We are all the same

Reuters reports that according to research done by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, most of the 1.3 billion people in China share only 1000 surnames. At least 100,000 people share the name “Wang Tao”, for example. The report states:

“Police in China, where most of the 1.3 billion people share just 100 surnames, are considering rules which would combine both parents’ family names to prevent so much duplication, state media said on Tuesday.

The report gave no details of the Public Security Ministry’s motives for seeking the change, but use of so few names by so many often sows confusion and must presumably hamper police work.”

My surname Ooi is very unusual and strange in the UK. There are probably only a handful of us in the phone books - and three of those would be me, my brother and sister. It’s difficult for Westerners to pronounce and they can never believe it when I spell it for them that it’s all vowels only. I’ve been variously called “Oi”/ “Oy”/ “Doi” and of course, double-oh-one.

But in Malaysia, it’s a fairly common name - and no doubt, it is pretty common in China, too. When my British friends have come to visit in Malaysia, they are always surprised to see Ooi all over the place.

The Chinese pictorial diagram for it is “yellow” so it’s the same surname as Wong or Wang or Whang and they are all pronounced differently because they are different dialects of Chinese.

So over in the West, I have the fantasy of thinking of myself as rather unique but I’m not really, of course!