This is Randi Hacker with another Postcard from Asia from the KU Center for East Asian Studies.

Here in Mongolia, name giving is a family affair. Soon after a baby is born, on a day designated by a lama – but never on a Tuesday or Saturday –there is a ner hairlah or naming ceremony. The whole family contributes names. The parents choose three and write each on a tiny slip of paper which they roll tightly and slip into a bowl filled with millet. The father shakes the bowl until one of the scrolls surfaces. He reads the name then returns it to the grain. He repeats the process until one name has surfaced twice and that is the chosen name. Then the father whispers that name three times into the tiny ear. Like the Rabbi of Prague giving life to the golem by whispering a secret name of god into its ear, there’s a power to this isn’t there?

From the KU Center for East Asian Studies, I’m Randi Hacker. Wish you were here.