How About Naming Her “Carrera”?

Recently, my husband has been browsing Carsensor even more than usual. Is he thinking of buying another car?

It’s not unheard of for car-loving dads to want to name their children after cars, and my husband was no exception. This all happened when I was pregnant with our second daughter. We often talked about wanting a name that would work around the world—something people overseas could remember and pronounce easily. But we just couldn’t settle on a name.

Then one day, my husband looked at me seriously and said:

“How about naming the baby Carrera?”

(Of course, he meant the Porsche 911 Carrera.)

C-Carrera…? (-_-)

“What kanji would you use?” I asked. He came up with three characters that sounded like they might work, but at a glance, they looked like the sort of deliberately over-the-top kanji you’d see in a biker gang’s motto. “We’re not a biker gang,” I said. “Why not just write it in katakana?” he replied.

Well, if the parents had striking, Western-looking features like actor Masao Kusakari or model Jun Hasegawa, maybe. But giving a katakana name to a child born to two unmistakably Japanese-looking parents felt like a bit much. And what if, once she started elementary school, the boys teased her with puns like “Carrera—because there’s only one of her!” or “Here come They!”?

Before our second daughter was even born, I’d already imagined her entire school life. I did everything I could to stop the “Name her Carrera” plan—and eventually managed to get my husband on board.

So What Did We Name Our Second Daughter?

Husband: “Then what about Serena? The Nissan Serena.”
Me: “Serena? We don’t even own one.”
Husband: “Mercedes?”
Me: “No way.”

We went back and forth like this, but still couldn’t agree on a name as my belly continued to grow.

Then one day, we were watching a TV documentary about Ayrton Senna when my husband casually asked:

“What about Senna? For the baby.”

Senna… Senna. Hmm. It actually has a nice ring to it.

“I like it. Senna sounds good.” I said. Then my husband pointed out:

“But Senna’s a surname, though. Still, Ayrton would be even weirder.”

Fair enough…

Ayrton Senna tragically died in a racing accident, but that doesn’t mean everyone named Senna will meet the same fate. After a long period of consideration, we decided to name our second daughter “Senna.” As a compromise that made both the dad who wanted a car-inspired name and the mom who wanted to stop him happy, I think choosing “the name of a racing driver” worked out pretty well.

Our Car-Loving Second Daughter

Ever since, my husband has joked:

“Imagine if Senna grows up to race and they call her the second coming of Ayrton Senna—or the Speed Princess!”

At first, I just laughed along. But…

It’s becoming clear that our second daughter, who’s nearly one, really loves cars. She spends ages playing with ride-on car toys, points excitedly at the car photos displayed around the house, and laughs while pointing whenever a car appears on TV.

If I ask, “Where’s Mommy?” or “Where’s Daddy?” she ignores me. But ask, “Where’s the Porsche?” and she points right to the Porsche photo. Could she really grow up to say, “I want to be a racing driver”?

Well, they do say a name can shape a person.