How I Lost My Name....(and got it back)

 

About the video/content creator: Nuseir Yassin is a Palestinian-Israeli video blogger who created 1,000 daily 1-minute videos on Facebook under the page, Nas Daily. In 2016, Yassin quit his job at Venmo and decided to explore the world, with the intention of video-documenting his travels. 

Transcript

Let's assume I ask for your name...

"What is your name?" 

"My name is Alyne." 

But, I never heard that name before, so instead, I call you 'Alan'.

"Alan, nice to meet you."

"Alyne!"

Soon enough, you will get angry. 

"My name is not Alan! It's Alyne!"

This may sound funny but it happens to all of us. Our names get messed up all the time! But what if I told you that the world map has the same problem.

Take Kenya for example. This country is named after a mountain when a British person came to visit, the locals said this is Mount Kirinyaga. The British man couldn't pronounce it. So, he said, "From now on, this is Mount Kenya." And because of that mistake, an entire country now has a different name on the world map.

In Madagascar, I saw a beautiful country only to learn that its name is a mistake! Marco Polo thought this was Mogadishu, Somalia and he misspelled that word to Madagascar. And now, the entire nation has to go by that name because of another mistake.

In the US, I went to Nebraska to meet the American Indians. But, they're not Indians! Columbus didn't know where he landed. He thought he was in India but in reality, he was in America. So, he labeled every one of these guys Indian.

"The mother tribe of the Sioux Nation and we're still here."

In life, the person with power can literally change the world map however they want. They can change your country name, your city name, and they can even change your personal name. 

I know how it feels because it happened to me, too. When I first went to the United States as a fresh immigrant, I told my roommate from Wisconsin that my name was Nuseir. He thought Nusier was too complicated, so he called me Nas instead, just like the rapper. I hated that name. But, turns out Nas is not just a rapper. It also means 'people' in Arabic. So, I decided to keep that name and start Nas Daily. I got lucky with the name change but many others did not. And now, they are taking action.

These people didn't like their country name. It was called Ceylon by the British. So, they changed it! And now it's Sri Lanka. 

The people in India didn't like the British name Bombay, so they changed it! And now, it's Mumbai. 

In Vietnam, people changed the city name Saigon to Ho Chi Minh. 

Slowly but surely countries are standing up to their real names and people are too.

Now, I require my closest friends to call me Nuseir because that is my real name.

This may sound trivial but it's a big deal to a lot of people because nothing is more powerful than being able to control your name.