I'm a "yuk" not a "yak." Then someone will spell my name "Kotyuck." Or, at the pharmacy, I give them my card with the clear embossed name Kotyuk and get their receipt with the name "Katyuk" in bright red three-inch letters.
"Why don't you change your name? It's too hard to pronounce." a friend once said.
"There's only six letters. Picasso has seven letters and you know how to pronounce his name!"
Some family relatives pronounce the name as Ko Ti Yuk. It has something to do with school teachers and the theory of language.
Others in the family say KÓ tyuk. I grew up pronouncing it ko Tyuk. [Like the sneeze, achew!]
In college, I gave up. My new friends asked, "How do you pronounce your name?" I would say "ko Tyuk." Then I would hear a series of "Ko…Ko…"
Enough already. What do I care how it's pronounced. What is important to me is you can read it clearly on my paintings and drawings. So now I say, "It's Kot Yuk," a phonetic pronunciation. In the meantime, please feel free to say it as you like.
See "Chicken With Its Head Cut Off."
Ida Kotyuk©
If you get fewer than 2,000 rejections a year, you are not working hard enough.
