Wonderful Cloud

In Chinese my name has two meanings. It means wonderful. It means clouds in sky. It is like wonderful clouds spreading in the blue sky on a sunny day.  

My family has a tradition which is that all family members’ names have two Chinese characters. Family members in the same generation have the same first Chinese character in their names, and males and females have a different second character. In my generation, my name starts with the character “Miao” (妙), so do my female cousins and my younger sister. It was chosen by my oldest uncle when my oldest female cousin was born. It means wonderful. In my name, the character after “Miao” is “Yun” (云). It was chosen by my father. What it means is just like what my father expected me to be. It means clouds in the sky, stay high from the ground and be free. 

At first, I didn’t like my name because some classmates made fun of it when I was at grade school. My name is pronounced like a name of nun in China, they said and then laughed. It made me dislike my name. Yet as time passed, I accepted my name gradually. Now that I have grown up, I like my name because I like its meaning. It is like water tries hard to become cloud in the sky, then returns as rain to moisten the ground. It reminds me to be strong, persevere in pursuing my dreams, and contribute to the society.