I go through 5 seconds of panic every time I go to Starbucks, precisely when the staff ask me, “What’s your name?”
Hell no. I’m not telling you my real name.
You wouldn’t have the time to go to HowToPronounce.com. Plus, I don’t want to waste other people’s time. The least thing I want to deal with before getting my morning coffee, is someone in front of me giving Starbucks staff a Mandarin lesson.
I had to come up with a strategy. I needed a Starbucks name.
Once you made peace with that reality, it actually became quite liberating. Some days I can be “Amy”, some days “Emma” or once in a while, something fancy, like “Hermione.”
But after missing the staff calling my “name” a few times, I decided to stick to an official Starbucks name. So now it’s official. At Starbucks. I’m Claire.
Why “Claire” is another story. The real question is, why do they ask?
I never had to go through that in China. When I go to the bank, I’m customer №X. When I go on a trip with my family and we join a tourist group, we’re family №X. Even when I was in high school, I had a designated number, №11. (My first boyfriend was №25 and I remember my classmates would make fun of us whenever they see 1125 in Math class. High school was fun.)
But in the US, the struggle is real. Not just Starbucks. Whenever I call a service hotline, like AT&T or Verizon, the conversation always starts the same way:
“Who do I have the pleasure of speaking with? ”
“Ughhh…. my name is Siyi.”
[Short pause. Trying to sound as friendly as possible]“How can I help you today, MISS?”
I wish I have something deep to say about the culture differences.
Collectivism has reduced individuals to just numbers in China, with no character, no personality? And in contrary, there’s more personal care in the American culture?
Maybe. But if you think about names, Chinese names are so much more colorful than English names, in my opinion. (A colleague told me earlier today that he asked Siri to think of a name for his daughter. Take a wild guess, he’s American.)
What I mean is, while there might be 2 Jimmys or 3 Emilys in an American classroom, in China, almost every name is different. Each has a unique meaning. My name means “rational + persistent.” Two characters, SI and YI, each translating to one word.
In a way, giving your child a name is like writing a poem. You can mix whatever words you want together to create new meanings. There’s endless combinations.
However, unfortunately my name doesn’t give me any advantage in the US. I get a little self-conscious when my name stands out in a list, almost as if it’s screaming, “This person is not American!”
Does that affect how people look at me? Isn’t there stories about some Asian American actresses having to change their Asian names to get better gigs?
So maybe it makes sense to have an English name. Otherwise why did English teachers in China keep giving you one? I collected so many English names like collecting Pokemons. In elementary school, I was Susan. In high school, Lucy, then Sharon, and college, Claire. (Now you know where my Starbucks name is from. )
And during my first trip in the US, I did introduce myself with my English name, for the most part. Until a lot of people started asking me, “So, what’s your real name?”
Now, after studying and living in the US for 3 years, I’m getting more and more comfortable with using my real name and the guilty pleasure of listening to people trying.
That said, I don’t think I’m ever gonna change my Starbucks name. Because it offered me something else: this quintessential American experience of Starbucks staff misspelling your name.
Now I get to boast that on my social media too.
This blog is published with permission from Siyi Chen. To view more blogs by Siyi, just click here.