Yuping Willow Zhu

Image: Yuping Zhu

I’ve spent the last 18 years of my life preserving my ancestry through the most obvious representation of my identity– my name. I’ve felt ostracized as classmates and teachers and strangers have butchered the pronunciation of “Yuping”, have ridiculed it, and have deliberately referred to me as “you, over there” instead of taking the time to learn my name. Whether it is out of discomfort or fear of getting it wrong, I don’t know. All I know is that it has made me incredibly insecure.

In Nashville, I have relinquished my grip on this battle, in choosing to go by “Yuping Willow Zhu”. In my introductions on stage and in Facebook Messenger, I opt to say, “Hi! My name is Yuping Willow Zhu, but you can call me Willow!” I’ve noticed that almost everyone takes the latter option; and so in Tennessee, I am simply Willow.

It has been quite strange, having a new name and a new identity. When people say, “Hey Willow!”, I look around to see who they are talking to, only to awkwardly realize that they are referring to me. I feel almost like an imposter at times, taking some random name and reassigning it to myself; and now everything that I’ve ever done or known as Yuping, I now do and know as Willow.

The most hilariously catastrophic part of it all, is that after going through the emotional hassle of changing my entire name and identity to Willow, I still have not somehow avoided the “how do you spell it?” and “what was it again?” questions. People have stared at me blankly, followed by two slow blinks when I’ve introduced myself as Willow, and other people have even spelled it “Wilowl” or “Willo”. It makes me wonder now, if maybe people’s inability to pronounce Yuping wasn’t solely out of malice or racism or something horrific; but rather it was out of some type of innocent ignorance… ?