend of mine chose Tan Chun from Hong Lou Meng and gets odd grins whenever she says her name - so perhaps nothing too cheesy)

[confucius]

牛妞

[Azumanga]

A friend of mine chose Tan Chun from Hong Lou Meng and gets odd grins whenever she says her name - so perhaps nothing too cheesy

It is a bit odd to use Tan4 chun1 as a name; It is just a little bit out of date--considering it was a name from hundreds of years ago. Plus, it is really a well known name since "Hong2 Lou2 Meng4" is a very famous book in China.

In ancient time, girls from high class wouldn't normally have their names ended with "Chun1", since it was supposed to be a popular name for prostitute at that time; I remember the author of Hong Lou Meng explains in his book why all the four daughters' names end with "Chun1". The eldest daughter was born on Chinese lunar year spring festival peroid, so her name was "元春" （yuan2 chun1）, then the following daughters just had to have 春 in their names as well.

I am not an expert in Hong Lou Meng, if my infomation is wrong, please please don't quote me.

[skylee]

春 can mean something else, which, if combined with the action 探, can be a fairly intriguing name ...

[yonglan]

Would you mind giving your full name and the meaning of your last name in whatever language it is from? Also, please tell us something about your personality and interests. All this can sometimes be helpful. Also, your gender.

[nazia]

hey thanks for the responses everyone.

It is a bit odd to use Tan4 chun1 as a name; It is just a little bit out of date--considering it was a name from hundreds of years ago

Yes, the friend and I referred to and I are actually doing the same Masters course in Chinese literature, which is one of the reasons why she chose the name, finding it romantic. Very interesting to know about the prostitute connection though - probably explains the grins!

Thanks Confucius. But what does it mean?

[yonglan]

Yonglan my full name is Nazia Hussain I'm afraid my last name has no *meaning* as such except indicating descent from a particular kind of Muslim clan (originally!). And I'm a girl, 23, who likes painting and calligraphy and peaceful places near water. Does that help?

Nazia, if you're working on a masters course in Chinese literature (at Oxford?) I'll let you pick your own name. I will share some thoughts, if you're interested.

1) Defintely get a 'real' Chinese name.

2) 胡 and 湖 are Chinese surnames that sound similar to the beginning of your surname. That's one way to start. [Edit: 湖 is not a modern surname.]

3) You could pick the surname of your favorite painter or calligrapher.

4) For your given name, look through the dictionary for some characters with meanings that speak to you. If you want to match sounds to your given name, fine, though my experience is that that's generally more difficult if one wants a real Chinese name.

5) Run your choice by a few native speakers. I once came up with the following given name: 忠風. When I asked a Taiwanese friend she said no way, because even though 忠 is first tone it sounded to her too much like 中風, even though 中 is fourth tone there. I thought of 默川 for you, but I don't know if 默 refers _only_ to a sort of non-speaking silence. All the words under it in the dictionary suggest that may be the case. But I don't know. A native speaker will have an intuitive sense for this sort of thing. There may be another problem with that name for all I know. Think of all the times you've seen some Chinese company or government advertisement or information translated into Singlish and thought, "Why didn't they just ask a native speaker to look at that first?"

6) The last character of the name should generally be first or second tone. Just sounds better to Chinese ears I'm told.

7) Don't pick a 市場名字. None of my Chinese friends who have one like theirs. There are thousands of common characters with positive or neutral meanings that you can choose from. Have fun with it!

Good luck

[confucius]

It means "Cow girl"

The first "Niu" is a surname in China and is also the first character for Oxford University's Chinese name. The second "Niu" means "girl"

I suppose one could also translate it as "Oxford Girl", nevertheless "Niu Niu" is a pretty, funny, and meaningful name that your Chinese friends will never forget.

[Quest]

Calling a grown girl 妞妞 (niu niu) could be offensive.

Some characters you could consider:

姬 ji1 -- beauty

姿 zi1 -- 姿色 zise, feminine beauty

雅 ya3 -- elegant

嫣 yan1 -- pretty looking

[amperel]

Na ~ 娜

zi ~ 紫 (purple), 芝, 芷, 緻 (fine, delicate)

a ~ 雅 (refined, elegant)

Hu ~ 胡 (common chinese surname)

s ~ 思 (think/contemplate), 斯, 絲 (silk), 石 (stone, or another common surname)

sa ~ 灑, 塞

in ~ 英 (petal/hero), 音 (sound/music), 瑩, 瓔, 鶯 (bird), 櫻

some combinations:

胡 芝雅

胡 緻雅

胡 娜

胡 瓔

胡 紫音

......

[confucius]

胡 娜? Don't take this one unless you have a real strong two-handed backhand!

Hu Na is a famous Chinese tennis player who changed her name to Na Hu after emigrating to San Diego. The last time I saw her she was doing tennis commentary in Asia on Star Sports cable network.

[LiYuanXi]

How about 湖月? Sounds romantic to me.

[againstwind]

i looked up one of the most authoritative dictionary 《辞海》(上海：上海辞书出版社，1988年）,the character 湖 is not a surname.

in China ,the surmane Hussain is translated into “侯塞因”.so ,i think for surname ,you have another choice ——侯.there are many famous person whose surmane is 侯 in China,such as historian 侯外庐，chemist 侯德榜，cross talk artist侯宝林.

BTW,“默川”is a nice name.

[yonglan]

i looked up one of the most authoritative dictionary 《辞海》,the character 湖 is not a surname.

Thanks for your input. According to 《正中形音義綜合大字典》, also one of the most authoritative dictionaries, it is a surname. Also, 《 中文百科大辭典》(旺文社出版) says it is. At the same time, two other Chinese dictionaries I have, including a one volume 辭海, don't list it as being a surname. It is also not in 《百家姓》. Unfortunately, none of my Chinese dictionaries are ordered by pinyin (all by radical), so in looking for a surname for Nazia (wanting to match the sound) I grabbed the pinyin ordered Chinese-English dictionary that sits by the computer (sitting there ironically because I don't like it and so only use it for quick look up of characters when typing) which said it was a surname.

5) Run your choice by a few native speakers.

So I'll defer to you . I guess it must be a long out of use surname?

[skylee]

my full name is Nazia Hussain I'm afraid my last name has no *meaning* as such except indicating descent from a particular kind of Muslim clan (originally!).

Well then perhaps consider dropping Hussain all together and adopting 寧馨兒/宁馨儿 (níngxīn'ér) for Nazia. As to the meaning -

寧馨 [ning2xing1'], adj., such a: 寧馨兒 such a pretty and lovely child.

BTW, there is a beautiful actress called 寧靜.

[skylee]

nazia, please tell us which Chinese name you will use.

[林彪]

It would be nice if we knew how to pronounce "Nazia Hussein".

My recommendation is 何娜芝. Although you shouldn't really trust me, since I'm not a native speaker.

[Asami]

i don't like any of those...

ur original name is just fine..

most of the words listed here tend are used repeatly by a lot of ppl..

i like to be unique..lol: P

[hifrank001]

NA JI YA is not a good name becasue it remind me a famouse brand of cell phone, "诺基亚 NOKIA" (NOU JI YA)。

"侯" is not the best surname for you neither; from my experience, there was no one good name with surname "侯" for a girl and, personnally, it always remind me the character "猴" for their same prononciation.

if NAZIA has some special meaning in your mother tongue, you could find a counterpart in Chinese.

In my case, (BTW, i am a native Chinese), “傅”is my surname, which means "the emperor's teacher", so my India surname is "GURU", given by my Indis friend.

If you make your decision finally, please tell us.

[jsku]

I like 林彪's suggestion......何娜芝 is a good name for a female and phonetically close to Nazia's real name.