My Name


I was born "Shmuel Fried", named after my Great Grandfather. The name "Shmuel" is the Hebrew for Samuel, so much later in life I started using the name "Sam" is all non-Hebrew contexts.

The name "Shmuel" is often shortened in Hebrew in various ways: "Shmulik", "Shmil", "Mulli" etc. My Brother (who was 2 at the time) wanted to call me "Mulli", but the neighbors also had a son called "Mulli", so I lost also the "M" and became "Ooly", as my Mom still spells it. After many years I succumbed to the pressure of various English speakers and started spelling my Hebrew nickname in English "Uli".

My family name is German, Fried, but in English that is often mis-pronounced as fried, and in Kentucky Fried Chicken. So I changed the English spelling to "Freed".


So that was how "Shmuel Fried" become "Sam (Uli) Freed".

My Dog's Name


My dog, Shunya, RIP, was called after the zeroness of it all, in Buddhism. The story is that I studied Buddhism (well worth it !) and in Buddhism there is a concept that all beings lack an enduring self or soul - any form of permanence is an illusion. This doctrine is referred to in earlier Buddhist literature as "selflessness" (anatman), which is a denial of the sort of permanent, partless, and immortal entity that is called "atman" (literally "I" or "self") in Hinduism and "soul" in Christianity. This doctrine is connected with the later idea that all phenomena lack substantial entities("substances", in the Aristotelian sense), and are characterized by an "emptiness" (shunyata) of inherent existence (svabhava, literally "own-being").

So, in short, my dog was called "nothing", since she was part of the world, and the whole world is illusory. At least my dog's name was honest ;) ....

My Black Cat's Name


My cat, Ophel (means Darkness in Hebrew) is called by some "Awful" in English. He has a first name in Hebrew: "Yikahehu Ha". Untranslatable - sorry.

My White Cat,'s Name


My White cat is called Luna. That is her first name. Her surname is "Tic", short for the Ticks she does not suffer from since she never goes outside.
Sometimes I call her in Hebrew Ms Akerstein, since she as deaf as a tile (Heb: "Balata"). Never mind, untranslatable.


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