Episode Details

“Our names are the stories we carry into the world.”

“名字，是我们带入世界的故事。”

My Chinese name is Li Zi-Jin (李姿锦), and my father said he personally chose it for me. Li is an extremely common surname—you can find people with the same family name everywhere in Taiwan. Yet, as a child, I felt different because of this name, since the great Tang dynasty poet Li Bai also carried the surname Li. That connection gave me an extra sense of pride and belonging. As for Zi (姿), my father chose this character because it contains both “second” (次) and “woman” (女), symbolizing that I am his second daughter. The last character, Jin (锦), is made up of “gold” (金) and “silk” (帛), representing his wishes for me to have a rich and beautiful life. As a little girl, I often felt that my name carried a mission—that my father’s hopes and expectations were all packed into those thirty-two brushstrokes.

我的中文名字是李姿锦，爸爸说这是他亲自为我取的。李是一个极其普遍的姓氏，在台湾到处都能遇到同姓的人。然而，小时候的我却因为唐代大诗人李白也姓李，而觉得自己与众不同。这样的联想，让我对这个姓氏多了一份骄傲与归属感。至于“姿”，爸爸选这个字，是因为它的结构里有“次”和“女”，象征我是他的第二个女儿。而“锦”由“金”与“帛”组成，代表他对我的期待——希望我能拥有富足而美好的生活。小时候的我常觉得，名字就像一个使命，爸爸的心愿和期待全都压在这三十二划里。

When I was in elementary school, my name became the subject of jokes among classmates. They loved to mimic the sound of “Li Zi Jin” saying it sounded like “ni zi ji” (“yourself” in Mandarin). Outwardly, I laughed along, but inside I felt embarrassed. What’s more, the last character of my name, Jin, was often misread as Mian (It means cotton in Chinese). Eventually, to avoid awkwardness, I let some teachers or strangers call me “Zi-Mian” instead. Looking back, those jokes were probably harmless, but they did plant a seed in me about the connection between names and identity.

小学时期，我的名字常成为同学的玩笑。他们喜欢模仿“李姿锦”的发音，说听起来像“你自己”。表面上我会跟着笑，心里却觉得尴尬。特别是名字最后一个字“锦”，常常被误读成“绵”。后来，为了避免尴尬，我干脆让一些老师或陌生人叫我“姿绵”。现在回头看，那些玩笑或许没有恶意，但确实让我开始思考名字与身份的关联。

In the fifth grade, I got my first nickname—“Spider.” Back then, it was trendy in class to change the last character of someone’s name to “Pig.”(猪） So Zi-Zhu (姿猪) became “Spider” (蜘蛛). My good friend Yashi even designed a spider logo for me: an oval with a smiling face, a bow on its head, and eight little legs. That time of my life was filled with pure joy. We always signed each other’s cards with this little spider, as if it was a secret code and a symbol of our friendship.

五年级时，我有了第一个绰号——“蜘蛛”。当时班上流行把名字最后一个字改成“猪”，于是“姿猪”就变成了“蜘蛛”。我的好友雅诗甚至帮我设计了一个蜘蛛签名：一个椭圆里画着笑脸，头上戴着蝴蝶结，还有八只脚。那段日子充满了单纯快乐，我们总会在彼此的卡片上画上这只小蜘蛛，就像是一种友情的暗号和象征。

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