When Char Seow Pao from Malaysia gets married to Loh Mai Chee in the US, she innocently follows the “procedures” stated in the immigration documents to get her last name (surname) changed to Loh. She did this reluctantly, but caved in, upon bombarded with horror stories of the naming trouble her MIL has to painfully wade through all these years.
Char Seow Pao has made a terribly big mistake. The name-change incurs more trouble, on the other hand. Her passport bears the name of Char Seow Pao. Her PR card bears the name of Seow Pao Char. Her working permit bears the name of Seow Pao Char. However, her driving licence bears the name of Seow Pao Loh. Her employer got her name logged in as Seow P. Loh. When employment eligibility verification check was conducted, there comes the red light. Seow P. Loh does not exist in the immigration system.
So, an easier way out to solve this issue would be to change the name on the PR card and the working permit to Seow Pao Loh, you might think. If you think a little bit deeper, you might find that Char Seow Pao will be in hot water when she re-enters the territory of the US from abroad. The custom officer at the port of entry might not let her in because her cute little red booklet bears a different name from her PR card. By the way, Char Seow Pao has never intended to give up her 32-page-little-red booklet in exchange for a green one. So, your suggestion to Char Seow Pao to have all her travelling documents names change to Seow Pao Loh is a viable solution but not a workable one, under her circumstances.
To her chagrin, Char Seow Pao found out that all her female Chinese colleagues do not get their names changed upon getting married. She questioned her MIL’s name, the one that had incurred so much trouble. It appears that her MIL’s maiden name is Wan Tan Mee. Upon getting married to Loh Mai Chee’s father, Loh Mai Kai, she changed her surname to Wan-Loh. With a dash, “-“, in the surname, a typical computer system will treat it as an invalid input.
The moral of the story is, do not follow the “procedures” blindly and do not listen to a one-sided horror story. First scenario: a doctor advises the public to take less sugar; second scenario: a person restricts his/her sugar intake. If you blindly follow heed by not taking in any sweetness at all, you might suffer from low-blood sugar. To add salt to injury, Char Seow Pao is expecting to give birth to a Little Loh Mai Chee in the very near future. Should the mother of Little Loh Mai Chee be Seow Pao Char or Seow Pao Loh?
No comments:
Post a Comment