Just Call Me Egg

It just so happens that neither of the vowels is my short, seemingly simple name truly exist in Korean.  This gives Koreans a couple of options for translating it.

My Korean teacher always called me 카렌 [kah-rain], which I thought sounded quite nice.  I assumed this to be the natural translation of my name, and I had no problem with it.

Then, I realized that other friends were calling me something different.  It didn't sound quite as nice, but it didn't seem bad... just oddly familiar... Finally, one of them spelled it out for me: 캐런 [kay-rohn]... I instantly recognized it!

Everyday in Korean class, the homesick Korean-American guy would declare: 오늘 아침에, 계란 샌드위치를 먹었어요 [oh-neul ah-chee-may, gyay-rahn sayn-de-wi-chee-leul mo-go-so-yo] 'This morning, I ate an egg sandwich.'

계란 [gyay-rahn] 'egg'... 캐런 [kay-rohn] 'Karen'... I could hardly hear the difference, much less pronounce it!

I tried not to let it get to me.

"I am not an egg," I told myself.  "The words are probably worlds apart; it's just my novice inability to distinguish Korean sounds.  That's all."

Weeks later, once I had just about convinced myself that no one could possibly be thinking of eggs when they called my name, I was overcome by a sudden bout of courage.  Compelled by my previously suppressed curiosity, I dared to mention my former mental struggle to couple of bilingual Korean friends.

Much to my chagrin, they instantly found humor in my identity crisis and, since, have taken to calling me the very thing that I feared I was being called all along...

안녕, 계란! [an-yeong, gyay-rahn!] 'Hello, Egg!' 

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