My Nickname(s) Story….

Sometimes, it is amazing to see how a name can be nicknamed to all sorts of names. Since I too have a lot of nicknames, I thought maybe it’s a good idea to write them into a blog. So, without further delay, I’ll just relate them to you in a story.

On the 22nd of December 1983, I was accidentally given the name Abraham Moses. I myself had a hard time pronouncing my name when I was young…. And because of that I accidentally made my own first nickname. How did it happen? Well, when I was a toddler my mom starts calling me by my name – which I’m still not aware of. Whenever she calls my name, I would give her a half confuse and half smile look….. ( I wonder how did I do that…?) . So when she could not get my attention, she would hold my arms and tell me, “ Abraham….follow mummy say Abraham…..” Then my face would be like “is it time for milk…?” and answered “ Yam… Yam…”. Since then, everyone in my family including my maternal relatives calls me “ Yamyam”. ( Damn…. I miss my mom’s Cook Home Rice - Translate that in cantonese). The nick yamyam was slowly transformed to yam, tomyam, Ayam, yang yang from the mouths of my maternal cousins.

However, my dad did not call me by that nick. I guess he thinks its gay and he wanted to instill some manliness into my growing being. So he called me “boy” instead. This nick was given to me when I started to had a Japanese-look-a-like-when-she-was-a-baby sister. This was to enable him to call the right child without messing with their names. (Pa, just kidding la….haha). As for my paternal relatives, they call me “boboy”, most probably that nick was influenced from my dad’s given nick.

So as I grew up, I get to understand the significance of my name. Where ever I go and whenever I say my name, people around me would say great people about this name. Among the malays, they say my name is nama nabi ( if my friend hear this, she might think of different thing. Eg: Midvalley --> KimGary or “ Three of my Friends cancel already" --> “ Three of your friends got Cancer already ?!!!! ( hehe… sorry lo… =P ) In English, we call them Prophet names. The name Abraham is famous for his faith to God while Moses was the man who wrote the ten commandments and also the one who stick his tongkat into earth and separated the sea into half in order to create an escaping route for the Hebrews to salvation. Some… would call me Abraham Lincoln – the President of the United States. I like one of the statement saying, “ with Great power, Comes with Great Responsibility…” ( Cho to Ma te ….! Isn’t that from Spiderman ???? Wth….)

As I realize these names were famous and noble among the people who bear it, I then thought of somehow “creating” one myself. So, wherever I go when people ask me my name, I would always try to pronounce it the right way. However, this was problematic for my Chinese primary school mates. You know how common Chinese names are structured into 3 words or characters ( Starts with a Surname and followed by 3 characters). So, in order to join the pack and avoid being a total outcast; my name was chop into 3 words too… Ah Ba Ham ! ( Believe it or not, that nick still stays alive until now…) . Others… were like Ah Bla ham , Ah be Ra ham and etc. Well, can’t blame them as our English at that time was still not up to that level yet. When I was in high school, they started to go funny and really short with my name like Ah ham, bra bra ( What the…), Ham lou, Ham ye, Ham kor, Ham….. Luckily I was immune of this as I already had enough “training”. During my university studies, my nick was more of a masculine nick. Instead of having my friends calling me Abraham, I ask them to call me Abs – even though I didn’t really got my 6 packs yet. Some even call me “King” ( I got this nick when I did some comedy act during 1 of my induction… Damn proud that time for my Stephen chow’s inspirational acting skill….). As for during sports like football, guys back in the university would call me Nakata …… ( bangga nih…)

There’s this girl who gets creative with my nickname when I played with her “mood”. I started with some mild “pokes” to her mood…. Initially, she responded back by calling me ApaHam or Mr.A and she didn’t even bother to care after that; I assumed that her friends use to do the same and probably because of that she somehow got immune to such pokes. Then, I gradually increase the “pokeness” just to get her attention. When she felt she was challenged, she started to retaliate and nicknamed me Hamburger Hamishu, Hamster and bla bla ham. But, once she ate the bait ( which means she started to be moody) ….HAhaahaha…. My Nickname was never-ending…. Here, I present to you Hamkor’s Top 10 Nickname…
1.) Bra bra Ham = i wonder if that’s posible for me…. Hehe…
2.) See Ham = Only can call this when u see me...otherwise, u have to say SeeNoHam !
3.) Ham dan qiu yan = Salted Egg Superman. Wonder why the chinese like weird heroes…?
4.) Ham Chim Peng = Some Chinese delicacy. Can find it on the net du…..
5.) Ham Sam Seng = Confucious say, “ you go to jail , Bad boy !”
6.) Ham Mani Home = She even made some voodoo spell from my name….?
7. ) Ham Sap Ham = I am….
8.) Ham be lang = ham with stripes…..
9.) Ma – Har – Ba = My name spelt from behind… she really got me….
10.) Ham Ka Chan !!!!! = Hahaha…. Guess she’s Moody Hot !