THE TENTH ONE

I belong to a clan where every member had long names. Some had names so long that the letters of their names if arranged on one another would be taller than the person standing on a two foot stool.

We are two brothers. We both have very long names each name competing with the other for space. Though I detested the long names they had their own advantages. One advantage I figured out early in my school days. I remember when my English teacher asked us to write 500 word long essays. I managed fairly well even when I fell short of ammunition to complete the essay. When I ran out of ideas I concluded the essay with my name which would end something like this “Author of the essay: Kakarlapudi Venkata Subramanya Krishnam Raju s/o Kakarlapudi Venkata Surya Narasimha Raju”. That used to take care of several words. I finished my essay close to 500 words with this divine help. So you see, they act as good fillers for incomplete essays.

There is a definite process to the naming and it has been followed diligently over the generations. You are named after your paternal grandfather if you are the first born and maternal if you are the second. The third is usually named after the father’s paternal grandfather and the fourth after the mother’s paternal grandfather and the list goes on in alternate sequence as the produce increases.

There was a general pride in naming the children after parents and grandparents. Names were always picked from there. Take the case of my father’s family. They were nine siblings. After the ninth one it is rumoured that my grandmother stamped my grandfathers foot and said enough is enough. No more of this nonsense. We have consumed all names two generations above. We don’t have any more names left. Good sense prevailed and the tenth never came. Just imagine if the tenth one was born. He would have been without a name. What a shame to the family of gigantic names having a child with absolutely no name. Their pride would have been punctured. A catastrophe was averted.


Long names also come with their own disadvantages. They end up eating space . The name block in the passport refused to take my entire name. Kakarlapudi Venkata Subramanya Krishnam Raju is my complete name. Forty letters in all. I sometimes wish I was the tenth child that my grandparents did not have.

The first being my surname and the second and third my middle name. Krishnam which is my first name is hidden in this long trail. As I was the second child I was named after my Maternal Grandfather whose name was Krishnam.

Our names are actually like long trains with many bogies and an engine heaving and puffing with not enough power to take all the bogies forward. So if you take my name the surname, would be the engine and the rest that follow are Bogies. So that would be 1 engine and 4 bogies!

When I read out my entire name people tend to ask “Which one is your first name in the entire trail” looking a little confused. My reply usually is “It is third from the engine, the third bogey. You will find it there :-) ”

When I became a father I said to my wife Rukmini pointing to the baby boy “ He shall be the tenth one - the boy without a name”. She looked at me in disdain at my silly suggestion and protested “How can our child be without a name. He should have a name. What will others call him. He will have a proper name even if it is a short one” She said firmly not giving me any further scope to manoeuvre.After several rounds of arguments we named him Pradhyumn after the child of Lord Krishna and Rukmini.

I have one anecdote to narrate before bringing my episode on names to a close.

The second largest name in the world belongs to one of my maternal grandfathers. Though I don’t have any proof to back the claim. I am sure neither of you will hold one to prove otherwise. The Guinness Book of records features only the largest name. There is no mention of the second largest or third largest name in the records.

The name of my mother’s paternal uncle is Sri Raja Kalidindi Devi Prasada Varaha Venkata Surya Narayana Kumara Lakshmi Kantha Raja Bahadur.

The longest name of course as per the Guiness Book of World Records belongs to one German immigrant of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. This is the longest name ever. It goes something like this.

Mr. Adolph Blaine Charles David Earl Frederick Gerald Hubert Irvin John Kenneth Lloyd Martin Nero Oliver Paul Quincy Randolph Sherman Thomas Uncas Victor William Xerxes Yancy Zeus

Wait the name doesn’t end here. That was only his first and middle name. I only stopped to take a break before I could have a go at his surname. It is three times the size of his first and middle name put together.

Actually his surname if read ( humanly not possible) will sound similar to the rattle noise emitted from a machine gun at full blast. Rat-a-tat-a-tat. So please maintain safe distance as you read. The killing range is 100 metres. Here it goes. Rat-a-tat-a-tat.

Wolfeschlegelsteinhausenbergerdorffwelchevoralternwarengewissenschaftschafe rswessenschafewarenwohlgepflegeundsorgfaltigkeitbeschutzenvonangreifeudurch ihrraubgierigfeindewelchevoralternzwolftausendjahresvorandieerscheinenersch einenvanderersteerdemenschderraumschiffgebrauchlichtalsseinursprungvonkraft gestartseinlangefahrthinzwischensternaitigraumaufdersuchenachdiesternwelche gehabtbewohnbarplanetenkreisedrehensichundwohinderneurassevonverstandigmens chlichkeitkonntefortpflanzenundsicherfeuenanlebenslanglichfreudeundruhemitn icheinfurchtvorangreifenvonandererintelligentgeschopfsvonhinzwischenternart Zeus igraum Senior.

That brings an end to this wild verbal orgy.

In case you didn't notice, he has one given name for every letter of the alphabet in his first and middle name plus the excruciatingly long surname. Though the text looks garbled it does mean something in German.

This gentleman was born in Munich in 1904 and lived in Philadelphia for most of his life. The name if you noticed ends with senior so there must be a junior around. The son probably had all of this and his name.

I suppose in the naming ceremony the poor priest in the church must have died of suffocation at the altar. Too many words in his mouth would have left him breathless. He would have only managed up to the middle name and thereafter his tongue would have twisted and twirled. He would have finally died of grief for failing to complete the name. In his place our Hindu priest would do better. He would manage to recite the entire name in one go and thereafter would have died out of happiness. Happiness because he managed better than the Catholic priest. Mr Adolph's name would be more appropriate if read as “Adolph to Zeus, the rest if you read, you are dead”.

Death by grief or happiness ,I can claim only one person in the entire world who can read the whole name and still stand alive. This feat can be achieved by the one and only Shankar Mahadevan of the breathless fame holding onto a machine gun. You know what I mean. He will manage to sing upto the middle name without losing breath and then in desperation fire the machine gun at full blast to complete the rest. Rat-a-tat-a-tat.