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Award-winning columnist Tom Archdeacon — an old-school storyteller in a brand-new venue — writes about sports, the city, southwest Ohio and anything else that catches his fancy… or yours.Home > Blogs > Through the Arch > Archives > 2008 > August > 11
Monday, August 11, 2008
BLOG: A Name That Has A Ring — five of them — To It
BEIJING — By now, you must know just how over the moon the Chinese people are about the Olympic Games, their Olympic heros and the way these Games make them feel proud and special.
You saw that Sunday night in the China-USA men’s basketball game when Yao Ming — 7-foot-6 Yao Ming — promptly opened the game with a long three-pointer. The place went crazy — 18,000 people in the sold-out arena, 18,000 camera flashes. It was like that all night.
I have seen some variation of that at every venue and at various places all around the city, but the point really was brought home at the Opening Ceremonies Friday night when I heard about Hu Yilel and his six-year-old son Aoyan outside the Bird’s Nest.
A European photographer told me how had stumbled across the father taking a picture of his boy with the Olympic rings as a back drop and how he had been very proud to explain the significance of that moment.
Turns out Aoyan is short for Olympics Games. In 2001, soon after the Chinese won the bid to host the games, Hu and his wife learned they were going to have a child and wanted to connect the two glorious moments.
I’ve found out now the Hus weren’t the only people thinking this way. Not long ago Agence France-Presse reported 4,104 children have the name Aoyan. More than 90 percent of them are boys.
There are all kinds of other Olympics-related names that have ended up on kids as the Chinese people want to forever link themselves to a moment that truly resonates in their lives.
Yet I think my favorite name comes from Zimbabwe. I don’t know what life moment prompted this one, but one guy — according to The New York Times — named his son Never Trust a Woman.
Think the kid’s going to like that one when he turns 16?
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