What's in a name ?

Ankur Khare, Bangalore

“What's in a name...” Wrote Shakespeare and wrote his name below it.

Names are a unique thing and you just seem to relate to a person by that name. Sometimes you even make a character sketch based on the name. At least I do and presume that others also do though the sketch may differ based on their personal experiences.

But names have been so confusing that it's about time I stop making a character sketch (CS) using a name. One of the names I used for my first CS was Ram. I had seen Ramayana like everyone else in my age group those days on television. That helped me make an image of the name. I always thought of people with name Ram as the one with characteristics of Lord Ram. Till one day one of the friends named Ram hit me with a missile stone and all my perceptions changed. I couldn't imagine myself being Ravana and the missle being a Brahmastra.

The moment you hear someone's name as Amitabh you imagine him to be a tall personality with a thundering voice and yet a polite person, until you meet Amitabh Singh of Chhatarpur who is 5 ft and has a feeble voice ala Sachin Tendulkar. That brings me to another CS. Sachin...A great cricketer. At least the person with this name should have something to do with cricket. But no, Sachin Gupta dint even know there are 6 balls in an over. The funnier part is I had made a CS of my name as well, till I met my namesake (nemesis) who spoilt my belief about the name Ankur.

The most ample opportunities I had for making a character sketch was for the name Rajneesh. Well I had a classmate, three college mates, and one office friend by this name. Not that I am telling anything new here but all of them were completely different from each other .Yet I have a CS even for this name. Next time I meet a sixth Rajneesh I will be ready with an image in my mind for that person as well. And I can tell you that image will do anything but resemble Acharya Rajneesh Osho. That's how our system works. Again I take the privilege of being a writer and making pretty much generalized statements and using the word ‘our’ systems.

I have this friend named Ashraf on whose blog I write all this crap. I presume those reading this would have an image or CS of him. So whenever I see any terrorist in the news with a name as Ashraful or Ashraf, I start looking for a researcher-cum-poet and a great friend in his eyes. Though I also sometimes wonder how many people search a terrorist in ‘our’ Ashraf's eyes. Ask the American embassy who rejected his visa. I, therefore, always tell him “Tera to Sirf Naam hi Kaafi Hai...”