Wednesday, July 9, 2008

Root, Root, Root for the Horsebeans

Name: The Chongqing Strange-Taste Horsebeans

Origin: A picture of a bag of treats or candies of some sort, via an email forward, via the epicenter of "the humorous English mistakes that appear in Japanese advertising and product design," engrish.com.

Suggested Use: A fantasy sports team of some sort. It's intimidation factor is low (who would fear horsebeans?), but it rates well in quirkiness (they hail from Chongqing, a city in China's Sichuan Province!* and they taste strange!) and complexity (two disparate adjectives, one geographical and one culinary, modifying a nonsensical compound noun). Fantasy sports are largely void of intimidation due to the lack of any actual physical competition, but are fertile ground for this sort of oddball nomenclature.

Perhaps this name is best suited for the long April-to-September haul of a fantasy baseball season for its potential to either annoy fellow competitors or grow on them as an endearing and enjoyably integral part of the experience in your particular league (the former causing frustration and lower competitor performance, the latter slowly earning preferential treatment in trades and policy decisions). Baseball also seems more plausibe in China than the other main fantasy sport, NFL football, thus giving the name some grounding in reality and lending it the feel of a piece of magical realism (like this could actually be a real team playing in China's fledgling China Baseball League).

*We do not recommend substituting your own city, state, or other geographical place name for Chongqing in this name because, frankly, that would not work as well: The Duluth Strange-Taste Horsebeans, The Saskatchewan Strange-Taste Horsebeans or The Redondo Beach Strange-Taste Horsebeans are simply awkward and forced, a nominal version of a shotgun wedding. Stick with Chongqing, my friend.

No comments: