大家好！My name is Mathew L, and I'm a senior at Syracuse University planning on (a) somehow, someway making a career out of this China infatuation I have, and (b) spending the next few years, prior to grad school, in China.

Which brings me to my dilemma -- I was never given a Chinese name by one of my 中文老师, so I sought the aid of my Chinese history professor, an American. Mathew meaning "gift from god" the name he gave me, in endeavoring to retain some semblance of both meaning and pronunciation was:

吕萌天 （Lǚ Méngtian） -- which I was told translates to 'sprout of heaven'.

I've since run the name by a few Chinese people and their reactions to it have been underwhelming. The first, my current Chinese language teacher, wanted me to drop the 天； she felt that 萌 and 天 made no sense together, one being about plants the other being about sky. The second person told me the name struck him as a girl's name at first glance. So this was worrying.

Anyways, sorry this post is so lengthy -- I'm hoping you all, and particularly the native Chinese among us, will be able to give me some feedback on the original name -- does it make sense? does it sound alright? does it give off an effeminate vibe?

谢谢你们，

Matt~

Hi everybody

As many of you surely know many of the countries when translated into Chinese are based on how it sounds when pronounced in English or the country's language. That's why England get's the name 英国 and America 美国 .Usually the characters are not meant in their original meaning but are only there to fit the sound. So the 美 doesn't necessarily mean beautiful 美国.

I, however, am from Switzerland and just like we have a special treatment for banks and political status, we seem to get special treatment with the Chinese word for Switzerland: 瑞士 (rui4 shi4). To me that pronounciation doesn't fit the pronounciation to Switzerland in any of the languages that might make sense (English, German, French, Italian...).

Does anyone else know of countries where the Chinese doesn't appear to make much sense, i.e. come from the pronounciation? And, maybe even more importantly, does anyone know where the pronounciation DOES come from?

David

Okay, so to go along with my gradual emergence from lurkerdome I figured I should have a somewhat cleverer screen name than my own name minus the spacing and capitalization.

So I'm going with the name that was given to me by an (American) friend I had in China. I was pleasantly surprised to find that I could change my username here without any hassle. So 长臂猿 (cháng bèi yuán) it is.

However when looking up that pinyin above on my much-loved Chinese annotation tool, I saw that 臂 came up as bèi rather than its usual bì. Can anyone confirm whether that is correct? Did the aforementioned friend christen me with a name he never pronounced correctly?

Incidentally, the name translates to "gibbon" which is close to my English surname.

    Here in the west (well, in Canada anyway) we tend to use organs and numbers for the location of acupuncture points.  When I began learning acupuncture points this was imensly helpful.  Bladder (BL) 11 is 1.5 cun lateral to the lower border of the first thoracic vertebra.  All I had to do was remember the pattern BL 11 -T1, BL 12-T2, etc. until T-8 then skip one until BL 30.  All the points from BL11-30 are 1.5 cun lateral to the midline.  Simple enough.

    But the name of the "Bladder meridian is 足太阳膀胱经 (zu2 tai4 yang2 pang2 guang1 jing1) Foot TaiYang Urinary Bladder Channel.  The other Taiyang Channel is 手太阳小肠经 (shou3 tai4 yang2 xiao3 chang2 jing1) Hand Taiyang Small Intestine Channel.  By learning the names of the channels it was revealed to me that these two are the same channel (太阳) and that the Small intestine and the Urinary Bladder have to "communicate" with each other.  One is associated with 火 (huo3, fire) and therefore 阳 (yang2) and the other with 水 (shui3, water) and therefore 阴 (yin1).  So a problem in one may result in a problem with the other.  And if I hadn't learned the names, I would still be thinking that the main relationship with the Bladder is the Kidney.

    And as for the acupuncture point names, BL 11 大杼 (da4zhu4) usually translated as "great shuttle", but I'm not sure yet what the name signifies or hints at.

    Also, if I learn the names of the acupuncture points, then I can communicate with TCM doctors that speak mandarin and I'll also be able to read medical texts from China.

    So, do you think that by learning the number system we a destroying part of the medicine?

I have a role as an internet activist and I get quoted in the press a bit recently, but this is the first time I've come across my name in an article in Chinese. It was in the illustrious Epoch Times (presumably not accessible from the mainland) - http://is.gd/iiaL .

I was very interested to see my name rendered - 杰考布 for 'Jacobs':

澳洲电子前沿基金会副主席杰考布.....

(The article is about the Australian government's plan to censor the internet, which my organisation, EFA, opposes.)

I like the choice, obviously, since 杰 has a meaning of hero, but don't take it too personally. I assume this is a standard. Is there some list Chinese journalists can consult to find the most appropriate transliterations of Western names?