UNIT 1. NAMES

[jon.gcia]

Actually, everybody knows where I come from owing to my first name. It's not common and you usually relate it to Basque Country. Moreover, my brother's name is very characteristic also: Gorka. Neither of us has short name, so our relatives call to us in exactly way.

Nevertheless, my parents don't have a strange first name, although their ones aren't as the most common names in Spain: Carlos, María, José,... . In fact, I have always believed that the most used names are the same in whole world.

[Loly]

After sending in the Internet about my family name, “Martinez”, I realised it is coming from the firt name “Martin” and it is one of the most extended ones into America and Spain. It was a custom to add to it the coming city or the conquest, like “Martinez de Arellano”, “Martine de Checa”, ect.

I`ve found nobody with my whole name in the internet. Of course, there are so many people if I search only with my first family name.

[an.fandos]

My name is Fandos, and I thought it was very inusual, but after searching in Internet, I found a lot of interesting people called Fandos. Gloria Fandos is a writter, Diego Fandos is a movies director, Albert Fandos is a waterpolo player in PSV Eindhoven, Amparo Fandos is a famous pianist....

I can find a missionary called Angel Fandos, I think he is the same I could meet once in a religious event.

I recently received an e-mail of a girl calle Fandos from Argentina. She was searching people with our name, Fandos. She told me her grandparents are from Spain.

[JEMO13]

Hi everybody.

My name is Jesus Mora and looking through Internet, I found that my family name derives from the word "mora" that's meaning "the blackberry" in Latin, my family name is also habitational and may well derive in many instances from living at one of the many places on the Iberian Peninsula called 'Mora', near from my parents town, theres is a twon called 'Mora'.
My family name isn't a common name but we are enough.

From my city, Madrid, the most common name are Jose, Pedro, Juan, Maria, Carmen, but now we are knowing new names as Fredy, Ithan, Rudy, etc., that they come from other countries.

In my country, when we meet someone for the first time, we use his/her surname, 'Hi Mr. Mora, how are you?', and we use his/her first name when we have more familiarity with this person. In my country we have another peculiarity, we use surnames without a title like Mr. or Mrs, this occurs a lot of times but I don't know exactly why.

The most common pet names use in my country are 'cariño', 'amor', 'pocholo', and a lot of them more

[igmartin]

Hello, my name is Ignacio Martín Pérez and, as I´m noticing most of the people here are from Spain, you would know that it is very, very common (and I can keep on with my family names: Martín Pérez Vargas García...; it is almost a collection of the most common sapanish family names !!!). For example, my name is so common that I have already met two people with the same one, the first during the military service and the other one is working at my company and, of course, it produces some misunderstandings, most of them by e-mail. I prefer not know how many e-mails I have lost due to this matter !

By the other hand my name, Ignacio, has a particularity here, in Spain because there are three/four diferents names which becomes into the same, I mean, Ignacio, Iñaki (or Iñaqui), Iñigo and Nacho are the same name (not short name, pet name or nickname) and that is the reason because, for example, my family named me Iñaki, at work I am Ignacio and some people call me Nacho. Perhaps it sounds a little strange to people from another countries but here it is well know.