In Thailand, people are used to Sanskrit and Pali names without any knowledge of how the origin of their names are. Anyway, I found out a long time ago that many Indian names are also based on the same words. For example:

• Surya is สุริยา (Suriya),
• Chandra is จันทรา (Chantra),
• Kumar is กุมาร (Kuman),
• Vijay is วิชัย (Wichai),
• Siddhartha is สิทธัตถะ (Sitthattha),
• Raja is ราชา (Racha),
• Raj is ราช (Rat),
• Anand is อนันต์/อนันดา (Anan, Ananda)

And how about my name?

Well, although I knew that my name has its root in Sanskrit and Pali, I just never knew how to write. Now, after I spent some time during the circuit breaker (Singapore’s soft lockdown) to learn the Devanagari script, I am going to reveal it along with all other versions of my names.

Thai name

I only have my Thai name registered, which is รตินันท์ ลีลางามวงศา.

The first name, Ratinan, is Sanskrit. It consists of two different words, Ratih and Anand:

• Ratiḥ (रतिः), pleasure, delight,
• Anand (आनंद), happiness.

My grandfather’s last name was Lee (李 / แซ่ลี้), but it was changed in my father’s generation under the Thaification influence. Hence, since my father’s generation, the last name became Leela-Ngamwongsa (ลีลางามวงศา).

Here is my Thai name in various scripts and their pronunciations:

* I normally shorten it to “Ratinan Lee”.

Chinese Name

My grandmother named me in Chinese but this name has never been registered. Here is the meaning of my name:

• 榮 (róng), glory, honor,
• 欽 (qīn), respect, admire.

Nickname

Generally, people call me using my nickname, Nat. Using the original spelling in Thai, นัท, there is no meaning. Anyway, some people misspelled my name by writing it as ณัฐ (short form of ณัฏฐ์) which means philosopher in Pali.