nicknames

i never really had any nicknames before i moved to indonesia. here is a comprehensive list of names i now answer to without a second thought:

1. bu guru gaul
2. BIE!
3. mbak kriwul
4. londo
5. ms pee
6. ms norris
7. parji
8. shasha
9. ebi
10. nona
11. habis
12. abs
13. bu sombong
14. udang kering
15. hutabarat

for my american friends, translations.

1. it means mrs. cool teacher. from my papuan friend, sylva.
2. this is just the last 3 letters of my name. pronounced BEE. it is almost always yelled for some reason. mega started it, and now just about everyone indonesian who i hang out with regularly calls me that.
3. ms curly. it's my javanese name from yohanes.
4. it's kind of a minor racial slur for a white person. in javanese. i get called this on the street a lot.
5. the elongated version of ms p. a couple of the seniors think it's funny to call me this. elselyn started it.
6. i once told the sophomores that i AM chuck norris. so jordan started calling me ms norris in class. regularly.
7. this is a javanese redneck girl's name (like bertha or billie jean). charles and marie lovingly call me this.
8. sammy (18 months old) insists on calling me this. he has for awhile now. he CAN say my name - it's one of the first words he learned - he just chooses not to. the wonderful thing is that this week, they got a dog named sasha. so now we both have the same name according to sam.
9. this is how my name is usually pronounced by indonesians. it is also the name of a dried shrimp dish. ebi.
10. this is just a VERY respectful way of calling someone miss. my house helper calls me this. and sometimes cashiers or waiters.
11. habis means empty. seti, a neighbor of mine thinks this is my name for some reason. so when i drive by, he stands in his front yard and yells "HABIS!" and waves. nice guy.
12. abs. self explanatory.
13. sombong is the indonesian word for my last name.
14. this means dried shrimp. (see #9) indonesians think it's the greatest thing when i joke about this.
15. when i'm on sumatra, this is my name. many batak (people group of sumatra) family names start with huta-. my friend turbo gave me his last name. hutabarat.