Many people here have names that are obviously religious, either Christian or Muslim – Hassan, or Rebecca, or Jacob (Yakobo). Some children in our school include names that might have roots in the German colonial period or in the subsequent British one, like Winifrida, Frederika, Eunice (pronounced You-Nee-See), Sabrina, Agatha and Veronica. Then there are names which are English words that mean something good: for example, Honest, Sustenance, Fortunate, and even Good Luck. There are names which mean something good in Swahili, like Baracka (Blessings) or Amani (Peace).
This photo is of twins, Amina and Zulfa.
When Don introduced Thompson to grand rounds, everyone seemed to find it very amusing that his name was Thompson, but Don’s name wasn’t Thomas. One man explained to me the system of patronymics – for male children anyway, the father’s last name becomes the son’s middle name.
Our tour guide planner, Ray Mboya, told us an amusing story about his son, who just turned one this week. He said when they went to register the child’s name, they were told that they had to give him a Bible name. They had looked through the Bible for an unusual one and chose Reuel (it’s in Genesis 35, he was one of Esau’s sons), but the registrar didn’t believe them that it was in the Bible and so they had to give him the name Robert as his official name and put Reuel as his second name. Of course, Robert is NOT a Bible name at all, but it is such a common one that the registrar must have believed it was! Very funny.
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