Just a few days ago, California started offering digital vaccination records so people don't have to carry their vax cards (which are easily faked) for various COVID reasons, like "vaccinated only" events.
So I decided to get mine.
Except I entered my name, exactly as written on my card... and I can't. It doesn't come up. No record. Hmmm... I even tried a variation of spelling on my first name, nope.
So I called up the troubleshooting line... Except the agent can't really offer any useful info either. She said please check with your provider or whoever gave you the shot.
So I did that...
And realized that provider used yet ANOTHER variation of my name.
You see, my name is very unique... It's transliterated from my original Chinese name. However, it is technically TWO WORDS. However, due to differences in records, the English version may or may not have a space in between the two characters. To California, I have no space between the two characters. To the Feds, I do have a space between the two. But both characters TOGETHER make up my first name. I have no middle-name.
And it appears that my vaccine provider was one of the places that took the first character in my first name, and used that as my first name, and took the second character as my middle name.
Just to give an analogy... there's a guy named Jean-Pierre Chabon, "JP" to his friends. His ID may have
- JEAN-PIERRE CHABON
- JEANPIERRE CHABON
- JEAN PIERRE CHABON
- JEAN CHABON
