My official name in the United States is Rudy Rudy (yes, Rudy twice, Rudy squared, whatever!). And no, it has nothing to do with that 1993 Notre Dame American football movie "Rudy", even though I happen to enjoy football. I know you are wondering, as many of my friends were: "Is that REALLY your real name? really? no way! how come?"

The answer is of course: NO (capital N, capital O). Let me take a few minutes to explain how I got into this situation. When I was born, my parents only prepared a Chinese name for me. As it might be difficult later in my life if I did not have an English name (or in this case, Indonesian name - by the way, I am from Indonesia), the nurse in the hospital suggested a name, which happened to be Rudy. I was named after a famous Badminton player in the 1970s since my dad was the best badminton player in our area. If you don't see how name can be a problem, tune on CNN or try watching the women soccer when China or Korea is playing, and see if you can make any sense when they are trying to pronounce an Asian name. And if you are a high school teacher, when taking attendance, don't you always stop for at least 5 seconds before calling an Asian name? Hey, we don't even use the alphabets!

What happened was that my birth certificate only contained one single name: Rudy. Yes, Rudy and nothing else! If only my parents decided to put their last name in, I would not have been in this 'trouble.' But hey, name is not that important in my country. Many people have only one name. For example, my country first two presidents: Sukarno and Suharto. Both of them have only one name. Wierd, huh? Oh ya, by the way, the last two presidents do have last names. But they only managed to stay in office for less than 2 years. Don't you see the problem? No last name, stay in office for 20+ years; last name, less than 2 years. :-)

So my life went on wandering without a last name. In 1992, I went to Singapore for high school. My passport, to match my birth certificate, contains only Rudy. I never had any troubles regarding my name when I was in Singapore. Even when I took the 'O' Level examination (it's a British exam), no questions were asked. I was safely assured that it'd never be an issue, until of course, I am here now in the United States.

In 1996, I applied to several colleges in the United States, all of them in Boston. One of them is obviously Suffolk University. In my application, I left my last name blank. Suffolk University accepted my application and admitted me as Rudy Rudy (Note: I found out later that before me, there was another guy who has only one name in Suffolk. He is from Indonesia as well. What a coincidence! Now, I know why it took them less than 2 seconds to simply double my name -- but hey, you don't just give people names like that! This is not the 19th century America, and I am not Irish! :-). Anyway, I realized this mistake but did not want to make a big fuss about it and just decided to clear this error when I came to Boston. Hey, I was pretty excited about the idea of coming to the United States! Start smiling if you think it's funny. Let me tell you what's even funnier! I applied to Tufts University as well and guess what they chose for my last name. I am not kidding! In the reply letter, Tufts University wrote: "To: Mr Unknown, Rudy." I guess I like the last name "Rudy" much better than "Unknown."

However, that's NOT the only problem. When I went to the United States embassy in Jakarta, I left my first name blank and simply put "Rudy" on my last name (PS: Without an official last name, I don't really have a clear concept of what first or last name is at that time). I did not know what happened, but before I realized it, I had the word "FNU" filled for my first name. WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT? I did not return to the embassy to fix this problem because of two reasons: 1) my country was (and still is) in a mess and I didn't want to get chopped on the way to the embassy, and 2) I thought I could clear all this up once I got to the United States.

So, I came to the United States in August 1997. I went directly to Suffolk University registrar to fix this name problem. The secretary said: "Okay, so you want to leave it without a last name?" Yup I said. But damn! The computer would not take it. It required a last name to be entered. Stupid technology! What was the programmer thinking? Everyone always has more than one name? The importance of name is over-rated anyway! I am telling you, that program won't sell in Indonesia. In the end, I asked her to put Rudy back as my last name.

After four years of being in Boston, I finally found someone who could tell me what the hell "FNU" stands for. It took me four years to guess wrongly, and it only took this guy four seconds to guess it right (Thanks, Ey al). Well, it seems to stand for "First Name Unknown" or "First Name Unavailable." However, according to some computer and tech geeks out there, FNU actually stands for "FNU Not Unix" (you know who you are - we discuss this in the PIClist :-).

So, don't you see? Wow, I am in such an identity crisis here in the United States. As far as the INS is concerned, there is this guy named "FNU Rudy" who enters the United States, suddenly disappears and then suddenly reappears and leaves the country again and again. As far as the IRS is concerned (my Social Security is under the name "Rudy Rudy"), there is this one guy named "Rudy Rudy" who never entered the United States, but somehow stays and works legally, and once in a while disappears for about a month or so. Fiuh! I am wondering how the hell I am going to get out of this trouble!

And so the story went. Ever since then, I am known as Rudy Rudy in the United States. Everyone I know here would call me by that name, and everyone seems to enjoy calling it twice rather than once. In certain classes, the professors would make me explain to the whole class in the beginning of the semester regarding my name. One of my friends would even call me like a 21st century product: "hi, rudy rudy dot com". She said I am appending my name as I live along. I started with "rudy", then I became "rudy rudy" and now she calls me "rudy rudy dot com" and then, she said I am going to start appending slashes ("/") to my name. (Well, Katka, told you I am going to put our discussion about my name on my web site!).

Now, the origin of this website! In the summer of 1999, a friend told me to buy this web address. I refused so many times because I didn't see the reason of getting it in such a hurry. He, then, told me that if I was not going to get it within the next 2 days, he was going to buy it and then sell it back to me at a much higher price later on. So, I went ahead and got it registered. I am really grateful because ever since then, this website has been put to great use. Thanks, Dan!

Anyway, after a while, I kinda like the name "Rudy Rudy." It's unique, it's easy to remember, and it makes people laugh when they hear it. I think I will use it for a long long time (just have to figure out how to fix the "FNU Rudy" problem)! I hope this story has entertained you somewhat. Thanks for reading, and have a nice wonderful day.