You know, what's your name?

And they say: "Oh, my name is John."

And I say: "Ok, that's a little weird."

You know, you don't look like a John, but I mean, that's ok.

[Our perspectives about Taiwanese people having English names]

(In Mandarin) Why do I have an English name?

(In Mandarin) Oh, because my cousin is a foreigner.

(In Mandarin) They all have English names when they were kids, so I figured that I should have one, too

I find that to be pretty helpful, and I think a lot of foreigners do, because often it's hard for us to pronounce or remember their Chinese name.

It seems like people put a lot of time and effort into learning English here.

I think it just kinda shows a more international perspective, English is the global language.

But usually I also ask their maiden name, their born name.

Because that's interesting, I think people should be proud of that and telling people that as well.

When I met people that were from Asia, I think a couple of them tried using their real names.

Americans tried to say them, they messed them up so badly that they just gave up

It was harder for people to remember.

And, um, in the school that I worked at Korea, I never even learned their Korean names—ever.

I taught the same kids for an entire year.

They called each other by their English names.

My name is Keith.

Okay? Keith.

Try to say that by yourself.

(In Mandarin) Are you done?

(In Mandarin) You have pronounced it wrong. Okay?

Because 99 percent of people in Taiwan, are going to say my name the wrong way.

They're gonna say 'Kai-ce', 'Kay-ce', 'Kai-ce', 'Kay-the'.

The point is, that you tried, and that's the important thing.

Look how Indians do it.

They have really long names like Rajaranum.

Those are way longer than any Chinese name that I have ever heard.

Do you know what the Indians do?

The Indians instruct the foreigner how to say their name.

There are even websites that say how to pronounce an Indian person's name.

Why did they do this?

So that IT departments can have better relationships with each other.

Because if you can say the real person's (person's real) name, it just, gives a good feeling to someone.

Your mother gave you your name!

You should be proud of that.

You should be proud that you are a Chen Wei-ling or a Liu Ao-bo, or whatever your names happens to be.

It's your name, and you should embrace it.

Once that you get to know the person, once you feel comfortable with them, I think you should say, hey, this is what my name is.

(In Mandarin) Thanks for watching.

(In Mandarin) If you like this video, please check out my other stuff at www.squawkonomics.com.