Everyone with an uncommon name and/or surname knows this: when you're young, naive pupils make horrible jokes about assonances (i remember myself in the first grade making fun of a friend called maffiotto, of course associating it with the infamous southern italian respected families), and parents sometimes do not help in the choice (having a surname "Impalato", Empaled, the choice of "Crocifisso", Crucifixed, is not ideal: all true...)
I remember in the past being called many many different surnames, the best being Scialuppi, or the more updated Cappuccino, but I wasn't that pissed with my first name. That fitted quite ok, overall.
This before coming to the UK. Andrea is lately a joke to me: when i claim this as a male name, people giggle and look somewhere else; still it is one of the most common names in Italy!
Today I just found out that I'm not alone in this misunderstanding. Ordes of very italian, very masculine "Michele", stay put: your name here is meant to be for a Miss, a Mrs, or more gently a Ms.
