Vavo

Laura Fitzpatrick

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Oct 22, 2008, 4:21:43 AM10/22/08

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Linda,

I think that's lovely to carry on the name for grandmother. It's those little touches like that which are handed down generation to generation that keeps your Portuguese family identity alive (no matter how diluted it can become over the generations).

It reminds me of the "tradition" I have started in our family. When I was born I was supposed to be named Francisca Maciel (Ferreira) after my grandfathers mother. My grandfather was "adopted" by his mothers brother when he came from Pico to the States and grew up with the surname of Ferreira. However, he was born Estacio Vieira Maciel.

Anyway, all my life my grandfather used to tell me how I should have been named Francisca Maciel. It was a real sticky point with him. I was the first grand daughter for him and he really felt strongly about my being named after his mother. My mother saw the movie "Laura" just prior to me being born and that changed that.

Growing up my grandfather latched on to me as his little "Portagee". I was the only one in my family of 3 brothers and one sister that "looked Portuguese". My mother is Irish and everyone inherited her pale skin and light eyes except me. Whenever any big event like a wedding would be taking place my grandfather would take me to buy my dress and I always ended up wearing some wild looking green and red combination dress. I looked like a walking Portuguese flag usually and hated it then, but looking back I cherish the way he paraded me around. I cherish the way he always called me his little Portagee.

When I grew up and my first daughter was born I named her Patricia Maciel. We have never called her Patricia (her fathers choice) and she uses the name Maciel as her first name. I remember the first time I saw my grandfather after Maciel was born. He was BEAMING from ear to ear. He kept saying how happy he was that I named her Maciel. He was so proud and dragged out all his old family photos to show to me and explain who was who etc etc. It was one of the happiest and proudest times I had ever witnessed in his life. In fact to this day it brings tears to my eyes to think that just a simple act of honoring his family meant so much to him.

My grandfather is many years dead now and my daughter Maciel is grown. When my daughter Maciel had her first child she named her Isabella Maciel. In fact, my other daughter, Claire, has also named her first daughter Cheyenne Maciel.

Each of my daughters have told their daughters that at least one of their future grandchildren has to carry the name Maciel as a part of their birth name in honor of my grandfather and our Azorian roots. I am proud of my daughters for understanding why. It's a little tradition that I wil pass on to my grandchildren now when I tell them the stories of how their great great grandfather loved his birth mother that he left behind on the little island of Pico to start a new life in America.

Now if I could only get someone to use the name Francisca. Nobody seems too fond of that name :) !!!

I am really heartwarmed this morning over your use of the name Vavo!

Good for you!

Laura

--------------------------

Date: Mon, Oct 20 2008 12:11 pm
From: "Linda Norton"

I'm going to be a grandmother! I have told my son and daughter-in-law that I
want to be called Vavo. My mother who came to this country from Sao Miguel
wanted to be an American all the way and had sworn to be Nana and Grandpa to
my children. I loved calling my grandmother Vavo. It was never Avu.
Unfortunately both my grandfather's were deceased so I never had the
privilege of using Avo or Vavu. My husband who is Irish/French says it
doesn't matter, but he thought Vavu was odd. He's not use to it. My sons
never heard of it because my grandmother passed away when I was twelve and
they were never around family enough to hear a lot of Portuguese except when
they went to visit over there. They were only use to Tia and Tio.

At least I know there won't be a conflict between both grandparents now.

Linda Borges (Furtado) Norton

Linda Norton

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Oct 22, 2008, 9:24:07 AM10/22/08

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Laura,

Thank you for sharing that wonderful story. Maciel is such a pretty name. I like different names.

I have two sons and this will be my first grandchild which by the way is going to be a boy. I wish I could have a say, but my eldest is very anti on anything I suggest. Now my other son is totally the opposite which I might get something out of him when that day comes.

I would love to carry something more traditionally down like you are besides Vavo because I think it’s the key to our true identity. Unfortunately, all my grandmothers were all Marys with their middle names of when they were born. One was Espirito Santo and the other Resurreicao. Some names like Francisca, Jacintha, Guerubina, Joaquina need to be left in that time zone.

My mother had told me she didn’t want me to have any Portuguese names and had my father’s aunt, my godmother, named me since she was in this country for a while before my mother immigrated. The only thing was she didn’t know what to put as a middle name figuring everyone had to have one coming from a country that always seem to carry six names. My father was adamant when he came here that he would take all names off and just had first and last name so they decided to put B on my certificate as my middle name standing for Borges. That’s all I got out of it. Whenever I’m asked to sign my legal name, I have to put down Linda B. which wasn’t easy because they think I just don’t want to say the name or they think Bea is my middle name. My mother’s name was Ines (pronounced E-nesh). I liked the way it was said rather than the Ines.

Thanks again for your appreciation and thoughts of our tradition.

Linda

Maria Sousa

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Oct 22, 2008, 10:46:18 AM10/22/08

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Laura,

What a beautiful story. Do you know where your Maciel family comes from? In Viana do Castelo in the north of mainland Portugal, the surname of Maciel is strong. There is a Maciel museum and a statute in the middle of a plaza of Maciel. Just curious.

Maria Sousa

--- On Wed, 10/22/08, Laura Fitzpatrick <laurafitzp...@yahoo.com> wrote:

Besotes

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Oct 22, 2008, 11:09:26 AM10/22/08

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Laura, what a wonderful story and very sentimental. This past June we met my Mother's cousin, Marguerite, in Terceira. She told us a similiar story in that each generation was to past down the name of Marguerite and pass on the family tradition. Looking back on my genealogy records this did happen until this last generation. My grandfather was the only child who had daughters. He wasn't aware of this tradition and none of his daughters carried on the name. One of his sister's was named Marguerite and also his niece (so two cousin's had the same first and last names), but they were from the same generation. So, let's hope our children will include this name in their generation and we can pick up the tradition again. Thank you so much for sharing your story with us.

Robin Borba Besotes

luv4...@comcast.net

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Oct 23, 2008, 12:33:25 PM10/23/08