Someone ask me,why some Chinese people have English name?
Many Chinese people choose English names for themselves so that westerners (more specifically English speaking westerners) have an easier time pronouncing their names. Because if we write our real name, like 李强，孙天，张三，李四 you will not be able to read it, AT ALL. Because even if we write the Pinyin of our names, you English speaking people simply never bother to learn how to pronounce it. You always pronounce it wrong, or forget how to pronounce it and we need to teach you every time.
In other words, vast majority of Chinese people picking English name as a courtesy for you English speaking people. We go out of our way to make things easier for you when we try to communicate with you, do business with you. And you all should take it with some gratitude instead of considering it’s a given, or somehow Chinese people are doing it because we don’t like our own names.
And why do we keep our last names? Because most of Chinese last names are single character and easier to pronounce, and we thought surely these westerners could learn how to pronounce Wang or Chen or Zhao. Because names are important, it is our first label, and we really want to maintain some integrity of our name when Romanizing it. Because last names go beyond ourselves, it represents our connection with our family, and changing it has significant impact to people’s identity.
So next time when you see a Chinese person (or any other person from a non-English speaking country, but having an obviously Anglo-Saxon name), have a little bit of gratitude and respect because they sure show a lot of respect to you.
