Friday, August 10, 2018

How I Became "Chandavkl"

One question a few people ask, but which I suspect more people wonder about, is how I adopted the name "Chandavkl".  Perhaps the most puzzling part is the "kl" at the end, which some people think refers to Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia, but which has nothing to do with it.  Actually, the origin is quite simple.  When my workplace computerized a couple of decades ago, they adopted a login system based on a combination of last and first names, which in my case became Chanda.  Later on, when it came to creating screen names for various purposes on the Internet, I thought I would honor my original employer, Kenneth Leventhal & Company, by calling myself Chandakl.  However, when I set up my first account name as Chandakl, I made some kind of error that rendered the account useless.  (Probably not really, but as a dinosaur I couldn't figure out away to simply change and correct the name.)  So I just opened another account throwing in the next letter of my first name, ending up with Chandavkl.  And so, Chandavkl was born.

I only recently recognized how fortuitous I was in messing up my attempt to use the Chandakl handle.  As it turns out, Chandakl is a very common name on the Indian subcontinent, while Chandavkl appears to be completely unique.  Consequently, while I can easily search for myself on the internet as Chandavkl, I'd have to wade through thousands or millions of unrelated hits when searching Chandakl. 

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