The most unusual Irish name you ever came across

Having any Irish name living overseas is a nightmare.

I spend a large proportion of my day spelling out my name on the phone while my colleagues piss themselves laughing around me. Conversation always goes like this:

"N.I.A.M.H - Neeve, yes N I A M for mother H and it's pronounced Neeve. Yes N for Nelly I A M for mother H. Yes it is an unusual name, it's Irish. Yes, there's no letter V in the Irish alphabet, like the name Siobhan? Yes, I am actually from Irelend. I'm from Dublin. Yes it's a beautiful place. Yes, it is an unusual name, it's from an Irish Myth. Yes, it is very rare in NZ but quite common in Ireland. Thank you - I quite like it myself"

on and on and on all day. It gets old really fast. I totally get why somone wouldn't know how to pronounce it but it does annoy me.

It's becoming more common here though, with babies and younger kids. People seem to really like it, although half the time they spell it Neeve which although from my experience I completely get it still annoys me for some reason.

ballsymchugh wrote: »

used to work with a girl called niamh in england. the locals just called her nim, as she gave up on trying to get them to say the name right, and they just pronounced it as it was written.
as for siobhan, i knew a local over there called shervonne. :eek:

Sometimes I don't bother correcting them either, my theory is though that if you tell people then when they come across another Niamh they'll know. I've had a few people know how to pronounce it straight away and I've been really surprised but they always tell me they know another Niamh.

Someone called me Nymph once - I wasn't going to let that slide at all . I'd just prefer if people said straight out "your name is really unusual, how do you pronounce it?". I do that with people now because I know I'd prefer it.

Also Siobhan is oddly common here, most people know how to pronounce it and when I compare the mh to the bh in Siobhan is seems to click. Makes me wonder why that girls name in particular caught on here. Sometimes people at work call me, read out a name for me and ask me how to pronounce it for them - I've been asked about Oisin, Tadhg and also Caoilfhionn (that is way worse than Niamh for the pronunciation!)

Disleksic wrote: »

Hope her surname isn't Rea.

It was actually pronounced jee-a; she was named after the Irish word for god!

The above is correct. In all dialects as far as I have ever heard, the pronunciation for Saoirse is closer to Seeur-sheh. I have never heard the pronounciation Sayer-sheh.

iamwhoiam wrote: »

I heard a request read out on TV3 the other morning for a baby called Ceol-Rince .

That's disgraceful. Parents should be imprisoned.