My surname is Trump and it’s a bloody nightmare

You meet a lot of new people at university. Often as the conversation flows you find out where they’re from, what they’re studying and which societies they’re part of. Eventually, they’ll say “add yourself on my Facebook, so we can keep in touch”. They hand the phone over to you, you type your name in, and hand it back.

They’ll then look down and see my surname: Trump. Two years ago, people wouldn’t have commented on my name. Perhaps they might have had a little giggle due to ‘trump’ being synonymous with ‘fart’ in some areas of the UK, but that’s beside the point. In the past year and a half people, understandably so, have taken a special interest in my surname.

A strong Trump pose

Nowadays when people see my name they’ll double take, and then the smile grows on their face as they make the connection and gleefully ask “any relation?” I smile, have a little chuckle, and say “no, thank God!”

Having my name read out in a group, or at the start of the year in a seminar 99 per cent of the time results in the seminar tutor cracking a joke about whether I’m a fascist or not.

This is a common theme, especially with Tesco delivery drivers. You can often see them bursting to ask the question and make a witty comment about Trump. Once, one rang me to say he couldn’t get past ‘the wall’ and would have to come back in four years. Another left saying “have a good night, Mr. President.”

I promise we are not related

Signing into careers events and societies is also amusing. I say it’s “Trump, like Donald”. They look at me incredibly confused for a second and then go down their list, tick me off and give me that ‘poor guy’ kind of look.

Working in schools also poses its challenges. The last year nine group I worked with were tasked with designing their own campus. They decided that they were going to ‘build a wall’ in my honour and ensure they made ‘campus great again’.

Sharing a surname with a racist, homophobic, climate change denying, conservative has its downfalls. But being a Trump isn’t so bad, if anything it’s a good icebreaker and I’ve learnt to laugh it off. I thought once the election was over people would gradually lose interest but oh, how I was wrong.