Reply #22: I changed my own first name. It used to be Nancy [View All]

[pink-o]

But that name held no meaning for my parents--I was child number 2 and since they already had my sis, they were certain I would be a boy. They hadn't even picked out a girl's name--so when the doc handed my mother her 23 inch long, 6 pound newborn girl, she came up with Nancy at the spur of the moment. Nancy grew to be 6'1" tall by the time she was fourteen in 1969--duh! Like the signs weren't obvious. Nancy always thought the name belonged to someone petite and spunky, and she (I) had problems with girls' names that don't end with "A", hence the name is now Anja.

As for my last name, anyone who has it comes from the same Shtetl in Lithuania. There's a notorious stockbroker who has it--he's from Australia who got "Martha-d" for insider trading on Qantas stocks, so when I was just in Sydney I never had to spell my odd Jewish name. And it ends in --kin (Jeez, I'm givin it away!) but my grandfather stuck an "ess" on the end of our branch so it would sound more like "Hopkins" or "Perkins". Lots of people don't realize it's Jewish--at least not outside of Down Under!

So both names went thru the change machine. My middle name is hideously ugly--Ruth--and I've kept it for all my life. Go figure!