Why I’m Called Dora AY

Someone asked me if my name is Dorothy, earlier today in school. She’s my coursemate, I mean the person who asked me. We have another original Dorothy in class and it becomes confusing when someone randomly calls ‘Dora’ when I and Dorothy are standing, sitting or walking closely.

I’ve been answering ‘Dora’ for some years now that my friend Kufre was confused whether to introduce me as ‘Dora’ or ‘Ayauwu’ some time ago in 2017.

‘Ayauwu’ is translated to ‘New House’ in English and its origin is Obolo. Obolo is a tribe that consist natives of Andoni and Eastern Obolo local government areas of Rivers State and Akwa-Ibom State respectively. I am particularly from Andoni, Rivers State, Nigeria. I sometimes wish I have a Canadian citizenship but that is story for another day.

My paternal grand mother was born a while after her family moved to a new house and so her parents called her ‘Ayauwu’. I told you the literal meaning earlier. I don’t think my parents had me in a new house but I’m my late grandmother’s namesake for academic, civic and health purposes especially.

Some natives spell the same name as ‘Aya-uwu’ but I grew up to notice that mine wasn’t hyphenated. The major advantage of the hyphenation, hence, may be to simplify its pronunciation. The Obolo tribe speaks Obolo language. ‘Ayaya’ means ‘new’, while ‘uwu’ refers to ‘a house’ in Obolo language.

Consequently, a number of people mistook me for a Yoruba and usually easily concludes that ‘Ay’ means ‘Ayomide’ and since I loved the meaning of the name I added ‘Ayomide’ to ‘Dora’ and made it a pen name. I love ‘Ay’ so much because it stands for both ‘Ayauwu’ and ‘Ayomide’ at the same time. ‘Dora’, which describes being ‘adorable’ for me, is a sweet name close to my heart too.

In an attempt to summarise this, ‘Dora AY’ is a pen name and progressively a brand in view. ‘Ayauwu’ can be pronounced as [aj:w], to the limits of my knowledge. Lastly, I like to think of ‘Ayauwu’ as a new mansion. The house suppose big well well naw, even Jesus papa na ‘mansions’ e get.

Now that you know why I’m called ‘Dora AY’, what do you think? Are all these names mentioned in this article easy for you to articulate or do you have a little problem pronouncing any of them? Does my name, Dora AY, remind you of anything at all? Let me know in the comments below.