Quote:
Originally Posted by KyleGoetz
Nagoyankee is a native Japanese speaker and he also knows French, so he'd be able to confirm/deny what I've said if he ventures into this wasteland of a thread.
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What you have said is correct. When the Japanese transcribe "Western" names, we go from the pronunciation of the name,
not the spelling.
Some might argue that their names sound so different in Japanese, but that is because of the vast difference in the sound systems between the two languages and it cannot be helped. Your name in katakana is the closest that the monolingual Japanese person can produce. If someone cannot accept this rather simple physical fact, at least s/he won't be learning Japanese very well. Your name won't even be remembered by us unless you present it to us the way we can pronounce it. Trust me, every language works like that.
Back to how we write "Simon" in Japanese. It depends on what language the name's owner considers his name belongs in, or simply where he's from.
"Simon" as an English name:
サイモン
"Simon" as a French name:
シモン
Same thing occurs to another common name.
"Charles" as an English name:
チャールズ
"Charles" as a French name:
シャルル
Not that I've even visited the "names" websites mentioned in this thread, I don't think they will explain these facts to you. I wouldn't trust them if I were you. I've already seen enough names written in a funny way in the thread.