No, it's not her first name

In Chinese 名字 (Míngzì) means "name".  The name of my Chinese girlfriend is 陈妍洁. The three Chinese characters in the name are 陈 (Chén), 妍(yán) and  洁(jié). You can hear how the name is pronounced by clicking this link to Google Translate and clicking then "listen"-button on the left pane. 陈 (Chén) forms the first short part of the name and 妍洁 (yánjié) forms second longer part. A natural conclusion for a western person is that 陈 (Chén) is her first (given) name and 妍洁 (yánjié) is her family name. This conclusion is unfortunately wrong, and I am embarrassed to admit I made this mistaken assumption for the first two months of our remote relationship.  陈 (Chén) is actually the family name (姓, Xìng), one of the 20 most common family names in mainland China. It just happens that in China family name is always written first in the name.

In addition to the confusing order it is further confusing to a western person that Chinese family names are so short. In English language, given names are on average slightly shorter than family names. But in China family names (姓, Xìng) always consist of only single character (like 陈) and given names almost always have exactly two characters (there are some exceptions with a given name having only single character). So a complete name (名字, Míngzì) in China are three characters long in 95% of cases and two characters long in the remaining 5% of cases. This is convenient for example when designing forms: form never needs to include space for more than three characters in the name field. This means also that the full name is always quick to pronounce.

It seems extremely rare to hear or use only the given name of a person. There is not even a clear translation for the phrase "given name" since 名字 (Míngzì) is take to refer to the whole name. If you translate "what is your first name?" to Chinese and back to English with Google translate, the result is "what is your name?". I have never heard my girlfriend in any circumstance say or write only 妍洁 (yánjié) but she did occasionally sign her letters as 陈 (Chén). It did not help to resolve this question that in messaging programs and social networking sites she uses nicknames like "olwen" and "fiona" and some of her friends call her with nickname 妹妹 (Mèimei, little sister)

During the first two months when I thought her given name is 陈 (Chén), I happily told my friends and relatives in Finland that the name of my new girlfriend is "Chen". Of course that was not strictly incorrect, especially when family names are very often used in China, but it was misleading since when western people ask "what is the name of your girlfriend?" and the answer is single syllable, they implicitly assume that the answer means the given name.

So when I realized I has used her family as the given name I was in bit of a problem. First, I was already used to discuss my girlfriend as "Chen" with many of my friends and it was awkward starting to try to switch to something else. But even bigger problem was that I was not sure what I should switch to. I was thinking to switch to "Yanjie" but I was hesitant because I had never seen her use that. In one slightly frustrated chat session I tried to ask her about her names and what she would like to be called but the answer was always: 我的名字是陈妍洁，陈是我的姓氏 (Wo de míngzì shì chényánjié, chén shì wo de xìngshì) which means "My name is Chen Yanjie. Chen is my surname". In the communication between ourselves the problem was not apparent because we mostly call each other 亲爱的 (Qin'ài de, beloved) or 宠儿 (Chong'ér, darling). But I had to find out what to call her to my friends.

After few days of awkward confusion I found my rescue. I remembered her telling in one of the first emails that she also has a nickname that at least her mother calls her. This nickname is 金琳 (Jin lín). So I managed to ask her if I can call her "Jinlin" (pronounced like English "Tsinlin") and got favorable reply. Since then I have been slowly trying to introduce this new name to my friends in Finland.

In addition of sounding nice, these characters have nice meanings. Character 金 (Jin) means "gold" and character 琳 (lín) means "gem" or "beautiful jade". This cutely reminds me of the Finnish habit of calling beloved one "kulta" which also means gold.

I have been mostly successful in introducing the nickname Jinlin to my friends, though my boys Arttu and Ilkka still happily talk of "Chen". Even this name the have apparently heard in a slightly different form: in a recent SMS Ilkka - who has especially enjoying some video chats with Jinlin - asked "Milloin Zen muuttaa meidän luo Suomeen?". This means "When is Zen going to move to live with us in Finland?" :-) Well, with my own confusion over the various names during our relationship, I cannot blame them at all for such minor spelling mistake :-)

Inventing English names

Given the differences in the structure, usage and culture of names between China and the English-speaking world, it is no wonder that many Chinese people choose a new English first names for themselves when they start to study English. In the internet one can find many Chinese Jasmines, Angels, Marys, Jennys, Amandas, and Lilys around. When they write their full name in English discussion they write it in the English order of
English first name first and the Chinese family name last. I was for example delighted to find out that in the forthcoming local elections in Finland, there is a candidate of Chinese origin whose name is "Jenni Chen" - clearly sharing family name with my darling and serving as example of successful immigration. Perhaps some day Jinlin decides to choose an English (of Finnish?) name and then we can start another round of educating our friends of a name change :-) Why not, after all names are just words - it's people we have fun with and love and care for in the end.