Monday, December 03, 2007

Thank God for Nick Names

I was talking to a friend of mine earlier. This friend hails from a very old, very hidden family of Spanish descent. Unlike other mestizos, though, he was what we would call in modern parlance 'jologs', a term which has come to mean kitschy or down to earth or in bad taste or cheap (all of these things and yet none of them-- it's hard to explain. I think nouveau riche isn't accurate at all, but it somehow connotes a misplaced ability to prioritize... or something). The conversation gradually drifted into the subject of names, but somehow he didn't like talking about it.

'What's wrong? Don't you like your name?'

'I do. I have enough saints in my name that they're probably fighting in heaven as to who should be my patron.'

'But don't you think it's good to have many patrons?'

'Sometimes I think I'd rather have just a few'.

'So just what the hell is your whole name?'

'Jose Miguel Alessandro Sebastian Carlo Maria de Aranzazu Felipe Francisco Javier Alfonso Martin Ignacio del Santisima Trinidad, Alzogaray y Acuna.'

'Oh.'

His nickname: Zazu, after the Virgin of Aranzazu.

2 comments:

Andrew said...

ROTFL... a long enough name for an English King. Perhaps I can pick up a few more names as well and let them fight it our in heaven on who's the UN-lucky one to have to be my patron.

Archistrategos said...

Hahaha, English kings ain't got nuthin' on Spaniards! LOL! Did you know that Picasso, though an atheist, was baptized 'Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Clito Ruiz y Picasso' ? You can pray a whole litany with that name.