I married and retained my maiden name.
Navy has no issues with it. Travel agents seem to. They make us Mr and Mrs. A, as in my name. It got us into trouble when we went to Bhutan because the ticket and passport did not match. We have been careful thereafter.
We still do not have a marriage certificate. It will be interesting if we are asked to prove how we are related.
Imagine situations where the authorities think we are a couple on a clandestine affair. Or when we fill in a ration card application ( yes, I do not have that either) , insurance / MF forms, maybe school applications for Anush.
In "You, Me and Dupree", the FIL( Michael Douglas) asks his son-in-law to take on his surname. So that the lineage continues. The SIL finds it blasphemous but tell me, why not?
Why can't both surnames belong to the new couple (except that our names may become too long). Would it not signify a coming together of two families?
A new surname can totally change how you perceive the individual? After all we have our own theories/ stereotypes of ethnicities/ religion. It also means reprocessing various documents.
If you end up with a hubby who shares the same family name as your father, lucky you.
PS For the non Hindi reader, the title means "just like that" though it literally means "for the sake of a name".
SURELY THIS ONE IS LOST IN TRANSLATION.
17 comments:
hey ditto ditto- mrrg cert people hav no issues- Ij ust applied & it was smooth on the name front.
but nice thought on the dual surname! also wud be nice if the mom comes into picture in the kid's name- like Sanjay "Leela" Bhansali
O God:-) Just imagined the name with both mom & dad's name in it too.. LOL Seems too long..:-) Here people have names with their great grand parents names in it so why not both surnames for us..
How come you don't have a Marriage Certificate? Oh & keep a pic of ur marriage day in ur wallet;-D
Call me old fashioned but I still think it makes life easier if the wife takes the husbands name.easier for the kids, no problems with pass port or ration cards and no explanations.when I look at all that,it is easier to just take his name.this does not mean that you have to give up your identity.you can still be you even if you carry his name.
nice job on your blog! I, for one had issues with my hubby's surname just decided to use his first name as my last name, instead. Maybe I did it out of guilt for not taking on his last name (felt liek I owed him something) not that he insisted on anything at all. Now that I am living life with his first name as my last name, I feel it would have been much easier/saner to retain my maiden name, but anyway no use crying over spilt milk or in this case over borrowed names.
I guess I am one of the 'lucky you'. My husband and I share the same surname...
I am Anusha Rajagopalan and my better half is Partha Rajagopalan :)
Its very easy when we are asked to spell our names in the US. We would just say one surname and when asked for the other's we would say 'its the same as the other':)
We guys actually talked about such a situation. I mean, we dont really care ahem... what the future wife's surname is going to be... but with the kid the problem is going to break out... so we have a solution
so if my lastname is Ramaswamy and her last name is Ramasubramanian.... we can add a bit of both names like
"Rama" (from her name") + "swamy" ( from my name) == Ramaswamy! tada!
If my future wife falls for this kind of logic then my offspring is better off with my surname! he he!
@the kid,
why cant it be 'Ramasubramaniam'? :)
In South America they do hyphenated last names with both parents' surnames for the kids. Anyway I like it when women retain their own last names... although I don't think it does much for women's lib... after all it's still either father's name or husband's name.
If the husband's surname is particularly embarassing, I think marriage is a great opportunity to get rid of it. I'm thinking specifically of "Butsky" here.
Well, I see no harm in any one or bopth the surnames being adopted.. It all depends on individual preferences..
But, actually when people decide to select a last name they might decide on the one that is less wierd to save the child from being picked on every day for 16 years at school! :-).. jus kiddin..
I know of a boy called Shyam sunder Gowri Suresh and his sister was Praveena Gowri Suresh.The mother's name was Gowri and father's Suresh.They combined both as the surname for children.Howz that for an idea?
I'd keep my name. Saves me from alot of shit like this.
Keshi.
All- Interesting to get diff thoughts on this
HHGma- Will love to go shopping with you and more imp catch up with you when u r in chennai
On "artnavy"- your guess on my hubby's name is not too wrong- mine is way off. If you go through some older posts' comments my name is there ...:-)
I agree with u. I don't know how far will that be possible. But I did what I can do. I did not change my name in my passport since I did not want to lose my identity.
I must be more of a hypocrite than I thought. I always believed in equal rights, when I marry, my wife can keep her name if she wants, and so on. So I get married, and when she applies for a passport, there is talk about getting her name changed. I did not utter a word, she silently agreed, and so she got a new surname (through a name change affidavit). Even though it was seemingly a very smooth and tension free process, makes me feel that could things have been different, I never did ask her whether she wanted to retain her original name.
Oh gosh - I can so empathize with this! I've retained my maiden name too. For two reasons:
1) It's just a real hassle to change you name everywhere - your passport, educational certificates - it's just annoying.
2) I am emotional about retaining my dad's name. Just because I got married, I don't suddenly stop being my parents' daughter. My identity, my sense of self is linked to both my first and my last names, and I just can't give it up.
I am SO sick of being referred to as Mrs.*My Mom* or Mrs.*My MIL*. In the US, most people would ask me before they addressed me as Mrs. or Ms...here in the UK, they first go for Mrs.*MIL*, and when I correct them and say it's not Mrs., it's not Miss, it's Ms., I get the brilliant "Oh, so you're not married, you're partners?"
$%^#*)#*
Good post AN! I've also stuck onto my maiden name cos I felt a loss in my identity. But yes during travel this does create confusion & hence have lately included my hubbys name as well. Yup so now I got 2 surnames!!
Afterall whats in a name! ;)
GET A CERTIFICATE!!
I am lucky that surname and my fiance's surname are both very short. So I can use both the names.
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