Help me!!

[soora95]

Hi all, me and my family are thinking of moving to the UK in the next few years from Korea. We currently have a 2 year old daughter and are expecting another girl soon,, The problem is, and I have not even thought about this before tonight, what if the names are too difficult to pronouce? My daughters name is Yoon-ah (I was thinking we could maybe simplify this to Yuna when we move.) Does anyone have any ideas about what we could name our other daughter? My husband seems to want to have a Korean name for her.
The ideas he has came up with are:
Ji-Hyun (I was thinking maybe Gigi as a nickname??)
Mi-Ri
Sa-Rang

At the moment, I think Gigi is our best option.

I knew a Korean girl called Nari, which sounds pretty.

Ara

Mi-Cha

It's probably okay to use the Korean names.
Gigi sounds like a stage name for a show dancer, which might suit your family if you are very glitzy and glamorous. A "quieter" nickname would be Jinny or Ginny.

Miri (usually pronounced Mirr-ee rather than Mi-Ri, but either pronunciation would be understood) is a well known short form of the names Miriam and Mirabel/Mirabelle. It would not cause any problems. In fact, on Mumsnet, it's often said to be pretty.

People will get used to their names! Don't shorten them !

I agree, keep the names as they are! People will understand they are Korean names and will learn them. None of the names you've listed seems difficult to pronounce in English.

Use their names. In the UK there are all sorts of names, and the ones you suggest shouldn't cause any problems.

The only thing that might cause problems are that if you put the surname before the first name (e.g. Kim Ji-hyun), people will assume that the child's name is Kim not Ji-hyun.

@soora95, your child will probably know children with names like Aoife (pronounced Eefa), Ciara (pron. Kira) and Niamh (pron. Neev or Nee-uv) and so on. She'll be fine.

• Just picked names that are popular that aren't said as they look, unless you know.

Most people might ask you to repeat it but then they'll make the effort to pronounce it correctly.

There are names from lots of cultures here.

Sounds like Hy in Hyun are difficult for English speakers to pronounce but people will try. I guess Hana is the most common name that works in English and Korean. I agree with above posters though - if you don't mind if people make slight pronunciation errors, just go for names you like.

Ji-Hyun I agree with a pp that the 'hy' sound is tricky for British people to say.

Both of these are nice and would work.
Mi-Ri
Sa-Rang

If you are moving to a multi cultural part of the UK, then all different foreign names are very common and no one will think it unusual.

I think Yoon-ah is a beautiful name and I can't see any problems with the pronunciation in the UK (unless I've got it wrong and it isn't pronounced phonetically)

I think you should name your child the name you and your husband like best, regardless of where you are living. People can and will learn and I think its a real shame to anglicise your culture if the only reason for doing so is to appease others.