What’s in a name?

ten years of having my name pronounced wrong

Kamala Harris has often publicly corrected those who get her name wrong

It really started within minutes of my stepping into the UK, at the airport in London. I had just landed after an eight hour flight from India and stood in the queue for 90 minutes before I was finally called up by the immigration officer.

“Do you know where you’re going?”

I nodded. In my best handwriting, I had noted on the form that I was headed to a hotel on Gloucester Road.

If you are familiar with English addresses, you’ll know that they’re often pronounced differently to how they’re spelled. Gloucester is really Glouster. Obviously, I got it wrong.

In return I was subjected to a stare that made me shrink and shrivel to the size of a raisin.

An hour passed, or maybe it was just a minute, before he looked down at my passport. He flipped through it and said my name out loud.

“Rahool Meesra"

I didn’t correct him. I didn’t say a word.

Like I said, that’s when it started. I realized soon enough that the officer wasn’t just taking revenge for my Gloucester mispronunciation. Over the next 10 years, person after person, classmate after classmate, colleague after colleague, all got my name wrong. I have now been in the UK for more than a…