Jiayi, a high school student in Taiwan,
has a new e-paI, Elizabeth,
an American high school girl.
In her last e-mail to Jiayi,
Elizabeth asked about the meaning of Jiayi’s name in Chinese.
In the following e-mails, they share stories about their names.
Dear Elizabeth, Thanks for the reply.
I’d be pleased to tell you about my Chinese name.
My full name is Tao Jiayi.
Tao is my family name and Jiayi is my given name.
Tao means “a potter,”
a person who makes clay pots by hand.
Our ancestors might have been potters thousands of years ago.
My given name, Jiayi, is from a fortune teller.
Most parents in Taiwan go to fortune tellers for a baby’s name.
We Chinese believe that a person’s name should match his or her time of birth,
or he/she may have an unlucky life.
My name is made up of two characters, Jia and Yi.
Jia means“beautiful” and Yi “happy.”
According to the fortune teller,
this name is perfect for my time of birth.
But in fact, Jiayi is a very common name.
There are twenty other students named Jiayi in my school.
How about your name?
What does it mean?