An Irish woman sent Twitter into stitches by revealing her UK-based coworker had looked up how to pronounce her name before a conference.
The woman, named Fionnuala, who is based in London, shared a screenshot of her colleague’s screen on the social platform, pointing out to a search tab at the top of the page.
The unnamed colleague had looked up how to pronounce her name, but unfortunately forgot to close their search before sharing their screen with the rest of the team during a video conference.
Other Fionnualas (which is pronouced ‘Fin-oo-la’) and people with Irish and Gaelic names sympathised, as they shared how people often struggle to proncounce their names, and come up with bizarre variations.
An Irish woman named Fionnuala and based in London sent Twitter into stitches by revealing her UK-based coworker had looked up how to pronounce her name before a conference
She explained the colleague had looked up her name but forgot to close the search tab before sharing his screen with the team during a video conference call
The tweet quickly went viral, with Fionnuala racking up more than 21,200 likes and nearly 800 in two days.
‘When your colleague shares their screen and they still have this tab open,’ she wrote, having shared a snap of her colleague’s screen and drawn an arrow pointing to the search.
She added to the tweet the hashtag #irishnameproblems.
Commeters asked Fionnuala if she would be offended if her colleague hadn’t known how to say her name correctly.
Fionnuala, pictured, – pronounced ‘Fi-noo-la’ said she did not mind telling people how to pronounce her name directly, because she was very proud of it
‘No, not at all,’ she replied. ‘I usually make them guess first to see how close they are but it’s such a great conversation starter.
‘I’m so proud of my name that I love being able to tell people how to say it.
Other Fionnualas chimed in to say people had had a hard time pronouncing their names on several occasions.
Other Fionnualas and people with Irish and Gaelic names said they’ve had the sane problem, with many people mispronouncing their names
‘I have been called Vanilla many times,’ one said.
‘Aww I would be chuffed they made the effort, instead of just calling me Fiona-wala,’ said one Fionnuala McCully
‘At my graduation, they pronounced it Fi-on-wala. My brother said afterwards he didn’t think it was possible to make my name rhyme with koala…but they managed it,’ another joked.
Other bearers of Irish and Gaelic names shared their own experiences.
One woman named Niamh (pronounced Neev) said people had no idea what to make of her name.
Many said the colleague had meant well by looking up her name, and that they had rather people made an effort to look it up than butchering their names instead
‘I’ve had phonecalls with clients that spend the first 5 minutes asking to speak to nee-am and when I say “yes that’s me” they say “no nee-am please”,’ she said.
The name Fionnuala stems from Irish mythology and means ‘white shoulder.’
Irish legends have it that Fionnuala was one of the four children of Lir, a sea god, who were transformed into swans for 900 years by their jealous step-mother Aoife (pronounced EE-fa).
People noted the colleague meant well by looking up the name’s pronunciation.
‘Nice of them to try and get it right first time,’ a woman called Brede wrote. They might think they would have offended you. I have I have this problem with my name but people just change my name to Bred-a without even asking and continue to call me that even if corrected,’ one said.
‘Aww it’s great they wanted to try to get it right,’ said another.
‘Oh that’s nice that they went to the trouble of finding out! I wish more people would do the same with my name. Guesses are never, ever right,’ said one.