Tuesday, June 11, 2013

What's In A Name?

Since the first hours that I was in South Africa, there has been something about me that has been of particular interest, and even peculiarity, to those I come across.  ...No, it is not that I am one of the few blonde, pale-as-can-be girls that you can find around here...  It is my name.

Since we are in winter here in South Africa, my Providence College fleece courtesy of the Admissions Office has been a frequent accessory of mine, and it happens to have my name embroidered on it.  In OR Tambo International Airport on our way to Maritzburg, I went to buy a bottle of water and the woman who sold it to me, a lovely woman, looked at it and said "Amanda? Is that your name? And they put it on your shirt? How nice!"  I told her yes and thank you, thrilled at how personable and kind she was, and walked away very interested that it must not be common to have your name on your shirt here.

Well, it turned out it was much more than embroidery that they were interested in.  I have been asked numerous times "Your name is really Amanda?".  A couple of people have even asked me if Amanda was a Zulu name.  I also noticed many town signs and names resembled mine, like Ayanda or Amina for example.  Yesterday, after a woman asked me if this was really my name and then laughed, I just had to find out if it meant something.  Hoping that it did not mean something terrible here, I asked Philisiwe and Lois at our lunch break at work.  It turns out that Amanda is a common Zulu name, or at the very least it strongly resembles common Zulu names, a name that might be passed on from generation to generation.  It is not the name that was funny, it was that it was mine.  I know Amanda to be Latin for "worthy of love," but they know it as a Zulu name, and therefore it is simply bizarre that this foreign girl from America has it.

I have really come to like this happy coincidence.  Although I am clearly not Zulu, I really like having something in common with these wonderful people, even having something that causes them to take extra interest in me or feel a little more comfortable with me.  I want nothing more than to really get to know the people I meet here, and so this common thread is something that makes me feel a little more connected to them.  They learn my name quickly because it is familiar.  It's just something that makes me feel a little closer to this wonderful community of people that I have been blessed to have gotten to know and work with...if that makes sense. :)

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