Ulaanbaatar, MongoliaSunday, January 24, 2009
This morning I attended my first cross-cultural baby shower. We gathered at a colleague's house with some good food and a whole gaggle of women from work. I organized a collage activity which quickly took on a Mongolian theme (as it should). See picture at right. My Mongolian colleagues included some important Mongolian elements, such as the fox who's keeping a watchful eye over the baby. The finished product will be a wall hanging for the baby.
The best part about the shower was the chance to learn about different traditions surrounding naming babies. One colleague shared naming traditions from her home in Central America, and then my Mongolian colleagues joined in with stories of how babies are named (or have been named) in Mongolia.
One colleague regaled us with tales of her own family. When her parents' first child arrived, they named the boy "Not Him," in keeping with the idea that if Death were coming to take their child, the parents could say that it was "Not Him". The next child, a girl, was named "Not Her." Not until the 5th child arrived did her brothers and sisters start getting more "regular" names. So, apparently in a certain generation of Mongolians, there are plenty of people named "No Name" for this same reason--of trying to fool Death.
